The late afternoon sunshine didn’t reach down to the railway station, so it remained under the gray, cloudy skies that had covered the city for most of the day. The breeze would pause, ever so slightly now and then, and give a brief illusion of warmth before again freezing the noses and hands of those waiting on the platform. Despite their coats and gloves, they shivered, she and he, while waiting for the conductor to call for boarding. When they finally parted, she on the train and he still on the platform, the wind abated just a bit, so as to make the tears in his eyes sting just a little less…

And so it was that I said goodbye to my wife. And tomorrow at the airport, she will say goodbye to me.

(OK, that just a little stylized, but maybe I do actually have that great American novel inside me waiting to get out.)

I would have been totally fine with getting the documents via FedEx, but my wife really, really wants me to have the documents I’ll need for the immigration paperwork now. And I realize that apart from the anxiousness of just getting the process started, there is also a practical aspect to this, in that she has the time off from work now to make this happen. Once her vacation is over, things would get a lot harder. And this is why we’ve been running around like crazy, getting everything stamped and whatnot.

As I’ve mentioned in prior posts, the documents coming from Ukraine need to be apostilled in order to be considered valid by the US government. An apostille, for those who haven’t looked it up or figured it out from context, is the official notarization and/or certification that tells another government that “shur as shootin’, that there is a gen-u-ine document of this here country, yes sir.” (Sorry, I don’t know the actual language used in The Hague signatory agreement for apostilles. But that’s the gist, yes sir.)

So yesterday (was it only yesterday?) we were in Donetsk to get the regional “yes sir” stamp, but the official Ukrainian stamp can only be done at the Ministry of Justice in Kiev. Given all the time frames involved — getting the documents, going to government offices when they were open, my flights, checking out of the apartment, etc. — the only plan that seemed like I it would work is the one happening now.

Last night, my wife (and her son, for company) took the train to Kiev; they should be arriving in Kiev in about three hours. Once there they will head over to the document division of the Justice ministry and submit assorted documents for apostille. I am still in Mariupol, and will be packing up and checking out of the apartment around noon, at which point I have a car arranged to drive me to the airport in Donetsk.

Around the time I will be getting on a flight to take me to Kiev, my wife should be getting back the documents now with the official apostille of Ukraine. Once I land in Kiev, I will put my bags in storage for a few hours, and catch a bus to the train station, where my wife will be waiting for me. We will be able to spend a few more hours together (and, of course, get the apostilled documents to me) before catching a bus back to the airport. There I will collect my bags, check in for my ungodly early flight to Amsterdam, and we say goodbye to each other once again. As I’m winging my way back home, my wife and her son will spend the day in Kiev, and catch the train back to Mariupol that evening.

I know we could have simplified this a bit. I was more than willing to cancel my flight from Donetsk and take the train with my wife. I’m pretty sure we could have checked out of the apartment last night (since I wouldn’t have asked for a refund of unstayed nights, it would have been free money for the company). my wife would still have had a day in Kiev after I left, but we could have reduced the other moving parts of this. But the wheels are in motion now, literally, and we’ll just have to hope that everything works as smoothly as we need it to. If things go awry, I’m not sure what we’ll do, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed.