But What if My Kids are Easy?

We used to be in Caribbean nanny land—lovely maternal warm and giving. Our babysitter was beloved by all. I made it clear that I only wanted her to keep my children alive and hold them a lot…so I’d come home and the house would be a mess but she’d be holding my sleeping boy and that was just fine. Diapers would be changed (more often than I’d have asked), milk would be put in (more often than I’d have asked), and hair would be oiled (that was odd…our scrappy blonde boy would be greased into Little Lord Fauntleroy, more often than I would have hoped).

And then I stopped working, and we didn’t need her anymore. We were ready for the college babysitter-type. Someone fun, someone who needed the money, but preferably someone with loads of sitter experience, as there were still vegetables to encourage, pull-ups to manage, bedtimes to negotiate.

Now we’re moving further down the scale. My oldest two children know all the systems. It just seems like a logistical fluke that they, at ages 8 and 9, aren’t old enough to just stay home alone and care for their little sister. We really just need someone who's at least twelve years old. Hannah Montana would be perfect. There's a fourteen year old a few blocks away who my children adore. We need someone to be pretty and fun with my girls and not take offense that my son is going to just stay upstairs reading, watching tv, and playing video games. We need someone to be pretty and fun and welcoming if he meanders downstairs and wants to be included in a game or a project. We need someone who can dial 911 or open the front door and start shouting if anything goes wrong. But we don’t need anyone to do all the hands-on nanny-mommy stuff anymore. Just pretty, and fun, and old enough. And by the way I know the pretty part is harsh--fun is most important, but pretty means my little girl will develop a mad crush, and she's always better behaved when she's flirting.

So do I really need to pay the three-kid rate?

Babysitting rates have skyrocketed since our early days of being parents. Part of it is just that our neighborhood has become affluent (but we’re not), part of it is that it’s nine years later, and part of it is that Brooklyn is still right up next to Manhattan and they always have crazy-high prices. We've had the good fortune to be sort of grandfathered in at the older prices. Like how house cleaners and therapists up their prices every year, but then the rate stays the same forever.

Until now.

A potential sitter, an incredibly dynamic and wonderful woman, just let me know what the current rates are. She said that she was told the rates are $10 for one child, and $15-20 for two, and more for three. This of course, added up to her asking for over $20 per hour. Well technically I have three children. But we pay $15 an hour. We can’t afford much more than that (but that’s a different essay)—but more importantly, is coming to our house and hanging out for 4 hours or so really babysitting THREE children? Is it?

Sadly, 14 year olds aren’t around to do school pick-ups plus commute plus snacks and homework. And that’s what we need. I get it. Commuting on a subway with my three kids and then overseeing homework is substantially more than flopping around being pretty and fun in the confines of my living room. But more than $20 an hour is just too much for us.

And then I started to think about it. This three kid rate. Babysitting thee kids might mean three wacky toddlers, all rolling around in different directions like marbles, with full diapers, and drooly chins. Forgive me for feeling superior, but we're kind of the opposite of that (and that, by the way, should cost like $100 an hour if you ask me). My youngest doesn't even need help wiping her butt anymore.

Our three add up like this. Three kids come in, put their shoes where they go, wash their hands. One child gets to watch unlimited Dora, two children sit down and do homework. After homework, one child disappears upstairs to laze around with various electronic things like Gamecube or Naruto. Leaving one kid to sit and ask thoughtful questions, while drawing or playing solitaire, or making an art project out of stuff in our recycling bin or something. I know that bad things could happen, but our kids aren't at the drown-in-the-bathtub or fall-down-the-stairs age.

So maybe we shouldn't have to pay like the other people with three kids do.

Did I mention? My kids are easy.

