I'm A Stranger Here, Part II

This week, I'm looking after my nephew and niece at their home. Sis tricked me into doing this after telling me she has to attend a conference in France and no one is available to look after the kids, not even her fiance, who works in another city and would have too far to commute to take care of the kids. I had rearranged all my evening activities to do this for her. Then I found out in fact, they had both taken off for France together. I can't help feeling I've been tricked here under false pretenses.

I had planned to return home each day to tend to mine and my own family's needs but be with my nephew and niece in the evening, overnight, and in the morning. But this morning, Niece said she wasn't feeling well and can't go to school. Now I am spending the whole day with her and my appointments are shot. But she seems well enough playing with her nanny's daughter.

The nanny is here mornings only. As she arrived this morning, so did two other kids. These are Niece's friends. Sis has an arrangement with their parents that they share the nanny before school. Then the contractors came through. Suddenly, the house is a chaos of noise and I am not dressed.

But Nanny skilfully organizes everyone and I get myself cleaned up. After Nephew and the two friends leave for school, Nanny goes to buy groceries. This morning, she's leaving her daughter with me so Nanny's Daughter will keep Niece occupied and Nanny will return from her shopping sooner. But it still comes down to me now looking after Niece and Nanny's Daughter.

It's interesting watching the two little girls play. For one thing, they both have their finger and toe nails painted pink. They look like pre-teens already, these five-year-olds. Thank god the content of their talk is still that of five-year-olds. They sit nicely and draw pictures, telling each other what they are doing and why.

Niece is a princess. She talks in a soft voice, buys strawberries, ham and bread in their play shopping, she draws pictures of clouds and trees and rivers. Nanny's Daughter, well she keeps talking about building things. Her father-to-be is a builder. She calls out her shopping list of cheese, meat and rice, she draws a compass on her picture, sketches in people and houses and draws in directions of how to get from one place to another.

I ask them what they're doing. They both answer, "Drawing." What are you drawing, I ask. Niece tells me she's drawing a ship to look for treasures. Then she draws in a rain storm. Nanny's Daughter tells me she's drawing a map. Niece shrieks, Where's the treasure on your map? Nanny's Daughter says it's under Rockfall Land.

They've given names to the various places on their drawings. Niece will get off at Storm Hill so Nanny's Daughter needs to put a treasure there too. She will be attacked by Super Waves. Nanny's Daughter says you have to roll up the map and put it in Arabic Land. Somehow, they make their drawings and stories work. Then they tell me where all the imaginary treasures are hidden in the house so I don't inadvertently remove them.

Meanwhile, there are workers in the house, turning the attic into living space. There's banging going on, the girls are jumping around and singing. If I was a mother with young children, this could be a nice communal set up and support network; may even be pleasant. But I am not. My days of young kids are over and I have a different life to tend to. So Grrrrr and fie on all this. I want to go home.