#98: Dawn and Too Many Sitters, Chapters 7-9
I am painfully aware of how long it's been since my last installment. I can, however, proffer the halfway decent excuse of having left the book at my parents' house for the past three and a half months. I only retrieved it last week, when I had bronchitis so bad I went home to Mommy and Daddy like the pathetic womanchild I am.
Part 1
Part 2
Chapter 7
“‘But you didn’t say anything about going to meetings!’ Byron protested.
“‘We just wanted to baby-sit,’ Jordan explained. ‘Not hang around with a bunch of girls.’”
While it’s slightly troubling that they claim to be mature enough to watch infants while still believing in cooties, is there actually a reason they have to attend meetings? They’re just trial members; how much responsibility can they actually have? Probably not more than Logan and Shannon.
I’m surprised the girls don’t act more ZOMG!mortified in the boys’ presence. I’m guessing it’s because they still see them as Kids and not yet as Guys. Girls. You are thirteen. In a few years, you could theoretically date one of them. If you keep acting like they’re SO MUCH YOUNGER, I have very little faith in your ability to take them seriously as colleagues.
“‘Heyyyyy, here come the boys!’ Stacey called, peering out of Claudia’s room.
‘Wheeere the boooyyys aaaaare,’ Abby’s voice crooned.
~
‘Hey, guys, you’re just in time,’ Kristy said.
‘And cute, too,’ Abby remarked.”
Stacey, I know Robert’s been neglectful lately (foreshadowing!), but can you try to keep it in your pants for half an hour? I’m sure Abby’s available after the meeting if you still need that itch scratched. Also, it’s clear from the rest of the book that you still see these boys as children. Tossing weird semi-flirtatious remarks at them is immature at best, psychologically troubling at worst.
“‘I call this meeting to order!’ Kristy shouted. ‘Have a seat, men.’
Adam and Byron leaned against the doorjamb. Jordan slumped against the wall. Jeff stood fiercely by my side.
‘Sit!’, Kristy barked.
They plopped down onto the carpet.
‘Now, you guys want to become baby-sitters, right?’ Kristy asked.
Nod, nod, nod, nod.
‘I guess you think baby-sitting is really easy, huh?’
Shake, shake, shake, shake.
‘You’re right. It’s hard work and long hours. You have to put your charges first and yourself second. Kids make a lot of demands. And have accidents. And through it all, no matter what, the buck stops with you.’
Abby saluted. ‘Thank you, Colonel.’
Claudia started giggling.
‘You guys, this is serious,’ Kristy snapped.
FNCW: 6
K. Ron: 0
Abby: >9,000
First of all, K. Ron, you think the boys don’t know that “kids make a lot of demands and have accidents”? They, unlike you, grew up with four little siblings. You have a lot of fancy theory (divestive system, anyone?), but they have experience, which wins out in the actual childcare practice 100% of the time. Seriously, ask any parent whose kid rejected all the wholesome educational toys and fell in love with a cardboard box.
The psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton became famous for his eight criteria of cult behavior. Number Seven is “Doctrine over Person”:
“In a cult, human experience and commonsense are no match for the cult's doctrine and are regarded as ‘hostile’ to the ideology.”
Keep this in mind, because it’ll be very, very relevant in the next chapter.
Second of all, baby-sitting does not inherently entail either hard work OR long hours. You’re not RAISING these kids, K. Ron. Play Candyland for an hour while Mom’s at her book club. There, you’re done, and so fucking what if the kid didn’t learn French. Also, if you can’t work past a certain time, it’s your prerogative to say so. You do not have to accept ten-pm jobs.
Also, I love Abby. I even forgive her for creepily flirting with ten-year-olds, because she is the only one who can put K. Ron in her place. Out of all these girls, she is by far the only one I’d actually want to be friends with. (It doesn’t hurt that throughout my life, a disproportionate number of my close friends have been Jewish, and I now nurse a bit of a soft spot for Jewish culture. You have no idea how many bar and bat mitzvahs I’ve been to.)
