Summer Job

Thoughts from my last week at work:

   In case any of you were debating over just how glamorous (I had to sing the song in my head as I typed that. Thank you, Fergie) my life is, let me put your worries to rest. At the moment, I am sitting on a red corduroy couch, under a Transformers blanket, while sipping water from my Spiderman Tervis. This is not my normal life. This is my work life. Because at some point during my normal life, I decided that it would be a good idea for me to spend my summer nannying two children. When I was first offered the position, I thought, "Heck yes! I'll be making money. But the important part is that I will be given the opportunity to shape and inspire two bright up-and-coming minds for the future." After the first day of waking up at 7 in the morning to drive to their house to spend ten hours in the company of a ten year old and an eight year old, I quickly realized that I must have been drugged when I accepted the job. But now, looking at it in retrospect, I am thankful that this is how I chose to spend my summer. In between the moments of the fragile diabetic ten year old trying to sneak fruit roll-ups past me while the stoic eight year old looks at me like I am a lunatic when I ask him to put his shoes on so we can go to the movies, there were some great moments.

Me: Do you guys want to go to Chuck-E-Cheese?

Lil' Joey (The stoic eight year old): Yeah!

Cool Blue (The diabetic ten year old): Nah. I stopped liking that place when I was, like, eight.

Lil' Joey: Okay, Cool Blue. Since you are too mature and cool for Chuck-E-Cheese and since you are practically a grown-up, they have a special menu for you now. Yeah, you can order from the adult menu. It's full of vegetables and stuff like that. So you can eat your broccoli while I play.

There were no words.
______

*We are all making origami*

Cool Blue: I need to make something for Mom and Dad. Hmm.. I can make Mom a butterfly. I don't know what to make Dad. What does Dad like?

Lil' Joey: Dad likes Mom. Make an origami version of Mom.

Once again, there were no words.
______

*Playing Monopoly*

Cool Blue: Ugh, I need to straighten all of these hotels. I'm OCD."

Lil' Joey: Cool Blue, you're not actually OCD. You only act that way because you like to think you're OCD. But you're not, your room is a mess.

Lil' Joey knows how to shut down a conversation.
______

*Driving home from Art Camp*

Lil' Joey: I wonder what kind of robots we will have when I am an old man.

Cool Blue: I don't think they can make anything else. I am pretty sure we have created everything that can ever be created.

Lil' Joey: What are you talking about? You haven't created anything.

Cool Blue: No, I mean "we" as in the human race.

Lil' Joey: Oh. Then no way! There's still a ton to create.

Cool Blue:: I don't know. I think this is it.

Lil' Joey: I bet that's what people were saying about the size of TVs a long time ago. Now look at us. Have you seen our TV?

It was at that moment when I looked in the rear view mirror and thought, "Who are you people?"
______

I know what you're thinking, "These boys sound hilarious. How could you not want to be around them?" But you have to understand, they only speak about 30% of the time. The other 70% is spent with their eyes glued to their handheld electronics as if they each have a personal vendetta to uphold.

This summer is coming to an end and I have to admit that I am a little upset. While I won't miss waking up early or the sound of plates breaking or a sea of smoke flooding from the kitchen.. I will miss the boys running up to me saying things like, "Can you help us freeze soap bubbles?!", "Have you ever made a telegraph?", "I don't get why people buy paper towels that aren't Bounty.", "You have long arm hair. I think if you wore a mask, people would think you're a boy.", "How can you like reading?", and "Can we go upstairs to hide from the zombies?"

To commemorate our eventful/extremely dull summer together, Lil' Joey wrote a poem about it as one of his summer writing projects for school. Here it is:

A warm gentle breeze
blows through the trees
but I didn't see it
because I was at the movies

We went to the pool
and it was pretty cool

Bryce had a bloody nose
but Jillianne cleaned it
with a water hose

We went to Subway
but she parked so far away
I asked, "Do we have to walk that?"
she said, "It's so you don't get too fat"

We had an art class in Bay Saint Louis
but when we got there
they said it was a funeral service^

She made guacamole
I said, "Holy moly"

It was time to go
but we wouldn't stop playing Halo

She told Bryce to check his blood
but he sighed and gave her a shrug^

Some friends came over
and there was a zombie take-over

She made me ham and cheese
and said I didn't even need to say please

I won at Monopoly
because I had hotel property

I've got a chill babysitter
so please, nobody hit her^

When he read this to me, I loved my job. I told him I was going to miss him and that maybe I would visit him one day at school. He said, "Please don't. I'll pretend I don't know you."

Thanks boys. I love you too.

^Spoken verbally but not in the final cut