the nanny

i have spent the last two friday nights in the valley and whenever i am there i am so, so, so happy that i do not live there anymore. there is something about the valley at night that is intensely depressing to me, it feels foreign and unfamilar even though i lived there for so, so long. the darkness makes it feel like some town i just exited to off the freeway, that i've never been to before, and will never be back to, nothing to remember. but i do go back to the valley. i also feel like it is crawling with teenagers. ew.

so, i've got this job. i nanny for an eight month old baby. i like it and i like the cold, hard cash i get paid in. it is a bit lonely though. i spend hours on end with someone who will never remember me, unless i become a permanent factor in her life which seems unlikely. i might be around when she turns one, but certainly not two, or three or four. my fourth birthday is one of my first memories. i remember my uncle got my a barbie coloring book and a box of crayons. he didn't wrap it he just put it in a plastic bag. my uncle has never been married and that was probably the physical, usable, present he gave me. it's been twenty dollars bills ever since, and yes, they are physical and i can use them, but i couldn't color on them or build anything out of them. when i die the baby will probably be around 60, with grandchildren possibly, but she won't know who i am, how i fed her and changed her and hummed itsy bitsy spider. i watch the baby to make sure she doesn't put anything dangerous in her mouth. i am supposed to be entertaining her but she is pretty good at entertaining herself. one of their windows faces a schoolyard and kids are always out screaming and playing. she can watch those kids play for minutes, which in baby time is long. maybe we don't remember infancy because it is so boring.

i am graduating soon and i am thinking about jobs that i want to have. i don't want a job that perpetuates a cycle that i don't like. and i am trying to decide if i like the cycle of academia. do i want to get my mfa so i can teach creative writing at the college level, it just seems so worthless, even though i have had some great writing teachers. i don't know how much school has helped me and sometimes i wish i never would have gone. it just makes me feel like everyone else, and it is a jungle out there and i don't want to be like everyone else. but there are millions of kids graduating from college, and working at some crappy job, tyring to pay off massive student loans, and why? i don't know if i want to be a part of that. so what cycles do i want to be a part of. i think i like nannying because it is a cycle that i don't mind being a part of, having a hand in.