Oh, Mercy, Mercy Me......

I know I said I wouldn't use names but I don't see the problem in this one....Mercy is the name of their housekeeper who is there literally EVERY day, ALL day. If I thought MY job was hard, hers must be hell. She does the same laborious things every day- does the laundry, folds it and puts it in their rooms, irons, vacuums, washes the floor, cleans the bathrooms and the bedrooms, cleans the kitchen, etc. etc. etc. I don't know how she doesn't pass out from exhaustion.

Mercy is my new favorite person. I adore her. She keeps to herself and doesn't talk much, but when you get her talking she's a riot. I always make a point to say hi every time I see her and to smile every chance I get. She probably needs the pick-me-up. I feel like we're on a team, Mercy and me. We work for the family doing the labor and we share the nanny bedroom. The nanny bedroom is where I'm instructed to leave my purse and my coat and shoes. She irons in there. One time, I went in there to get something from my purse and she was sitting at the desk eating a hamburger and reading the paper. Even Mercy gets time to eat!

Mercy and I bonded today. The mom picked up W from school today (why, I'm not sure) so I was supposed to meet them at the house. Well I got to the house on time but they didn't arrive for 20 more minutes. It was just Mercy and me in the house. I kicked back, put on my obligatory slippers, caught up on texts, and got some water. The only quiet 20 minutes I'll ever have there again.

It was just me and W again all day. M had a birthday party and wasn't getting home until later, so W and I did what we do best- play and giggle. We started to play one of her creative "role-playing" games but her mom came in and preferred her to play with one of her puzzles that will challenge her mentally. It makes me so sad; she is a 5 year-old girl. She's using her imagination which is what they're supposed to do and it wasn't good enough. That child is so smart though. We played a logic game that her mom brought out and she was brilliant at it. All the while, eating her 42 pistachios. I know it was 42 exactly because she counted up all the shells when she was done to find out how many she ate. I had my own stroke of genius when I compared a pistachio to a venus fly trap. Have you ever seen a venus fly trap? And have you ever seen a pistachio? They seriously look like. Now she's had a healthy snack and learned something new at the same time.

I like teaching her new things. The other day I told her about zodiac signs. She was really into it. I don't know much about them so I wasn't the best teacher, but she was into it.

In the middle of playing with the logic puzzle game and eating pistachios, I hear the voice of a very friendly woman at the front door. W runs out to see who it is and the young woman introduces herself as T (name will be excluded). I know the look of a woman like this right away- she is clearly a nanny or something of the sort. She was very friendly and said that W looked beautiful in her dress.... that's my line. I automatically went into suspicious/paranoid mode and thought about all the options of who she could be. Was she going to be the nanny for their weekend house? Did the mother know that I was eating off of their plates and she was going to fire me and replace me with this chick? I got in a very bad mood because I was mad the mother didn't tell me who she was. I felt betrayed. I started asking W if she knew who she was and she had her own theories but didn't really know.

Later, the mother comes into the bedroom and says, "E, can I see you for a minute?" I swear my heart was racing. I thought I was getting fired and replaced. I came to find out that this girl was being hired to be an EXTRA tutor for M because she thought she needed more time for her homework. I mean, are you kidding?? This poor child. So good news, I'm not being replaced. I am kind of sad though that I won't be able to help her with her homework anymore. I really enjoyed that.

Even worse though, was the mother saying to me, "I don't want W to think that you're leaving and this girl is going to start watching her. Would you mind explaining that to her? And don't tell M about this". I said "sure!" and "of course!" when what I wanted to say was, "actually, that's something YOU should break to W, and I won't tell M because I hope that YOU will tell her soon". This was a moment straight out of "The Nanny Diaries".

I tried to explain to W that I wasn't going anywhere and that this new girl would be here some days in the week, but she didn't seem to care. I don't think she was worried in the first place. Now I look like an idiot.

Playtime continued, with more "Bethany the Ballet Fairy" and more games. She tended to her injured bear again, using a little calculator for a thermometer. I thought that was so clever. This is what I mean by using their imagination. Only a child could look at a calculator and think, this will be the thermometer!

I was told that the family was leaving for their weekend house by 6:30 when I'm normally done for the night at 8:00. This meant I was leaving an hour and a half early. I can't say I was too upset about that, but I was upset that she didn't tell me earlier. That's an hour and a half of work that I wasn't getting paid for.

Since the schedule was off for the day, I gave W a bath on her own. It felt lonely without her sister to play with her. I kept her entertained pretty well but she got extra time since it was just her. I got to read her a book while she was in the bath. It reminded me of when I was kid and my dad would play the guitar to me while I was in the bath. If I knew how to play guitar, I would have serenaded her.

Then came my favorite part of the day: blow drying her hair. It was just me, her and Mercy in the house because the mom went to pick up M from her birthday party. I started singing "You'll Never Know", one of the songs from the 1940's cabaret, while drying her hair. The blow dryer was so loud I could hardly hear myself. I guess I was singing a little more loudly than I realized because Mercy came in the room saying, "is that YOU singing?" She totally startled me and I got embarrassed that she could hear me. She said it was beautiful and she wasn't used to hearing singing in the house. She asked if I was an opera singer.

Hahahahahaha.

When I'm a mother, there will be singing in the house ALL the time.

Then I started doing ballet with her since I knew she was in a ballet class. I used one of the posters on her bed as a ballet barre and did some plies and releves with her. I came up with a combination that she really liked for some reason and she ran out to get Mercy to show her. Again, I was embarrassed, but Mercy enjoyed the simple combination. I told you, I adore her.

M came home from school and I was instructed to pack their bags for the weekend house. For real? I put M's homework in her bag and I put vests on the girls and gave them their scarves and hats. I made sure W had enough fairy books in the bag to get her through the weekend. Then their car was waiting outside, I went down in the elevator with them, and then they walked into their car and I onto the subway. They didn't even hug me goodbye.

Hey, weekend.