Um, I guess so. Sort of. It's weird. Rich people have nannies, not middle class academic staff. It's expensive to have a nanny, but not as expensive as it should be. By that, I mean, I can't afford to pay her what I think the job is worth, which is more than I make an hour, that's for sure. I think that child care as work is undervalued in America, no matter who does it.
But in any case, I have two days per week in June and the first week of June/July that I need to cover with more part-time care. My parents are going to help out for the last two weeks, leaving three wide open. It was making me crazy. But luckily, Pete has a friend from his latest class at the U who has taken care of babies and who offered to babysit for us sometimes. We hired her for Wednesdays and Thursdays, 10-4. That gives me time on either end to get to and from work, perhaps get a couple of things done at the house, and have 4.5 hours at my desk.
It's going to cost us almost as much for those six days as Finn's 9 days at day care. We're pretty much paying two months of day care in one, and who doesn't want that? Oh well. You do what you have to do.
(Just for reference, we're paying Ellyn $15 per hour, working out to $540, and we're paying the day care $591 for June. That will go up to $771 in July. I don't have any problem talking about money. It should not be so taboo.)
I was worried about today because Ellyn only had a chance to spend a few hours with us and Finn on Sunday, and I want him to be good for her. Our trip revealed his disposition to be more like Pete's than mine (that is: easy-going, friendly, mellow as opposed to fearful, suspicious, and cantankerous, like me.), thank goodness, so I had hopes that he would be a lovely baby for her and not Tyrannosaur.
Have I mentioned that he's an excellent baby?
He did great. The only problem encountered during the day was that the key we gave to Ellyn broke off in the front door lock. Others who have taken care of our baby and our cats will know that this was going to happen at some point. The thing sucks. The only person who does not have trouble with it is me. It all needs to be replaced, and now we have the perfect reason to do it.
In any case, Ellyn called me at 3:00 to let me know that they had come home from a walk, and the key had broken. I was in The Bunker, expressing myself, so I just packed up and headed home. It was only 15 minutes early anyway.
They were walking around in the (extraordinarily chaotic) garden and, again, Finn was happy to see me but not crazed. I like that. It says to me that he is pretty secure.
As today is our 3-year wedding anniversary, we are going out, with Finn, for Indian Food.
Yum.
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