Originally posted on nycmomsblog.com

Crayola True to Life Series

Crossposted on Parentalapproval.blogspot.com


My youngest child just started school in the same building as her older brother and sister. Hallelujah! Only one PTA meeting to feel bad about missing every month, only one school asking us for more than we can give. It's simplified everything. The trick is that, now, she has to leave with them in the morning. No more packing them off to big kid school while we laze around in pajamas only JUST starting to consider what we want for breakfast, and what we should wear for the day. It puts a little more pressure on bedtime, and it puts a little more pressure on establishing some solid routines. Throwing out nighttime television (shhh unless the Mets are on) and morning television is a good beginning for us. Our little girl cannot tell time but 'after Dora,' and 'one more Backyardigans' has felt a little bit like 'I'm staying up til 8,' and 'I'm not going to bed til 8:30.' So cutting out those thirty minute chunks of time that eat away at her bedtime so easily seemed right. That left us with the question--well what are we going to do after dinner then? (Some of you will shudder as you struggle to answer the same question, and others will shudder at how ridiculously tv-centered our lives must be that we'd even have to ask it). Here's what we do: we do a lot of drawing, and then when the little one goes up to bed, we break out the board games she doesn't have the stomach for (she actually cheats at Candyland so we figure she's not ready for the hard stuff yet). So it was fun to be able to offer my kids the new and exciting Crayola True to Life stuff. Crayons, markers, and pencils, each with a tri-colored tip. I'm guessing the True to Life series gets its name from the idea that, in nature, no green is just plain green, no blue, just plain blue. In each case, there are a handful of obviously related colors (yellow/red/orange) and surprising combinations (purple/orange/red). The names of these blends are stunning--Maui Sunset, Grand Canyon, Yosemite Campfire... And we've all really enjoyed drawing with them. If we had to pick a favorite, we'd choose the crayons. There's something about the texture of the crayons and the blending of the colors that goes more hand in hand than in the case of the markers. Markers seem to me to be a bit more specific. If you want to color in something with a marker you tend to feel strongly about the color you choose. But with crayons, you get that kind of scrubbly texture anyway, and the colors don't tend to be as pure. So the subtle surprises in the crayons are slightly more satisfying than with the markers. A circle filled in with Amazon Rainforest (three green shades) with the marker creates a kind of schizophrenic disk of scribbled lines, yet in the case of the crayon, you end up with something that looks like a lemon that isn't ripe, with some extra greenness at one tip. In that instance, the True to Life series really does earn its name. As an art teacher, the only drawback I can see is that some children know exactly what color they want something to be, and don't feel very flexible about variations on that idea. Young children can be much more rigid in their expectations of their artwork than grown-ups tend to think they'd be. That said, I could see using the True to Life series being perfect for many different types of art projects--designs with watercolor overlays, invented flowers and fruits, or anything else where the surprises would be welcome. And in one final nod to the markers...I'm looking now at a 'board game' that my four year old made. Long intersecting lines form the boxes that your piece travels, and there's something really lovely about how the gold turns into purple and olive green. Who needs television after dinner? (stay tuned, this is only the end of week two).

My Summer Camp Acceptance Speech

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you so much for this incredible award! I'd like to thank the members of the Academy for recognizing all of my hard work this summer. I know I know, there were people who didn't think I'd be able to pull it off, having three different kids in three different summer day camps these last six weeks. And there were certainly those who thought it couldn't happen. But look at me! I did it!

(Applause)

I did the math too. I was scared to do it back when we signed on for this, but now that it's over I allowed myself to do it. Check this out! Six weeks of camp times three kids, five days a week, all different drop-offs and pick-ups (I know, I know)...and sometimes in three different boroughs? One hundred and eighty transitions! And no child forgotten! And (get this) no extreme latenesses. I'd have about died if I'd ended up getting in trouble like Karen did, for picking her daughter up twenty minutes late that day. Yikes.

(Applause)

Of course we all know how saved I was by the late bird option at those three weeks of camp my seven year old did in Park Slope. Too bad I didn't discover that until the last week! I still haven't gotten the bill for those extra hours but it's gotta have been worth it, right?

