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For the past several years I’ve enjoyed the babysitting services of a girl from my neighborhood. When her mother introduced her to me, she was in her final year of high school. They lived close enough that she could walk to and from my house whenever I needed her help. After graduation, she ever so conveniently moved just a few streets over and began working in a place with quite flexible hours.
Even if she’d lived across town, I still would have cherished her because she’s wonderful with my kids. They find her delightful; I find her supremely capable, even if she sometimes doesn’t manage to get all the dishes into the sink after meals. Eh, I don’t either.
She’s taken in stride my lack of foresight where scheduling is concerned and my charming habit of picking up extra children along the way. Exhaustion and absorption in parenting prevented me from calling her for several months after my youngest child came home. When I did, it was for a doctor’s appointment that I’d forgotten about and to which I could not take my children.
Presenting your babysitter with a brand new child she didn’t know you possessed as you dash late out the door may be the ultimate test of a sitter’s unflappability, and mine handled it wonderfully.
I’m not so irresponsible as that last paragraph might suggest. Really. Usually.
In the past year she changed jobs, moved in with her boyfriend and began training for a new career. I knew in my head that she was moving on into serious adulthood and would likely not need the paltry income from babysitting for much longer, and yet I could not help but to see her as a teenager still.
When recently I had a look at a book for Jane’s Guide that seemed to be directed more toward the younger set (instead of to a grizzled veteran such as myself), I wondered who among my friends I could pass it off to so that it wouldn’t wind up languishing on my desk.
Immediately I thought of my sitter, but I felt incredibly awkward about offering it to her. She’s so young! Would it really be appropriate to give a book about sex to a girl who just yesterday was in high school?
So the book stayed on my desk, forgotten until the sitter came to my house the other night wearing an uncharacteristically floaty shirt and a subtly more rounded face.
As so many babies are, this one is a happy accident. “Do you have a name picked out?” I asked. I’m sure she’s been asked that about five thousand times so far. She rattled off something babyish and cute.
“It’s the only thing we can agree on,” she said.
My radar went on alert. “The only name you can agree on, or the only thing at all you can agree on?”
“The only name,” she said. Then after a pause, “Actually, the name is just about the only thing at all we agree on right now.”
So now I’m plotting all the items I can give to her (read: get out of my own house) in preparation for the new baby. I’ve got clothes, and a portable crib, and some parenting books. I need to start a box of stuff to give to her next time she comes over.
Guess it’s ok to give her that sex book, eh? Maybe I’ll tuck it into the box underneath and burp cloths and onesies.
Would that be inappropriate, you think?
Abby on May 14th, 2008 
Nick on May 14th, 2008 
ms.inconspicuous
sillygal01 on May 14th, 2008 
Omnipotent Poobah
Red
sera
Finn
Tony Comstock on May 14th, 2008 
nenasadije
A
the little sister on May 14th, 2008 
ted on May 14th, 2008 
Mountain Girl on May 14th, 2008 
norby on May 14th, 2008 
urgh on May 17th, 2008 
T on May 17th, 2008 