“‘Your sitter will give you one quarter of her earnings … Now, you’ll keep in mind that we’re doing this for you. Despite the fact that we desperately need to save money for our Hawaii trip.’”
Taking lessons from Mary Anne, are we? Listen, martyring yourselves won’t win you any prizes. You are under zero obligation to hire employees you cannot afford, and it’s better for everyone if you don’t, because you will inevitably grow to resent them. Kristy, you will grow up to be That Person who buys everyone lavish gifts and then screeches about ingrates when your bank account dries up.
“‘Can I take one of them next time I have to sit?’ Mallory asked.
…
Mary Anne ran her finger down the calendar. ‘The next time is two weeks from Monday.’”
Hold the fuck on. Each Sitter only Sits about every two weeks? Get off your damn high horses, ladies (Mallory, here’s a towel: go clean your damn pants. You disgust me.).
Chapter 8
“‘Ew ew ew ew - take it off me!’ yelled Jenny Prezzioso. ‘I hate sun scream!’
…
It was … a Jenny Prezzioso bad day.
Jenny has good days too. She tends to do everything to extremes. The basic problem: she’s spoiled. She has enough clothing in her closet to make Stacey jealous. When her baby sister was born, Jenny received a ton of gifts. I think she’s still opening them.”
Hating sunscreen totally makes you spoiled. Not acquiescing perfectly to every single demand makes you spoiled. Jenny. Is. FOUR. She was also was diagnosed with OCD in a later book, right? I have severe OCD. Not “that picture frame is crooked, better go wash my hands” OCD, but “I’m having intrusive thoughts about bloody car wrecks and I actually think I might die today” OCD. I admit I was a nightmare as a very young child. My senses overloaded very, very easily, and the wrong taste or texture could initiate a total breakdown. Here’s the thing - IT WASN’T BECAUSE I WAS SPOILED. It wasn’t because my parents didn’t raise me right or some victim-blaming shit like that, and it certainly wasn’t because I was on some mission to frustrate my baby-sitters. I had a neurological condition made everyday life difficult for me, and if I ever screamed about sunscreen, it was because having something cold and slimy applied to the back of my neck was an unbearable trigger. Kids’ problems are not about making adults’ lives more difficult, JESSICA. Vilifying a four-year-old the way these girls so shamelessly do is a special kind of fucked up.
Also, hating on her for “receiv[ing] a ton of gifts”? That’s just puritanical. Also, did I mention she’s FOUR?
Jessi coaches Jeff through a diaper change. I know she’s taking on the Wise Old Sage archetype here, but I work at a summer camp, I know plenty of ten- and eleven-year-olds, and picturing ANY of them with the responsibilities Jessi and Jeff have in this book is making my ovaries wince.
“‘You’re supposed to untie [the bonnet] first, Jeff,’” Jessi said.
Seriously? That has NOTHING to do with childcare, Jeff. You don’t need daycare certification to figure out that you should untie a garment before attempting to put it on. Does you try to put on your jeans fully zipped, too?
“Calm down, she said to herself. He’s trying.”
Jessi, I admire your patience, because mine would’ve snapped in the first five minutes, but “he’s trying” is NOT an excuse for botching an infant’s care. Letting someone other than the hired caregiver watch an infant is ethically questionable already, but it’s downright cruel in the case of Mrs. P, who’s already paranoid about her kids. Humor the woman a little, Jessi. You are her employee. You do not make the rules.
“Jenny looked happy, too.
Jessi sighed. Oh, well. You had to take what you could get.”
Jebus, Jessica. The job is over and the kids are alive and content. What more do you want? Contrary to cult dogma, you’re not a failure of a sitter if you don’t teach the kid French and perform an emergency appendectomy. You amuse the kid for an hour until the parents get home. That is your only job. Leave the raising to the parents. This is like some weird reversal of The Nanny Diaries (my favorite guilty-pleasure movie. Sue me.).
Also, remember when we talked about “doctrine over person”? Here it is in all its gory glory.
