A Suppressed Rant and Two Stories

What I would like to do is wax eloquent about how much I hate moving. But whining makes poor copy. Instead, I will give thanks that DOB is not in the military and move on to tales from the move itself . . .

The Key Incident
It was a day last week when evening fell and I had had all the moving-out mess that I could take. So while DOB and his brothers finished putting together a load, I took the children and a very full station wagon and drove to the new apartment to see how I could fare in moving-in mess.

I arrived, carried in D2, with D1 (rather soggily attired) clinging to my hand. I tried the key. No luck. It would go in, but it wouldn't turn. I tried a few other likely-looking keys, but they wouldn't do anything either. I called DOB, who called maintenance, who agreed to come out in a few minutes.

In the meantime, I had two hungry children to keep occupied on the doorstep. Fortunately a bag of chips happened to be among the stuff in the wagon, and D2's snack is always at hand. So we sat in the hallway and ate and told stories. It was actually quite a bit more fun than moving.

If this were a story, a lady would have passed us in the hallway and stopped to chat about our predicament, and she would prove to be a kindred spirit and become a lifelong friend. But nobody came by, and the voices I could hear did not sound like kindred spirits--at least not to each other.

We had finished The Three Little Pigs and Goldilocks when the maintenance man arrived. If this were a story, he would have identified that we had been given the wrong keys and apologized. Instead, he pointed out that I was trying with the wrong key. (I could have sworn I tried with the right key, too, and that it wouldn't go in at all, but I have since discovered that it is a little tricky to get in the hole.)

Anyway, we were home. Despite the lateness of the hour and her general lack of a nap, D1 immediately set to work unpacking the Tupperware into a suitable kitchen cupboard. I can't wait until she's 12.

How to Obtain a Library Card
The Saturday after moving we had to run around to various stores to get those various essential things that somehow you don't have and are absolutely essential to get the house running.

Being us, we wound up at the library. Alas, it is not an elegant Carnegie library like the one in our old town, but a bland slot in a dreary stripmall. But, it is part of the Cincinnati system and should have great selection potential.

Anyway, we had not even arrived before it occurred to us that we would be unable to check anything out, because we had no card and no proof of residence with which to obtain one. Not easily daunted, DOB determined to go see what he could do about it.

Fortunately he happened upon a sympathetic librarian.

"Do you have any children with you?" she asked. (The ducklings and I were already hanging out in another part of the library.)

"Well, yes, but they're really little," DOB replied.

"That's OK, just make it look like they signed their names," the librarian said. "We don't require proof of residence for people under 18."

So D1 carefully assisted DOB in printing her name, as legal guardians we signed her as authorized to check out anything she wanted from the library, and we were set. When we had accumulated a sizable stack of books and a couple of DVDs, she sat proudly on the library counter and handed over the card to check them out.

I did get her a couple of books, too. Most notably Make Way for Ducklings, which she has wanted to hear over and over. The first full-length story book! Now we are in for some fun.