Rituals are a funny thing. We form them without even realizing it. It’s the cafe you visit with a friend for breakfast each month - not for the food, but for the company, the setting, and the sense of comfort.
A new ritual has entered my life: dropping my daughter off at first grade. The walk to school is a novelty for me. I’ve never lived walking distance from any school I attended, so our quick three-minute stroll feels special. It’s the same path we took to her kindergarten tram last year, but now we just cross the street, and we’re there. First grade is the “start of school” year in Czech Republic, so this time the drop off has more meaning … and less parental involvement.
Inside the entry hall, our goodbye is its own small ceremony: a hug, a kiss, a few seconds of token tears about not wanting to go to school, then a sniff as she joins the stream of kids heading into the locker room. Czech kids change into slippers at school, so she has to swim upstream through the crowd to her locker. I know she leaves her coat there, but beyond that, it’s a mystery. Parents are barred from the locker room for “hygienic” reasons1 - or so the sign says. I suspect it’s really about helping the kids find their independence.
My job is to wait. At the end of the hall are two glass-paned doors, locked from my side. I wait and wonder what’s taking so long, and then she appears from another door, heading for the grand staircase to her classroom. We wave and blow kisses as she climbs. I get a wave halfway up and another from the top. Just before she disappears, she ducks to peer back through a gap between columns for one last wave, then straightens up and enters her world.
Every day, a group of parents performs the same ritual. Many have younger children with them, observing how it’s all done. One woman always has a small dog over her shoulder, facing away from the action. A few kids get caught in an eddy, taking forever to emerge, and you can see the parents glancing at their watches. Others come to the glass to wave, mouthing words and pointing, only to be met with gestures to “go upstairs.” They never seem to realize the doors aren’t soundproof; they’re just old, and we could hear them perfectly if they didn’t mouth the words like a whisper.
My part of the ritual is done. I leave with a smile on my face and return later for the reverse. I tap an NFC chip on my keyring to a reader, which tells me if she’s in the after-school program or still at lunch or otherwise occupied and not allowed to leave yet. This tap also tells the school I am here so they send her out. She appears from somewhere - I honestly don’t know where - and comes to the glass doors. Only she can open them from her side, and she makes a show of struggling with the handle until, with great effort, she’s free. Then the stories from her day come spilling out, a mix of songs she sang and things she made, all while I’m trying to get her to put on her coat.
It’s a life worth living.
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It’s hygienic in the same way that all restaurants that close unexpected for the evening do so for “technical reasons” that don’t explain that the cook is sick or whatever. You don’t need to know. ↩