The Songs Remind Me

The Songs Remind Me

By Slavica V. Joković

I was standing in the rain when it suddenly started to fall, and I heard a well-known song from a nearby Bistro. The beautiful melody of "O Sole Mio" flowed through my body and took over my mind. “What a contrast to the gray rainy day”, I thought, as I stood there for a few moments, trying to open the umbrella.

I remembered the time when I first heard that song. It was in elementary school, in the fifth grade. We had a music teacher to whom we gave an unusual nickname: Sole. Every music lesson started with the teacher playing a song on the piano: "O Sole Mio" or at least one part of it.

I fell in love with this song the first time I heard it.

At that time, we had a music section at school, and the teacher organized auditions for the admission of members to the choir and for solo singing at school performances. Thus, I was chosen to sing in the choir and as a soloist in school performances. With the nostalgia, I remembered the song I sang at the performance, accompanied by the teacher on the piano. It was Johann Sebastian Bach's song: "Ah, what I love". I started singing this beautiful song inside myself.

At that moment, with gentle tenderness, I remembered those wonderful days of my happy childhood and school days. I remembered my mathematics teachers from elementary school and high school. My mathematics teacher in primary school, Vukosava Seka Grujić, was strict and fair, rigorous in grading, so that you knew the difference between 4 plus and 5 minus. She had high evaluation criteria, but she was an excellent lecturer and pedagogue. No one knew how to explain mathematical material clearly as she did. I told her that once, when we met after many years. She answered: “Slavica, I taught everyone the same thing, but you were a piece of gold, you simply absorbed knowledge.”

My mathematics professor at the Gymnasium, Gavrilović, whom we called Gaša, was a good, honest man and an excellent pedagogue. His wife taught English at the Gymnasium, and they had one daughter, Branka, who was a little older than me. On one occasion, after high school, when we had both finished our studies, we met in the city and talked. She, who was a witty person with a sense of humor, said to me with a smile: “Do you know that while my father was teaching you math, I just hated you?” “Why, what did I do?”-I asked. “Nothing, you just knew math very well. Every time my father brought home your tests and homework to review, he would put your notebook on the table in front of me and tell me: “Look how the child works, look up to her.” We both smiled sweetly then, remembering those beautiful school days.

Thanks to the knowledge that my teachers passed on to me, I won numerous prizes at municipal and regional mathematics competitions. In high school, I was awarded the "Mihailo Petrović-Alas" Diploma for exceptional results in mathematics.

My teacher, who taught me in the first four grades of primary school, Gordana Radosavljević, was a warm and beautiful woman. She seemed to be made to be a teacher. Even then, in elementary school, I liked reading books and writing various compositions. The Serbian language teacher, Dušica Dragičević, encouraged my love for books and writing. I read a lot, especially during the school holidays, and so to speak, took books from the City Library every day. Whether it was books about the Wild West or classic novels by Leo Tolstoy and Victor Hugo, they aroused great interest and imagination in me.

Furthermore, I started learning French in elementary school, and thanks to the excellent French teacher, Sasha, I gained a solid foundation for further training, which was very important to me during my professional practice abroad.

I was awarded the "Vuk Karadžić" Diploma and numerous other awards for my excellent success in elementary and high school.

Also, I remembered my happy student days, which are one of the most beautiful periods of my life. Those were good times, when we went to student dances in a large company and greeted the New Year cheerfully. On weekend evenings, we usually went out to dance at the famous and popular Engineering Students Club. Further, I remembered I was full of hope, will, and good wishes.

Furthermore, at that moment, I also remembered how I was preparing the daughter of my acquaintances for the mathematics exam at the Faculty of Economics. As a sign of gratitude, they gave me a yellow ocher material similar to the color of old gold, which had been sitting in my drawer for a long time, as if waiting for me to finish my Doctorate in Economics.

One day, I took that material out of the drawer and gave it to my seamstress, Živka, who sewed me a nice outfit, a skirt, and a blazer, which I wore on the day of my Doctorate defense. I thought what an excellent seamstress she was, who could compare with the world's best tailors. Indeed, there are plenty of talented anonymous people, extraordinary in their work, but who remain forever unacknowledged.

At the Faculty of Economics, I scored the best marks and was awarded the University Award for excellent academic performance. Excellent success at the Faculty of Economics enabled me to get a job through public competition, to which over 400 candidates applied.

Moreover, I remembered how many times I used weekends, annual vacations, and days off during the holidays to write my Doctorate. I completed my Doctoral studies and obtained the title of Doctor of Economic Sciences.

Taught to study and work systematically, I always had a dedicated approach to my work, subordinating private life to professional life. I remembered that countless times I stayed longer at work, after hours, as if I was carrying materials from work home to do a job over the weekend. All superiors liked to use my economic analyses and other professional materials that I wrote.

Indeed, I was praised many times for my work.

After 34 years of professional and conscientious work, I was dismissed due to so-called technological redundancy. My life was thus divided into two parts, one before the dismissal and the other marked by the dismissal.

“O, c`est la vie", I remembered the song.

This paradox of life may sound strange, but that's how it is in practice, which I have personally experienced. After my dismissal in 2015 on the eve of the New Year, my fight for justice in a court labor dispute is still ongoing.

“How many books written - so many years in the court”, I thought. It turns out that the labor dispute in the court has been going on for almost as many years as I have published books.

I thought about how everything passes, but books and music remain timeless. In those few moments of reflection, while I was standing in the rain, memories of different events from my life poured in, like in a movie.

All the time flew by so quickly, like a flash of light, in an instant. The songs remind me of that, because everything was music.