We had previous experience with appraisers while selling our own home, and they're a scary lot. Sunday was all about cleaning the house to make sure that we appeared to be ideal tenants. Monday morning was all about making sure that the kids stood stationary in a corner until the appraiser showed up, lest they dare dump their bin of Playmobil toys all over the floor.
I told Eloise, in my least dramatic voice, that a lawyer was coming and the house HAD to stay clean or else Mommy would go to jail. I would have gotten away with this threat had we not visited an old jail the day before. "Oh, that's okay Mommy. Jail isn't that scary, it just has lots of ghosts." Why won't my kids take me seriously?!?
The prison has been left relatively untouched since its destruction by the Allies. As you walk around, unguided, you get a real sense of history. Interior bricks remain on the ground where they landed, rickety stairs stay rickety, the cells are still covered in dirt, the pathways dark as night. But it has an almost ethereal quality too. Nature has taken over and there is a juxtaposition of beauty and brutality that creates a stillness in the air, an invitation to reflect.