Chapter 9
“‘Experience the glow!’ I called out. ‘The power! Your body will thank you! Your mind will thank you!’
I see K. Ron’s taken to sending out street missionaries.
Mary Anne and I were sitting patiently on two folding chairs, in the busiest corner of Stoneybrook’s outdoor strip mall. Spread before us on two card tables was the most gorgeous array of healthy foods you have ever seen.”
Dawn. Dawn, Dawn, Dawn. Where’s the girl I knew and loved back in book five, who selflessly stocked her cookout with hamburgers and hot dogs because she knew her friends would appreciate them? Where’s the girl who fucking KNEW HER AUDIENCE? If you must foist your eccentricities on Stoneybrook’s white-bread ‘Muricans, you couldn’t have staked out, oh, a yoga class? A consciousness-raising circle? A Hare Krishna meeting? Anything but this mank-ass strip mall. If it’s anything like the one in my hometown, it contains a Rite Aid, a dollar store, and a whole lot of employees who’ll side-eye the fuck out of you for interrupting their smoke breaks with your screed.
“For hours, Mary Anne and I had slaved over a sign, which now hung proudly from the card table:
SHOP, BUT DON’T DROP!
KEEP YOURSELF FIT AND FABULOUS
WITH THE BEST FOOD ON EARTH!
ALL NATURAL!
ALL SCRUMPTIOUS!”
In what universe, outside of Claudia’s personal one, does this take hours?
Also, Dawnie, I grew up with fitness-obsessed martial artist parents, and I more or less followed their lifestyle until I went to college and turned into a borderline alcoholic pudding-snarfing lump. I’d love to sit you down and school your innocent little face about what nutrition actually entails. You know what the cornerstone of a healthful diet is? Variety. You know what’s terrible for women of childbearing age? Too much soy. You know what will crash your blood sugar and lead to the dreaded “drop” you mention? TOO MANY GODDAMN CARBS. I know it’s just another blasphemous bloodmouth biotruth, but a lean burger will keep you full for way, way longer than sprouts stuffed in a pita pocket.
Don’t even get me started on “all natural”. You know what else is “natural”? Death, disease, and arsenic. I’ll just leave this here.
“Quickly I had to become a salesperson. I had to find my Inner Kristy.”
Oh god. The capitalization kills me a little deader each time it catches my eye. Is anyone else vividly picturing Dawn starting a spinoff cult of her own? Breatharianism seems right up her alley. She’d probably turn to it after level 5 veganism became too mainstream for her and she decided to champion the rights of the shadowless.
FNCW: 7
K. Ron: 0
“Our next sales scheme: Mary Anne’s used junk. … (What can I say? We were desperate.)
…
If people could pass up fresh, mouth-watering, reasonably priced food, who would buy this old junk?”
Hey Dawn? From the way you’re talking about that food, I don’t think it’s your mouth that’s watering. Go harvest some organic cucumbers already and get a goddamn room.
“Who would buy this old junk?” you ask? Do your memories of each year of being 13 magically erase themselves each time you start over? How many yard sales has the Cult held at this point? How many times have you been ZOMG!sosurprised that people - who’d have thunk it? - will buy damn near anything?
Also, I’m snorting into my vodka-and-store-brand-cherry-soda at the fact that you didn’t first turn to the moneymaking option that costs you jack shit, as opposed to the one that required a hundred-dollar down payment at Whole Paycheck. You just know Richard was gnawing his tongue in the corner watching them plan this farce.
“Richard and Mom were so impressed they donated some of their own treasures. … (I drew the line at a set of cancer-causing pipes.)”
Stuck-in-the-‘50s alert: no one except college boys with ironic mustaches smokes pipes anymore, so for the longest time that line made me picture a lead bathroom set that was inexplicably divorced from the rest of the house. Also, Dawn? You know what, besides tobacco, causes cancer? TOO MUCH FUCKING SOY. And, hypocrisy aside, absolutely nothing could make me want to quit smoking LESS than being harangued and denied paraphernalia by a thirteen-year-old harpy. I would relish every second of blowing the smoke of sweet adulthood into that sour face.