(Laughter)

There are so many people to thank. Let's see, I hope I don't forget anyone.

Umm, I'd like to thank my husband for stepping in and handling some of the heavy-lifting, and especially that week where he did all the drop-offs and pick-ups for our nine year old and his friend at Mets Baseball Academy wayyy out in Long Island.

(Applause)

And also for the time we needed to sprinkle the kids around the city but I couldn't end up being stuck with the car (alternate side parking rules were in effect that day and I had an appointment in midtown!) and he agreed to be saddled with the van all day. But mostly for taking the time with me on those two nights--you remember those, right?--where I needed an extra adult and a piece of paper and a pencil and the cellphone in my hand to figure out the Sudoku of getting everyone set for the next day.

Then there's my friend Nadia, who lent me her car on the day when I'd figured out all the drop-offs and then realized at lunchtime that I had no way to get everyone home! Yowza! Good thing she was around. Good thing that weird light on her dashboard only came on at the end of the trip! Thanks Nadia!

I'd like to thank the traffic in the morning for being so agreeable, making it possible to nail two different 9am drop-offs two miles apart. One child was a handful of minutes early, the other a handful of minutes late. The camp counselors didn't even notice! I never thought I could pull that one off on my own! Too bad moms don't have stunt doubles, huh?

I'd like to thank the Children's Museum of the Arts in Soho for having that groovy ball-pit. Dragging my four year old from her camp to her brother's camp every afternoon became a lot easier once she discovered that gem. She actually wanted to go pick him up from then on!

Thank you Elena!--the mom from Park Slope I only met because I was looking to carpool with someone--anyone--who was heading into Soho for claymation camp. Thanks for not being as tit-for-tat as you had every right to be (and as some moms can be--which I find so annoying!). I know I was able to help bring your son home to you several times (that was helpful, I know) but I appreciate that you didn't keep score about it and didn't seem to mind when the scales tipped a little bit the other way. Thanks for being so flexible about all that! And thanks for feeding him on the nights we couldn't get to him til after dinner. Do I owe you anything for that?

(Music begins to swell)

Oh, umm, wait. I can't forget my kids.

(Laughter)

Wait! I didn't mean that, I mean, I can't forget to thank my kids. A hundred and eighty opportunities to forget one of of you and it didn't happen. Right? We made it, we really made it, didn't we? I'm so glad you each got to do the summer camps of your dreams. But the greatest part was that you were all so exhausted by the time you got home. And you were hardly at each other's throats since you hardly saw each other!

(Laughter, Music swelling)

Okay, so...thanks so much to everyone for recognizing what I managed to pull off this summer. It was such hard work, and at times I wondered if it was worth it but standing here, holding this award, knowing that you all really appreciate my efforts...? Wow. Really. Wow. I'm truly humbled by this honor, and I'd like to dedicate it to all the moms out there, slaving away behind the curtain, making everything work for their own families, thanklessly. It's too bad there isn't enough room up here on this podium for all of us.

Smoking My Kids

In a recent essay in The New Yorker, David Sedaris talks about taking up smoking as a young man. He said it was as if he'd been fumbling around on a stage his whole life, and then the propmaster finally showed up.

At last! He knew what to do with his hands. Finally! He had an instant conversation-starter. Sure there were downsides to smoking, but to him, they paled in comparison to what were then some pretty obvious social benefits.

I get that. I really do.

I haven't smoked a cigarette in ages, but it was an awfully convenient accessory in college, and in some of the years after. Arrive at a party before anyone else I knew? Just ask someone for a cigarette or a light...boom!...instant interaction, with little flashes of knowingness, being now a smoker engaging with another smoker.

Traveling in a foreign country? Smoking'll come in handy too. First there's the comfort of seeing familiar brands abroad, and second there's another thing to have in common with someone whose language you might never understand. Smiling eyes, engaged hands...offering a cigarette, accepting a light. Piece of cake.

