Ugh.

Papa has to return to school in a few months. He loves school. He does not love the idea of leaving you behind while he is at school. He may have to do this. The classes he needs to take are during the day. So he must look for a babysitter of some sort. But where does he look? Who can he find? Why does he constantly refer to himself in the third person?

When he was growing up, babysitters grew in everyone’s vegetable gardens. When the time came, all we had to do was raise our hand, maybe give a low whistle or holler, and a babysitter would rise out of the soil like a plucked carrot, dust off her clothes, shake out her hair. Sometimes we’d find dirt behind her ears, or maybe a beet leaf dangling from her tangled mane. I think one girl once wore cantaloupe rinds for shoes, which made great sclortching sounds when she walked on mom’s freshly-waxed linoleum. But she was always on time, always played games with us, always made sure we had a snack before we went to bed.

There are not seen very many vegetable gardens where we live–at least not the magical kind that produce babysitters. Perhaps I need to check under our lavender and rhododendrons.

What to do, what to do.