Also, Dawn? I’m surprised your California keister doesn’t know about pipes’, um, alternative uses.
Part 1
Part 2
Chapter 7
“‘But you didn’t say anything about going to meetings!’ Byron protested.
“‘We just wanted to baby-sit,’ Jordan explained. ‘Not hang around with a bunch of girls.’”
While it’s slightly troubling that they claim to be mature enough to watch infants while still believing in cooties, is there actually a reason they have to attend meetings? They’re just trial members; how much responsibility can they actually have? Probably not more than Logan and Shannon.
I’m surprised the girls don’t act more ZOMG!mortified in the boys’ presence. I’m guessing it’s because they still see them as Kids and not yet as Guys. Girls. You are thirteen. In a few years, you could theoretically date one of them. If you keep acting like they’re SO MUCH YOUNGER, I have very little faith in your ability to take them seriously as colleagues.
“‘Heyyyyy, here come the boys!’ Stacey called, peering out of Claudia’s room.
‘Wheeere the boooyyys aaaaare,’ Abby’s voice crooned.
~
‘Hey, guys, you’re just in time,’ Kristy said.
‘And cute, too,’ Abby remarked.”
Stacey, I know Robert’s been neglectful lately (foreshadowing!), but can you try to keep it in your pants for half an hour? I’m sure Abby’s available after the meeting if you still need that itch scratched. Also, it’s clear from the rest of the book that you still see these boys as children. Tossing weird semi-flirtatious remarks at them is immature at best, psychologically troubling at worst.
“‘I call this meeting to order!’ Kristy shouted. ‘Have a seat, men.’
Adam and Byron leaned against the doorjamb. Jordan slumped against the wall. Jeff stood fiercely by my side.
‘Sit!’, Kristy barked.
They plopped down onto the carpet.
‘Now, you guys want to become baby-sitters, right?’ Kristy asked.
Nod, nod, nod, nod.
‘I guess you think baby-sitting is really easy, huh?’
Shake, shake, shake, shake.
‘You’re right. It’s hard work and long hours. You have to put your charges first and yourself second. Kids make a lot of demands. And have accidents. And through it all, no matter what, the buck stops with you.’
Abby saluted. ‘Thank you, Colonel.’
Claudia started giggling.
‘You guys, this is serious,’ Kristy snapped.
FNCW: 6
K. Ron: 0
Abby: >9,000
First of all, K. Ron, you think the boys don’t know that “kids make a lot of demands and have accidents”? They, unlike you, grew up with four little siblings. You have a lot of fancy theory (divestive system, anyone?), but they have experience, which wins out in the actual childcare practice 100% of the time. Seriously, ask any parent whose kid rejected all the wholesome educational toys and fell in love with a cardboard box.
The psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton became famous for his eight criteria of cult behavior. Number Seven is “Doctrine over Person”:
“In a cult, human experience and commonsense are no match for the cult's doctrine and are regarded as ‘hostile’ to the ideology.”
Keep this in mind, because it’ll be very, very relevant in the next chapter.
Second of all, baby-sitting does not inherently entail either hard work OR long hours. You’re not RAISING these kids, K. Ron. Play Candyland for an hour while Mom’s at her book club. There, you’re done, and so fucking what if the kid didn’t learn French. Also, if you can’t work past a certain time, it’s your prerogative to say so. You do not have to accept ten-pm jobs.
Also, I love Abby. I even forgive her for creepily flirting with ten-year-olds, because she is the only one who can put K. Ron in her place. Out of all these girls, she is by far the only one I’d actually want to be friends with. (It doesn’t hurt that throughout my life, a disproportionate number of my close friends have been Jewish, and I now nurse a bit of a soft spot for Jewish culture. You have no idea how many bar and bat mitzvahs I’ve been to.)
“‘Your sitter will give you one quarter of her earnings … Now, you’ll keep in mind that we’re doing this for you. Despite the fact that we desperately need to save money for our Hawaii trip.’”