It occurred to me the other night, as I arrived to pick my middle child up from soccer practice, that my children are my cigarettes. I usually take my four year old with me to these soccer games but on this particular night I didn't have her with me. I found myself hesitating before approaching the group of parents. I was on my own. No prop, no built in distraction, no obvious conversation starter. Just me and a group of people I didn't really know. Usually it's not obvious that I don't really know them, so busy am I chasing around the four year old. And if she bounds towards them, golden-retriever-like, I lump along behind her and then end up having little snippets of conversation with them. Likewise, if she decides to roll down the hill over there over and over and over, I'm perfectly comfortable setting up a blanket and sitting alone on it with a magazine, keeping an eye on her, but also keeping near her and feeling justified in my decision to set up camp away from the other grown-ups. On this particular night I didn't really know what to do. Aiming directly towards the group of other parents seemed brash and forward. My intent would be clearly visible, and if I wasn't greeted with eye contact and welcomed into the fold I wouldn't really know how to get away. But setting up camp alone seemed ridiculously unsocial. I felt naked without her. It was then that I remembered the Sedaris piece. I was on the hilltop without my prop, and I wasn't sure how to behave.

I started thinking of all the ways that my kids have been my cigarettes through the years.

The biggest thing that stands out is the first grown-up party my husband and I were invited to after our first baby was born. Of course we brought him, he was just a few months old. But this wasn't a party full of parents, it was a medical school crowd. Sleek Grey's Anatomy folk mingling, having adult conversations about adult things. Since my social life had been swallowed up by pregnancy and childbirth--meaning that it was all I was ever required to talk about, I'd completely lost the ability to chat up strangers, if we weren't talking about episiotomies or cracked nipples. So there we were, my husband and me and the baby, attempting to schmooze and mix, but really we just kind of hung out by the dip all night and tried to steer conversations towards the baby. We fought over who was going to hold him (because whoever wasn't holding him might be asked to weigh in on some topic like politics or graduate school), and the poor kid probably got about seven diaper changes. Lull in the conversation? Oop, think I should go change the baby. Kind of like having to go put OUT that cigarette.

We took the boy to Chile when he was almost two. He was a platinum blonde kid whose looks got us more and more attention the further we travelled from Santiago. In one beach town about seven hours north of the capital, every restaurant we went into seated us in a front window. Places that my husband and I might have been nervous to go into--you know that uncertain feeling at the threshold of a new place, where you wonder if it even is a restaurant? No problem when there's a baby around.

I just returned from my twentieth college reunion. I brought my four year old. It didn't make sense to many, but it made perfect sense to me; I've since found out that the proper term for her in this case is 'distance regulator'--a chapter heading in books about intimacy (and how people avoid it, I'm guessing, though I haven't peeked). It was a perfect weekend, the perfect amount of being with old friends, and the perfect amount of being interrupted--oh, excuse me for a minute, I need to make sure she finds the dessert table--as well. There were extras on hand to help out with her, but it was always ultra-convenient to have her in the periphery.

Maybe someday I'll quit. Oh wait, I mean, maybe someday my children will grow up and move away and I'll be forced to find my way back to being comfortable without them. Or maybe I'll move on to some other kind of 'distance regulator.' I have a hunch that a blackberry might do the trick.

Babysitter Rejection

My most vivid rejection memory from childhood is of playing in the front yard with two older neighbor girls--the one who I choreographed the Dancing Queen routine with who ended up working at the U.N., and the one who became a track star in high school who teaches public school in the South Bronx. The Dancing Queen/U.N gal decided that we should race to her front door and so we all started to run there. I got there last and by the time I got up to the little cement step with the white iron railing they'd shut the door and announced that I wasn't allowed to play with them anymore. What a terrible feeling! I'd been slow, I'd been duped, I'd been dumped.

