Golden Chimneys and Spinning Drying Racks

It was one final errand before leaving: deliver the parcel to the UPS dropoff before loading up in the car from #4 Panton Street for the final time. A simple cycle ride through the center of Cambridge, a quick handing of a package, the return trip, and the end of a chapter.

And now carefully and deliberately stored in my long term memory. I rode up Trumpington Street, past the engineering buildings where I had sat in class and wrote my dissertation, the Judge Business School where I got the whirlwind miniature MBA, the treasure of the Fitzwilliam Museum, and the front range of Pembroke.

I turned right into Pembroke Street and locked the image into my mind: a nearly deserted street with golden sunlight illuminating the chimneys while leaving warm and welcoming shadows to ride through. And it hit me hard. The chapter was closing. It was time to say goodbye to our life as students in Cambridge.

I do not possess the talent to truly capture the dichotomy of the lovely anguish which leaving has left in me. But there are a few final vignettes of our last few days in Cambridge which may help me remember and grow wistful in the future:

• It is a quiet and still evening, everything just turning blue as once more day loses its battle to night. Henry and I are alone in a small garden, A little patch of grass, a border of rose bushes, a pear tree in one corner, and an old clothes drying rack in the middle. It's the very British variety of a central pole with lines looking something like an umbrella torn inside out by a gust of wind, and Henry has just found out that if you pull one of the old, dangling strings it spins. Around and around he goes, laughing hysterically and enjoying one last time in the warm hospitality of Peter's house. Inside Jen and my parents are talking about something or other with Peter (or Dr. Martland) as we prepare to conclude one of our last visits to his home before we must return to the other side of the Atlantic.
• Another evening, Henry is in bed at home where Grandma and Grandpa are resting. Jen and I walk the familiar streets together in a slow flood of memories. As usual for one of our walks, the talking it half of the experience. But tonight we talk about why leaving this place is so hard. For me, the thing I will most miss is not the buildings, learning, or history, but rather our family time. For the past year, I have been able to spend almost as much time with Henry as Jen has, and that will likely never again happen with any of the rest of our kids. And it makes me dread not having the same connection I have with him with the rest of our future children.
• As we walk, we pass the iconic chapel of King's College. Normally dark and unobtrusive at night, the interior lights are all on now and the fantastic window are a blaze of colours and stories. One more memory to hold to forever.
• Finally, before we go home to #4 for our last night there, we make our way through Pembroke itself. In the ledgers of the Old Library my signature will forever mark the page of the 2013 matriculation records, but we must begin saying goodbye. As we walk along the library courtyard we do get a rare and happy glimpse of a shy college resident as a hedgehog darts across the lawn.
• Finally, we spend some quite moments in the chapel, a place where time seems as as unchanging as the 18th century engravings made by bored students in the choir benches. Old wood and English humidity have combined to give the building that special scent which cannot be described, only experienced. This college, and the people there, have become a family to us. Before we leave we light one of the candles in silent gratitude. Then we walk back to our little terrace home for our final night under that roof. It is time to move on.

Cambridge became more than an adventure to us. It was our home. And saying farewell hurt more than I ever thought it would. No matter where life takes us next, nothing else will ever be able to truly fill the hole in our hearts for what we leave behind.