Taking lessons from Mary Anne, are we? Listen, martyring yourselves won’t win you any prizes. You are under zero obligation to hire employees you cannot afford, and it’s better for everyone if you don’t, because you will inevitably grow to resent them. Kristy, you will grow up to be That Person who buys everyone lavish gifts and then screeches about ingrates when your bank account dries up.
“‘Can I take one of them next time I have to sit?’ Mallory asked.
…
Mary Anne ran her finger down the calendar. ‘The next time is two weeks from Monday.’”
Hold the fuck on. Each Sitter only Sits about every two weeks? Get off your damn high horses, ladies (Mallory, here’s a towel: go clean your damn pants. You disgust me.).
Chapter 8
“‘Ew ew ew ew - take it off me!’ yelled Jenny Prezzioso. ‘I hate sun scream!’
…
It was … a Jenny Prezzioso bad day.
Jenny has good days too. She tends to do everything to extremes. The basic problem: she’s spoiled. She has enough clothing in her closet to make Stacey jealous. When her baby sister was born, Jenny received a ton of gifts. I think she’s still opening them.”
Hating sunscreen totally makes you spoiled. Not acquiescing perfectly to every single demand makes you spoiled. Jenny. Is. FOUR. She was also was diagnosed with OCD in a later book, right? I have severe OCD. Not “that picture frame is crooked, better go wash my hands” OCD, but “I’m having intrusive thoughts about bloody car wrecks and I actually think I might die today” OCD. I admit I was a nightmare as a very young child. My senses overloaded very, very easily, and the wrong taste or texture could initiate a total breakdown. Here’s the thing - IT WASN’T BECAUSE I WAS SPOILED. It wasn’t because my parents didn’t raise me right or some victim-blaming shit like that, and it certainly wasn’t because I was on some mission to frustrate my baby-sitters. I had a neurological condition made everyday life difficult for me, and if I ever screamed about sunscreen, it was because having something cold and slimy applied to the back of my neck was an unbearable trigger. Kids’ problems are not about making adults’ lives more difficult, JESSICA. Vilifying a four-year-old the way these girls so shamelessly do is a special kind of fucked up.
Also, hating on her for “receiv[ing] a ton of gifts”? That’s just puritanical. Also, did I mention she’s FOUR?
Jessi coaches Jeff through a diaper change. I know she’s taking on the Wise Old Sage archetype here, but I work at a summer camp, I know plenty of ten- and eleven-year-olds, and picturing ANY of them with the responsibilities Jessi and Jeff have in this book is making my ovaries wince.
“‘You’re supposed to untie [the bonnet] first, Jeff,’” Jessi said.
Seriously? That has NOTHING to do with childcare, Jeff. You don’t need daycare certification to figure out that you should untie a garment before attempting to put it on. Does you try to put on your jeans fully zipped, too?
“Calm down, she said to herself. He’s trying.”
Jessi, I admire your patience, because mine would’ve snapped in the first five minutes, but “he’s trying” is NOT an excuse for botching an infant’s care. Letting someone other than the hired caregiver watch an infant is ethically questionable already, but it’s downright cruel in the case of Mrs. P, who’s already paranoid about her kids. Humor the woman a little, Jessi. You are her employee. You do not make the rules.
“Jenny looked happy, too.
Jessi sighed. Oh, well. You had to take what you could get.”
Jebus, Jessica. The job is over and the kids are alive and content. What more do you want? Contrary to cult dogma, you’re not a failure of a sitter if you don’t teach the kid French and perform an emergency appendectomy. You amuse the kid for an hour until the parents get home. That is your only job. Leave the raising to the parents. This is like some weird reversal of The Nanny Diaries (my favorite guilty-pleasure movie. Sue me.).
Also, remember when we talked about “doctrine over person”? Here it is in all its gory glory.
Chapter 9
“‘Experience the glow!’ I called out. ‘The power! Your body will thank you! Your mind will thank you!’
I see K. Ron’s taken to sending out street missionaries.