Aside from that, I wasn't the victim of a lot of rejection in my early years, or even in my later years. Maybe that's why I don't have tough-rejection-proof skin. Maybe that's why I can, on a certain kind of day, feel rejected so easily. Maybe that's why I can find rejection in the strangest places. Maybe that's why I cringe so much at the thought of calling around for a babysitter.

I know it's ridiculous. I do. I'm not always this sensitive. Just when I'm not feeling at the top of my game, or when I'm feeling a bit blue or disconnected--more often in the winter than in the summer. If I could just use that knowledge to my advantage I'd be fine. But I never know when a pair of tickets might end up in my lap, or some other kind of night out with my husband might present itself, and all of a sudden, no matter my mood, I find myself in need of a sitter. And the agony begins.

Take Jane. Jane never calls back right away. (Why doesn't she ever call?) But she usually comes through in the end--'Hi it's Jane? I'm so sorry I never called you back! Do you still need someone? Cuz I can do it if you haven't found anyone else.' Great, Super. She loves the kids, and ours are the only ones in her life. She's in school with a weird schedule and so I know (intellectually) not to feel bad if a Wednesday evening class means she can't watch them on a Wednesday night. But still...why doesn't she ever call?

Then there's Carly. Carly watched the kids once and wrote us a long note describing how wonderful they were. And now she's NEVER available. But I keep trying, especially since there's always that big gap between leaving a message for Jane and hearing that she can do it. Carly always sounds convincing when she says she feels bad, and she's a bigtime neighborhood babysitter and I'm usually calling at the last minute--so there's a chance she really is always busy. But still...should I be reading between the lines here?

Yolanda is fabulous, but has a way of accepting a job that unnerves me and makes me feel desperate. 'Yeah sure,' she'll say drowsily as if I just asked her if she liked milk in her tea. 'You can do it?' I implore. 'Yeah. No problem.' I can hear her shrugging through the phone. This indifference (even though it's a yes) triggers some nervous energy in me and I find myself prattling on 'really? really, it's okay?' It must drive her nuts. She said 'Yeah, sure' four mintues earlier and I'm there nervously rambling on, 'really? tomorrow? So, you can do it tomorrow? Really?' Several times I've gotten off the phone with her, still not confident that she understood what I was asking.

Adding to the awkwardness is that I call some of these women so infrequently it's impossible to avoid calling them in weird places and at weird times. Like in the middle of their own wedding ceremony ('whoa, sorry...I mean, congratulations'), on the other side of the world ('ouch, what time is it there?'), or in the wake of some tragedy ('ohhh, sorry...' I'll say, feeling guilty that I'm calling about such a ho-hum-life-goes-on reason--'so I guess that means you can't watch the kids so Joe and I can go out to dinner?' I might add sheepishly, depending on how desperate I'm feeling). Several Pratt students have just moved on with their lives (tends to happen to twenty-one year olds after they graduate): Peace Corps, Boston...but I rarely see this coming and feel foolish when my call finds them in some far off place.

And don't even get me started on the no-shows. Or the last-minute no-explanation cancelers. To be sitting in my going-out clothes with the kids in the living room all hopped up on pre-babysitter adrenaline in anticipation of some girl who never shows up is the worst feeling. My four year old LOVES babysitters, my seven year old loves it when ANYONE does an art project with her, my son LOVES that his sisters leave him alone. It's like being stood-up times four. I can know that it's a reflection of the lousy woman who didn't come, and not a reflection on me or my kids. But in the moment it feels pretty personal.

Hooray! I just got a pair of tickets to Wicked! What fun! Joe scored Knicks tickets! Wonderful! my friend just invited us to Ethan Hawke's new show! And ohhhhh crap....I think, picturing a stack of phone calls to wonderful women with busy social lives and oddly-timed classes. All it takes is one yes. One yes erases all the uncertainty, all those gaps of not knowing. It's just too bad it can take so long to find it.