The Girl Next Door

Here is what I would like to say to the child who is always here, "do you have something to do at home? Maybe help your grandmother? Unload the dishwasher or put away laundry?".

Early in the summer she appeared at the back door, in the morning as I turned on the tea kettle, the rest of the house still sleeping. She startled me; in the city people do not show up at your back door, or your front, both being behind gates and locked entry doors. She waved and I opened the door, "the girls are still sleeping", and she skipped off to another house.

She's been back every day, and more often than not she finds two very willing play mates. From time to time I must tell her no, that they cannot come out as they are reading, or cleaning their room, or doing something far less exciting than running from yard to yard with no direction or purpose. Occasionally she catches me alone, as she did last week when the girls, back from the beach, were showering, and I was savoring those moments of anticipated solitude on the back deck with a book. She sat down on one of the chairs when I told her the girls were busy inside.

"What are you doing?", and she looked as though she just might stay.
"I'm going to read my book, at least until the girls are finished showering."
"And then what are you going to do?"

She stayed. And I put down my book and learned that her mother has just returned after a long absence, exact whereabouts unknown,  and that her father lives in a state very far away and calls occasionally. That she lives with her grandmother and brother, and now her mother, who works as a waitress in town, and that they have two bedrooms and no dishwasher, so there is no dishwasher to unload.

And here is what the child who is always here said to me, "You spend all summer with the girls? Really? You do everything with them? That's amazing".

Come on in, but you may need to help with the dishes.

Slow Down, You Move Too Fast

"My face looks funny, it doesn't fit on my body". We were walking up Broadway, Mary and I behind Jack and Kate and she said this all too casually, as if we were college roommates craning over one another for a look in the tiny dorm room mirror. Had it just been this comment maybe I could have responded just as casually but this followed "I think I look fat in these pants" the day before. She is six. And telling her that the pants she had on were a size four would only reinforce the idea that numbers, and size, matter. So we stopped and I asked why, when what I really wanted to do was scream, and cry and yell at everyone in her class, and every parent of every child in her class, but instead I asked, "why?'. Which wasn't the right question, although I am certain that I have no idea what was. She didn't have an answer, a mumble, nothing specific and then just as quickly she was distracted and running off to catch her sister.

At least three times per week Mary comes home asking about Hannah Montana. She aches for a Barbie and thinks that princesses are the best things going. She's not alone. Better than half the little girls in the library want princess books, and many refuse anything else offered. The line into class each morning is scattered with ICarly and Hannah Montana bags worn on the back of the six and seven year old girls.

The thing that continues to amaze me is how frequently people say to me "they grow up so fast" and yet those same people buy Justin Beiber posters for their five year old daughters. When a first grade girl croons "he's so cute" I remember that I thought Charles, who lived down the street, was not at all cute. Rather, he was annoying and a bit stinky. I was six and most, if not all, boys appeared to me as Charles did.

My girls don't have painted toenails, we don't go for mani-pedis together, not yet. I cringe at introducing the idea that a woman needs to be painted or adorned to be valued, and struggle with their understanding of what that might mean. At six I'm not sure they can make sense of my red toenails and my need to relax and enjoy an hour of quiet occasionally. What I see in my children are two amazingly beautiful girls, today sticky and dirty and covered with summer, which makes them all the more lovely, and all the more six. I'm not ready to give that up, to sacrifice dirty summer toes for ten shiny pink ones.


At a time when they are building character and discovering who they are, I can't support them believing that who they are is limited to what they see. With so many wonderful choices, I struggle with options that offer a very one dimensional portrait of what they can become. And yes, I want to slow down, because they only have one shot at being six years, 9 months, and a few days; let's not waste that one wonderful day hurrying to the next.

Hertz Please

When offered an option, I much prefer driving a rental car. Having nothing to do with novelty, the lure, quite simply, the complete unfamiliarity, and the assumption that I have no idea what I am doing, a consideration not given to me when driving my husband in the car we have owned for five years.

"Allyson, turn on the back wiper, you can't possibly see anything behind you".

Pulling on something to my left, the bright headlights go on, which I don't notice as I am furiously looking in the rear view to see if I have found the right switch to activate the rear wiper.

"You have turned on the bright lights, which you need to now turn off as you are blinding those driving towards us".

Knowingly I look away from the rain soaked road and directly at my passenger seat husband, "I know that dear but I thought it best to be able to see in front of me. And now that I can see that yes, there is a road there, I think it's safe to turn these off". Reaching to the left I turn off not only the brights but the headlights as well, leaving us in complete darkness. In a hasty attempt to bring back the light I turn up the volume on the radio as Jack stretches over to me to turn on the head lights. In a confident show of driver control I let fly with wiper fluid.

The simple idea that I might know why the car is beeping is removed in a rental car. Not one to read the manual we get in and go, after the the requisite two hour installation of the car seats. We are now on our third set of seats, each one promising to be more user friendly than the last. One might think that having now done this for five years we would be accomplished, experts perhaps, but sadly no, it's possible we have regressed. Jack pulls and pushes, I climb about in every kind of unflattering position, wedging myself in between the seats, feet in the air, while the girls play in the open back area, hungry, tired and often cranky. In a convoluted car version of Twister, he hands me a strap which I attach to the nearest thing that looks to be a receiver, Mary's seat now firmly held in place to the front seat shoulder strap. We begin again. When they appear to be firmly in place I begin the test drive, shaking each seat violently, assuring myself that the car could roll over twice and bounce to the moon and the seats would not move.

Now strapped in we begin, and when navigation is an issue, I drive because my husband has decided that it is far more painful to watch me make sense of a map, choosing instead to suffer through my my driving, to which I defend myself, "but Jack! I once drove in Paris". He turns, "and I thank God each and every day that I was not with you". Bravely I pass over the Do Not Back Up sharp things and turn left, no right. This car beeps and we turn up the radio and sing; at home this behavior is considered foolish and is strongly discouraged. Beeps and bells are to be immediately investigated and discussed in detail with the car repair man. However, when flying along on unfamiliar roadways in New Hampshire, it is perfectly acceptable to completely ignore the car's attempt at attention getting and enjoy the scenery. One rain drop, then two, and we both search for the wiper switch, turning on seat warmers, headlights, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang wings and the cruise control before landing the right lever to whisk away the bothersome rain on our once clean windshield.

This camaraderie does not exist in our own car where the driver is expected to know the specific purpose of each and every knob, stick and button available. Save the stereo, where the driver is only allowed limited control.

The rain slows to a stop just as I turn onto our street and with a boldness usually reserved for guacamole making, I reach to turn off the windshield wipers. Swish, swish, the back wiper jumps to attention, whisking away any remaining drops on the rear window. Found it!