2004-04-05
how to tell a nanny from a mother
I was at the park yesterday (before the daily torrential downpour) and a Czechoslovakian nanny named Lucy came up to me and started talking.
The place was full of kids running around and climbing on things and falling down and hurting themselves and crying. And parents were there too, sitting on benches drinking tea or "tea," (wink, wink) telling them to get back up on the jungle gym because cement doesn't hurt that bad.
We chatted for a bit, then Lucy decided to take the children for a walk to tire them out.
(Tiring children out is the main objective of any nanny. Who cares about potty training and vegetables? If you're a nanny, you want your charges to be as exhausted as possible as quickly as possible. You want them asleep by seven, eight at the latest.)
As she left, I asked her how she knew I was a nanny before we spoke. There were plenty of other young mothers, some better-dressed and some worse than I.
"You're wearing earrings," Lucy said as she walked away. "The mothers never do that once they've had kids."
betholindo at 10:54 a.m.