Moving Day

And so they'll walk in to the Residence after the parade, and everything will be there. Clothes hung in closets, not piled in a heap. Photos displayed, walls anything but bare. The kitchen stocked with more than take-out and pickles. Tidy and finished, not endlessly cluttered. One final touch on a momentous day: it must be a little surreal.

Since the Bushes have mostly packed up and shipped out--good riddance--and the Obamas are leaving their Chicago home intact, tomorrow's White House transition won't be as much of a logistical miracle as is traditional. But still! What an out-of-sight experience.

The magical behind-the-scenes move has been my favorite part of Inauguration Day since I first watched Backstairs at the White House in 1979. I've more than made up in the, oh lord, 30 years since, but back then I'd never even moved once. And I was 10; I'm sure I didn't quite appreciate the work, but the beat-the-clock hustle captured my fancy. That and I think the verging-on-royal respect for the office: nothing moves until the outgoing exits, and everything's complete before the incoming does. It would have been enough to make even Amy Carter seem like a princess.

This time, of course, knowing that by tomorrow afternoon no sign will remain of the previous occupant is satifying in more seriously symbolic ways. But I know amidst all the balls and the speeches I'll also think of a family arriving home for the first time with everything taken care of and squared away. Compared to picking a path through cartons that should have been ignited not relocated, it sounds like the beginning of a fairy tale to me. It won't be, of course, not even remotely. But for their sakes and ours, I hope there are moments.