Sweet Sorrow

This morning was a little more relaxed than the previous. After Dennis and I dropped the kids off for what would be their last day of school in Switzerland, we wandered over to our apartment. There, at 9:00, we had our our "Abgabe," our white-glove inspection by our superintendent and our official handing over of the keys to the new tenants.

Our superintendent, Herr Meier, shuffled around our apartment, peering over his glasses at our walls and floors and fixtures.  He was amazed that we were able to maintain our wooden floor so well (as am I!), but he did say that he'd have to charge us for some painting.  Luckily, nothing that we've done falls outside the realm of "normal wear," so apparently our insurance should cover most, if not all, of the cost of repairs.  Also, Denise, our relocation agent, was able to talk down the price of our furniture removal, so we had plenty of good news this morning.

We learned that the new tenants were the very first group to whom I showed our apartment, a couple of months ago.  They're three twenty-something boys, fresh out of university, and they're apparently really excited about sharing this place together. And I'm sure my neighbors are now very excited about the excellent sound-proofing throughout the building.

Young and poor as they are, they were also really happy that we were "willing" to leave our super-cheap light fixtures behind for them.  The boy who received our keys was so enthusiastic that he didn't even care if we left up Alex's and Joey's sun-shaped ceiling light, or Ella's light, decorated with perky clouds.  It makes me giggle to imagine two of the trio having to sleep under our cheerful little plastic light for their first nights in their new big-boy apartment.

We did have some bad news today, though. Back in March, I lost one of our house keys, a mistake that we today learned would cost us an extraordinary 600-Franc fee: the market price, apparently, of changing all the locks.  The new tenant watched, wide-eyed, as we received our bill. "I can't even count how many keys I've lost in my life," he admitted. I advised he wear his new key on a string around his neck, and he didn't argue.

While we were waiting for Herr Meier to complete his rounds and paperwork, we chatted with Denise, and I learned that Ella's German tutor is Denise's sister. I'm constantly surprised by what a small town Zürich is.  Denise's sister apparently found Ella adorable, and liked what Ella said about our temporary move here: "We came to Switzerland for adventure." This teacher isn't a full-time staff-member, and she runs classes for girls on self-esteem and self-empowerment on the side, so I feel doubly lucky that Ella got to be in the company of such a good role model.

Denise's improbably roomy car.

After our we were finished with our apartment, we took one farewell look and then hefted our last few belongings out the door. Dennis and I were planning on slowly lugging our 50-pound boxes to Google, but Denise offered to help us move them in her car, instead.  Dennis, who was familiar with Denise's car, laughed outright, but somehow, magically, stubbornly, Denise made everything fit.

Christmas shoppers in the Altstadt

So that freed Joey and me to head downtown, to look for a birthday present for dear little Caroline, whose fifth birthday we'd be celebrating later today. We took a very relaxing walk through Pastorini Spielzeug, a magical little toy store filled with hand-made wonders. On our way home, as we were walking through the Altstadt, I had a moment of panic and dismay.  Zürich is certainly at its prettiest at Christmas time, and as I looked at the scrunched together, ancient buildings, decorated with pine boughs and fairy lights, I just couldn't remember why we were leaving this place.

It didn't help when I went to pick up the kids, and I found them simultaneously glowing with joy at a wonderful day at school and close to tears at the thought of saying goodbye to their friends. Alex's teacher reiterated her request that Alex write to everyone, and she handed me one last bag of Alex's artwork and hand-made treasures.

Ella's class had put together a little booklet of heartfelt letters to her, and, when I found Ella, she was with huddled with nochElla, opening a gift, a pretty little handkerchief decorated with edelweiss.

The girls told me about the school-wide carnival they'd enjoyed today: parents had sent in mountains of food and soda, which were all free for the taking, and each teacher had an activity or craft in her classroom. The girls in Ella's class had flocked around her, and they all went around the school in a mass and made Christmas cards and coasters and solved quizzes and puzzles and pranced around on the gym equipment.  After we said goodbye to nochElla (with my Ella dramatically dashing half a block back after her friend, for one extra farewell hug), Ella whispered that today was the best and worst day of her life.

But there wasn't really time to dwell.  The zipper on Alex's coat broke, and so we needed to replace it before heading into the snowy mountains for our vacation tomorrow.  We made the quickest dash to the mall possible, where Alex obligingly fell in love with the first coat he tried on, a puffy thing that looks straight out of 1982.

Sometimes they're so responsible

Only then did we go home and have lunch, with an hour's respite in front of the television at the hotel, before turning around and leaving for Caroline's birthday.  I spent my free hour trying to repack our things for our trip tomorrow. I'm clearly moving too fast, trying to get everything done: when we left the hotel, I forgot Caroline's present.  But somehow Joey fell asleep in my arms during the 2-minute walk to the tram stop, thus gaining about twenty limp pounds.  So I gave Ella her snoring brother ("Ohh, I'm really going to enjoy this," she said, as she cuddled him) and left the three of them at the bus stop while I dashed back home.

"Someone standing on his head," check.

Blessedly, I finally got to slow down, for the first time in days, at Susannah's.  Caroline had request a school-themed birthday party, so fondly sat back and watched as Susannah called the class of five to order, led them in an art project, and then took them outside for a photo scavenger hunt. 

The little birthday girl

Ella got to team up with the little girls, with Caroline's grandpa as their intrepid leader. Meanwhile, Susannah and joined the boys' team, with Alex and Joey and baby Christopher. But Alex didn't seem to mind having a somewhat less-capable team: there was the definite bright side of having the attention of two mommies.  It was cute, watching him trot off with Susannah, on a mission to cross "Bakery" off our list.

But it made me so sad, once again, to think that I'd be leaving such a dear, creative friend, whom my kids so obviously adore. Joey, when he woke up from his nap, had a pretty high fever (from yesterday's trudge through the rain, I suppose), and so he wasn't really his perky himself.  But there's nothing like a flu to make a child extra-snuggly, and Joey spent a good portion of the party happily curled up in Susannah's lap.  He'll miss her, too.

Playing with Caroline's birthday present

The party went by so quickly, and then it was time to take the kids home.  While Dennis and I continued our packing, the kids curled up in bed and watched German Christmas specials until they couldn't keep their eyes open any longer.  Welcome to vacation!