Mary Anne and I were sitting patiently on two folding chairs, in the busiest corner of Stoneybrook’s outdoor strip mall. Spread before us on two card tables was the most gorgeous array of healthy foods you have ever seen.”
Dawn. Dawn, Dawn, Dawn. Where’s the girl I knew and loved back in book five, who selflessly stocked her cookout with hamburgers and hot dogs because she knew her friends would appreciate them? Where’s the girl who fucking KNEW HER AUDIENCE? If you must foist your eccentricities on Stoneybrook’s white-bread ‘Muricans, you couldn’t have staked out, oh, a yoga class? A consciousness-raising circle? A Hare Krishna meeting? Anything but this mank-ass strip mall. If it’s anything like the one in my hometown, it contains a Rite Aid, a dollar store, and a whole lot of employees who’ll side-eye the fuck out of you for interrupting their smoke breaks with your screed.
“For hours, Mary Anne and I had slaved over a sign, which now hung proudly from the card table:
SHOP, BUT DON’T DROP!
KEEP YOURSELF FIT AND FABULOUS
WITH THE BEST FOOD ON EARTH!
ALL NATURAL!
ALL SCRUMPTIOUS!”
In what universe, outside of Claudia’s personal one, does this take hours?
Also, Dawnie, I grew up with fitness-obsessed martial artist parents, and I more or less followed their lifestyle until I went to college and turned into a borderline alcoholic pudding-snarfing lump. I’d love to sit you down and school your innocent little face about what nutrition actually entails. You know what the cornerstone of a healthful diet is? Variety. You know what’s terrible for women of childbearing age? Too much soy. You know what will crash your blood sugar and lead to the dreaded “drop” you mention? TOO MANY GODDAMN CARBS. I know it’s just another blasphemous bloodmouth biotruth, but a lean burger will keep you full for way, way longer than sprouts stuffed in a pita pocket.
Don’t even get me started on “all natural”. You know what else is “natural”? Death, disease, and arsenic. I’ll just leave this here.
“Quickly I had to become a salesperson. I had to find my Inner Kristy.”
Oh god. The capitalization kills me a little deader each time it catches my eye. Is anyone else vividly picturing Dawn starting a spinoff cult of her own? Breatharianism seems right up her alley. She’d probably turn to it after level 5 veganism became too mainstream for her and she decided to champion the rights of the shadowless.
FNCW: 7
K. Ron: 0
“Our next sales scheme: Mary Anne’s used junk. … (What can I say? We were desperate.)
…
If people could pass up fresh, mouth-watering, reasonably priced food, who would buy this old junk?”
Hey Dawn? From the way you’re talking about that food, I don’t think it’s your mouth that’s watering. Go harvest some organic cucumbers already and get a goddamn room.
“Who would buy this old junk?” you ask? Do your memories of each year of being 13 magically erase themselves each time you start over? How many yard sales has the Cult held at this point? How many times have you been ZOMG!sosurprised that people - who’d have thunk it? - will buy damn near anything?
Also, I’m snorting into my vodka-and-store-brand-cherry-soda at the fact that you didn’t first turn to the moneymaking option that costs you jack shit, as opposed to the one that required a hundred-dollar down payment at Whole Paycheck. You just know Richard was gnawing his tongue in the corner watching them plan this farce.
“Richard and Mom were so impressed they donated some of their own treasures. … (I drew the line at a set of cancer-causing pipes.)”
Stuck-in-the-‘50s alert: no one except college boys with ironic mustaches smokes pipes anymore, so for the longest time that line made me picture a lead bathroom set that was inexplicably divorced from the rest of the house. Also, Dawn? You know what, besides tobacco, causes cancer? TOO MUCH FUCKING SOY. And, hypocrisy aside, absolutely nothing could make me want to quit smoking LESS than being harangued and denied paraphernalia by a thirteen-year-old harpy. I would relish every second of blowing the smoke of sweet adulthood into that sour face.
Also, Dawn? I’m surprised your California keister doesn’t know about pipes’, um, alternative uses.