3 months in Lice Land

One evening, while helping with bath time at "Beatings R Us", I noticed a small bug crawling near Sarah's hairline. Not wanting to cause panic or listen to incessant teasing the rest of the evening, I picked it out of her hair and squashed it between my fingernails. I had a lot of training for this as my Maltese-Poodle mix at home enjoyed running around in flea prevalent areas.


After the bath, I went to alert their mother. She was very upset and quickly judged that it had been a louse (look at me using the correct terminology!) It seemed the girls had gotten lice sometime in July and they had already spent most of their summer washing linens and picking through hair strands. Now that it was September, they must have picked it up at school - knowing what I do now, I'd say it's probably more likely they never got rid of them. In a society that is obsessed with the organic remedy, this family refused to use a chemical treatment. This should've come as no surprise seeing as how they didn't even have a microwave! The remedy instead would be "Rosemary Repel" shampoo...


Criminally, they charge $25 a bottle and it never worked! Both girls slept in the same bed, both girls got lice. When one would get rid of hers, the other would spread her little crawlers to her sister overnight. (Is your head itching yet?)

And Then I Got Slapped

Admittedly, I should have seen this one coming. Having just moved to Boston, I was desperate for a job to help pay my rent and support the lifestyle to which I had become accustomed. Desperation is never a good quality when it comes to making important choices. Of course, you are unable to tell yourself this in the moment so you might as well accept that your ship is sinking.


When I showed up to interview for the family, I was informed that the mother would be working from home - easy enough, I've worked several jobs where one parent is in and out of the house or in an office. Then after a series of questions about my background she began asking me about methods of discipline... "I'm happy to follow any of the guidelines you've set but I will not be doing any spanking". "No, of course not, but I mean... Do you have any ideas? I'm just exhausted and nothing seems to work." says Mama "nervous breakdown". It is important to note that her two girls (6 & 7 y/o) are running in and out of the room and jumping on everything in sight during this conversation. RED FLAG! My sinking ship was sending up flares but good ol' desperation just kept throwing small buckets of water off the deck. Eventually, I would learn that the preferred method of discipline was to "say you're sorry" (because teaching head-strong children to lie early on is a very good lesson). She hired me on the spot, it seemed I was not the only person sailing on S.S.Distress. I started immediately, as in, she left the room and asked me to get the girls ready for bed. What?! Ummm... Okay.... They were cute enough but it soon became clear that the older sister, Jane, was insanely jealous of the attention stealing younger sister, Sarah, who wanted nothing more than to be liked by Jane. Aside from this typical show of "sisterly love" they both watched WAY too much Disney Channel!


It seemed that someone (read: Miley Cyrus) taught them they were the ones with the "real power" and it was their common goal to exploit it. On several occasions they threatened to tell their mom to fire me if I didn't take them somewhere. "Your mom will never fire me, she needs me too much..." not surprisingly they would agree with me.

In the Beginning... or Shame on Me

The first time I ever babysat, I was in the 7th grade. I still had some baby teeth, was taller than most boys in my grade, and still believed that I could grow up to marry one of the Hanson brothers.


I had been working in my church's nursery and some of the mothers solicited occasional jobs from the volunteers that bounced their babies every week. This particular family had two boys, a baby about 9 months old and a 2 year old terror. Seeing as how this was a very long time ago, and statistically humans have difficulty retaining specific information when they are in a state of panic, some of the details are a bit foggy. What I do remember is calling my mother twice; once to ask what babies are allowed to eat and then to ask what to do about a crying baby when you put him in his crib. Her advice was helpful but my efforts were futile. The two year old sensed my hesitation and insisted that he always slept with his lamp on and I was so scared to let the baby cry I kept going back to his room and picking him up. When the parents returned home at about 10:00PM, they were greeted by a 12 year old in their living room bouncing their wide awake baby on her knee, watching sketchy television programing with all the lights on. To make matters worse, the two year old darling boy came bursting from his room (where he had been quietly playing with trucks....waiting to shame me) as soon as he heard his parents walk in.


After 12 years and thousands of hours logged watching over little ones, this whole memory is a bit horrifying now. But then I remember, these people left their children with an over-grown 7th grader! I couldn't be expected to Mary Poppins the job if I couldn't even keep my own room clean!
A few weeks passed and I never heard from them again. I'd see them occasionally at church, averting their eyes from mine and wrangling their children. All I can say is, thanks for the lesson and sorry for the headache.

-sam