Babysitting

            by Amanda Eyges

        One of the most effective forms of birth control is babysitting.  While watching after children that are not yours, you start to ask yourself; do I really want children when I grown up?  Some may think that peeing the bed and changing diapers are the worst of it but to the professional babysitter they are mere child's play.  Although little kids can be the most adorable things that have ever crawled the face of the earth, some situations call for a different set of emotions.

        When children are sick with a cold, you feel the need to stay at least 2 rooms away.  "But they're just a baby.  How sick could they really get you?" an untrained sitter might wonder.  After sneezing directly on you, they will wipe their tiny little nose with their hand.  Suddenly, they will take an uncontrollable interest in your mouth.  Every movement is exaggerated as you now see the entire interaction in slow motion.  His eyes widen and lock onto your lips.  His hand reaches outward and slips smoothly into your mouth, grabbing your lips and pulling.  Now, not only is your lower lip bleeding and throbbing but you're infected as well.  Baby colds are no laughing matter to an adult.  Somehow they manage to keep you out of school or work for at least a week with coughing, sneezing and a sore throat. You try desperately to kill the germs by scouring you own tongue with a rag and bleach but to no avail.  You are stuck with this cold and with the baby too.

        Most children are extremely calm and relaxed in their youngest years but this is simply a resting period for what's to come.  When they reach the age of one or two they soon acquire super-baby strength.  When you become a veteran in the profession you will start to see things coming, from pulling branches off of low-hanging trees to throwing heavy breakables from the counter onto the floor.  But this time they will take a sudden interest in their own mouth; all items must be felt and tasted.  Everything from flowers to windows to dog toys will at some point enter the oral cavity.  Finding the child atop the birdcage (which hangs from the ceiling with no base to climb up on) tormenting the helpless bird inside will soon become a normal occurrence.

        Generally, at the age of two, children become fascinated with fecal matter (also known as poo-poo, doo-doo or "uh oh").  Bath time may be extremely stressful to begin with because of the opportunities that water gives a small, flailing child but this situation can only get worse.  One night they will be in the bathtub innocently playing with a rubber bath toy when the time comes to get out and dry off.  You will rush to get a towel, not leaving them for longer than 10 seconds, but this amount of time will prove to be far too long.  You will stare down at the water, eyes wide and mouth agape as the theme song from psycho plays in your head.  There, floating in the cloudy water is a little round poop.  You rush to snatch the culprit from dangerously infected waters.  Quickly drying him off, you can think of nothing but a second bath for both of you.  You put him to bed and then cautiously enter the affected area with gloves, a home made net and a bandana around your nose and mouth.  You fish it out and spend the rest of the evening scrubbing the entire bathroom, yourself included, with the strongest killing agent you can find.

            Children will later enter the booger stage of their lives around the age of about three.  It seems as if their tiny bodies leak from every orifice but mostly from their noses.  Having so much mucus stored in that little cavity will prove to be too much to take and therefore must be expelled from the body and cling to something else including their own shirts, hands, mouths and those of their babysitter. You will return home one day after a hard day's work only to find a large ball of snot on the pant leg of your jeans.  You may think to yourself that this child should be disciplined.  This isn't fair.  But soon you will learn that all is fair in love, war, and babysitting.  You haven't seen the worst of it yet.

        As soon as little boys reach an age of "maturity", parents are taught to praise them whenever an erection is "achieved."  Research has found that this praise promotes a boy's self-esteem but can be detrimental to a babysitter's health.  You will be babysitting one afternoon, reading a book or engaging in some other leisurely activity, when you will look up to see the boy standing in front of you with a grin on his face and a full erection in his pants.  You will cover your eyes and look away quickly, as not to embarrass him or you any further, and ask him what he is doing.  He will ask you for a treat or a reward, still with the large grin on his face.  This will leave you in a state of shock.  Then he may say something inappropriate like how pretty your hair is or how he's a big boy now, which will leave you no choice but to put him on timeout.  Later that night after the incident has passed and the child has gone to bed, his parents will come home.  You will tell them of the tale, innocently laughing it off.  To your surprise they will not laugh with you but instead ask you to next time tell him that he is a very good boy and give him a fudgsicle.

        Your final test in becoming a professional babysitter will be the BIRTHDAY PARTY.  Over 30 families will attend this party, with one or more children, each with their own special case of ADD.  Although the host family has allowed you a friend to "help with the load" you may feel tempted to monopolize the babysitting service for the day. You may think that you need the salary and that you are trained enough to handle it but please think twice.  You should not attempt this alone.  You arrive at the soiree promptly at 2:00 p.m. only to find that the parents have started without you.  As you pass the kitchen you can see the host couple and friends taking multiple body shots off of each other's stomachs and the other parents doing keg stands in the backyard.  You soon realize that you are on your own and in charge of 45 children.  Panic may set in but fear not because you have your training to fall back on.  Upon finding three young boys in the garage "buffing" the brand new BMW with sand paper, two children in the hot tub with the parakeet trying to see if it will swim, and a little boy in the bathroom trying to see how many wedding rings one can fit down the toilet, you give thanks to $30 an hour and birth control pills.  If you can survive this event, then you have passed your final test.

        After becoming a seasoned babysitter, you may find that your work follows you home.  Soon you will be sending your friends and family on timeouts when they don't do what they are told.  Replacing "please" and "thank you" with candy and fudgsicles and communicating with people of authority in baby talk will become constant. You may even wonder to yourself when someone is crying if you should change their diaper or give them a bottle.  Congratulations!! Although they may discourage this behavior, it only means that you are a true professional.