Moving Day

A day the Blau family never thought possible had arrived. Sybil was ecstatic. Julia was beside herself with excitement. Timmy was upset because Julia in her excitement of getting a larger and better equipped kitchen had hurriedly packed whatever she found, which included Timmy’s Torah and tallis together with her pots and pans. George, meanwhile, remained above the fray laying on his lounge chair on the deck watching shrimp boats with the seagulls flying behind them. Rosa wasn’t quite sure what to make of all the changes happening and baby Brenda crawled across the floors in search for whatever a year old Sandpiper would look for.

George to the delight of Sybil had realised that his growing family could not all fit nicely into their little nest, and that an upgrade was definitely in order. Sybil finally believed that with Brenda in a bedroom of her own she would be able to understand that Rosa was not her mother. Everything was going well. Moshe and Benne and rented a U haul truck and had promised to be there at three o’clock to move the entire Blau family’s boxes, all of the hundred feet, to the new and very much improved nest. The new construction was built by an East Coast builder known for their meticulous workmanship, or at least that’s what the realtors, Kingfisher and Son in law had told them. George wasn’t quite sure. But everyone loved the new nest with its seven bedrooms, eight and a 1/4 bathrooms, wrapped around deck, so George could watch the sun not only rise but set. There was also a bedroom for Melody, but she still preferred to sleep outside just in case a lonesome hermit crab wanted to challenge her to a game of pickle ball, even during the night.

As soon as George and Sybil had signed the closing documents, Julia ran back to their nest and began to pack anything and everything she could find. “Why so fast?” she was asked by Sybil to which she gave no answer other than just in case the mortgage wasn’t approved, and once they were in the new nest, they couldn’t be removed. George however laughed and gave every child a job to do, including Rosa.

“George! George! George!” it was Sybil slamming the sliding glass door behind her and George sighed. He wasn’t going to be able to spend his last couple of hours before they moved and the new nest owners moved in, to watch and fantasise about being on a slow boat to Africa, turned and looked at a very cross Sybil. “George,” she repeated hoping that for the first time in his life he would jump to attention when she called him.

“Yes, Sybil?” George was calm, cool and collected. Nothing was going to make him irate on his last day in the nest they had called home for years.

“George,” repeated Sybil for the umpteenth time, “you gave all the children jobs to do, didn’t you?”

George smiled and nodded his head. “And?” he asked.

“Well, what was the job you gave Rosa?”

“To write on all the boxes as to where they were to go once they made their way over to the new nest.”

“You had better come and see how well your instructions to Rosa were carried out.”

George groaned as he got up from his lounge chair thinking how bad could things really be. He followed Sybil into the dining room, and as he saw the boxes labelled by Rosa he smiled. ‘That’s my daughter,’ he thought to himself and as he followed Sybil into each of the other rooms, he suddenly burst out laughing much to Sybil’s dismay. Julia and Timmy stood together with Brenda still crawling across the floors wondering what all the fuss was about. “Well, what are you going to say?” asked an angry Sybil.

George looked at the boxes without saying anything and finally walked into Rosa’s room, where she was standing next to a box filled with her toys grinning from ear to ear. “Well, daddy, did I do a good job?”

What George thought and what George needed to say were two different things. “Well, Rosa dear,” Sybil rolled her eyes and sighed deeply, “when I asked you to write where each box should go in the new nest, I didn’t expect you to write on each one the words ‘not Rosa’s,’ but then I see on the one with your stuff in it, you wrote your name on all the sides!”

Rosa was beaming. She thought she had carried out her task perfectly. “Well daddy, those other boxes don’t belong to me. So that’s what I wrote and then this one,” she pointed to the one she was standing next to, “is mine. See daddy, R o s a Rosa, that’s me.”

“Yes, I understand,” George wiped the tears from his eyes. “I understand that none of the other boxes go into your room because they don’t contain your things, but in which rooms do they go when we get there?”

Rosa’s smile disappeared from her face. “Oh,” she whispered and hung her head. George expected something that original from Rosa, but to Sybil it made matters worse. “Do you want me to open the boxes and then write on them which room, daddy?” Rosa sounded sad. George didn’t want her to feel badly, because in her own mind she thought she carried out her father’s instructions perfectly. However, with Sybil standing right behind him with her wings crossed, he knew he had to tread carefully.

After a few seconds of deep thinking, he turned and faced Julia and Timmy. “Julia, do you know what boxes go into the kitchen?”

“Yes, daddy,” she replied in her fake Southern drawl.

“Ok, good,” George was satisfied. “Well, in that case let’s make a game of it. I will tell Moshe and Benne to put all the boxes except the ones you made Julia, into the living room. Then before open them one by one, we can guess which room they go in, and the one who gets the most right will get a prize.”

“A blizzard!” asked Julia knowing the chances of her winning her pretty high because she had packed most of them, while Rosa asked for a banana split and Timmy, a half gallon of Breyer’s ice cream because it was kosher. Brenda would have whatever.

Then George turned to leave, but stopped for second and looked at Rosa. “Why don’t you come with me young lady,” and with that he grabbed her wing and led her outside. He sat her down on one of the two lounge chairs and sat down himself on the other. “So, Rosa. I think you’re not completely happy with this move are you?”

Rosa looked down at the floor. George repeated his question and Rosa finally looked up and said, “daddy, I don’t like change. I really want to stay here.”

“I know you do and so do I, but really Brenda is growing up fast and she needs a room of her own, doesn’t she?” Rosa looked down again but nodded her head. “So, I think this will be a good move for everyone, including you. Look, you will have your room back and you can decorate it anyway you want and you can choose your bedroom first before anyone else.” “Including you, daddy?” Rosa had perked up.

“Well, except mine and your mummy’s.”

“Can I get one that looks out at the ocean?” she asked.

“Yes, absolutely. Then once you’ve done that, we can buy you a new bed and new furniture, how’s that?”

“Ok, daddy, you promise?”

“Yes young lady, I promise.”

At that moment the sliding glass door opened and George thinking it was Sybil, turned to see what she was annoyed about this time. But it was Moshe standing there with a huge grin on his face. “Who wrote that on all the boxes?” he asked. Geroge pointed to Rosa. ‘Ha, ha, ha,” he laughed, “I knew that when I saw them. That’s so funny. Benne is in there laughing his head off. Come one little girl,” he said beckoning to Rosa and stretching out his wing to take hers. “You’re going to ride in the truck with us.” And with that, they left leaving George on the deck by himself. He decided to lay back for a moment but then the sliding glass door opened again and Sybil came out. George smiled.

“Can I tempt you with a glass of port young man?” she asked.

A tear fell from George’s eye as he jumped up and hugged his wife. “I love you Sybil, you’re the best!” Sybil just rolled her eyes.