On Duty by Jamie Kirkpatrick

So there I was, Honorary Vice President of the Four Monkeys Babysitting Club for the next three days. And on Herself’s birthday weekend, to boot. How did this happen? I guess I owe you an explanation…

It all started almost a year ago when my daughter-in-law and son-in-law accepted an invitation to a weekend wedding in Charleston, South Carolina. Hmmm… what about their four kids? “I’ll watch them,” Herself said in a heartbeat. “But that’s your birthday weekend,” I mumbled. “So?” she said. “We can celebrate later. I don’t like birthdays anyway. We’ll have a blast!” My goose went in the oven to cook.

But, to be honest, it goes back further than that, nine or ten years, at least. After more than two decades of peas-and-carrots bachelorhood, I was preparing to propose. Or proposing to prepare. You choose. At the time, there was only one grandchild in the local picture, so an occasional baby-sitting gig didn’t seem like it would pose much of a problem. In the throes of proposing, one tends not to think about all that second marriage entail: the blending of families, the new responsibilities assumed, the love that gets multiplied. Only after it’s much too late does it hit you: this is a package deal!

Now, lest you think for a moment that I’m complaining about any of my assumed grandfatherly responsibilities, let me say that I wouldn’t exchange them for all the oranges in Florida. The juice is so worth the squeeze. Oh sure, I thought I had an inkling about what I was getting into, but as Poet Frost told us, “way leads on to way,” and now there are four grandchildren in Household A, two in Household B, and two more in Household C. And on this particular weekend, we were on duty in Household A.

On the first afternoon of duty, the kids ran in from school and I shared a big hug from G2N (Grandchild Number 2). We whispered about her day at school; we couldn’t let go. Suddenly, it was a bull market and my shares were soaring! As in the Christmas carol, for the next hour or two, “all was calm, all was bright,” but as the dinner hour drew near, just as Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe predicted, things began to fall apart. Thankfully, Herself rose to the challenge, I poured myself a glass of wine, and pretty soon, we were watching the kids eat a little of this and a little of that. Everyone was laughing, talking about the best parts of their respective days. One plate hit the floor, but somehow—miracle of miracles—the mess got cleaned up and we moved on without any tears or recrimination.

At the end of the first day, we played a game of Uno, watched some TV, and eventually, up to bed they went, one-by-one. The next-to-last had to be carried up stairs; who knew a nine-year old could weigh more than a Great Dane?  And then suddenly the house grew still and all the lights were off…

The next morning, I heard them before I saw them. I think the sun was up, but I’m not sure. As it was Herself’s actual birthday, there was some singing to do, some breakfasts to make. We sailed along until someone (yours truly) looked at the time and asked Herself what time the kids needed to be at the ice rink for their skating lessons. “We need to leave here by 10:30,” she said.

“Are you sure?” said I. “I thought you said they had to be there by 10.”

She checked the schedule that had been meticulously prepared and left behind by the Chairman of the Board, then looked at her watch. “Uh-oh,” I heard her say. “Kids! We have to leave in 10 minutes,” she yelled. “Come on! Get dressed!!”

Four kids in pajamas and a kitchen in complete disarray. Nevertheless, ten minutes later, they were out the door, and I had been demoted from Executive Vice President of Baby-Sitting to Assistant Interim Director of Kitchen Clean-Up. Such is a grandfather’s lot…

Everything else is a blur. I think there were four full dishwasher loads, a load or two of laundry, at least two dozen eggs and two pounds of bacon, one Saturday afternoon soccer game, one Sunday morning ballet class (minus one shoe), and maybe a birthday cake somewhere in between. But who really knows? Maybe it was all just a dream. By the time Sunday afternoon rolled around, Herself and I had Household A running like one of those new driverless cars. What could possibly go wrong?

My grandfather name is Geep and I’ll be right back.

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His debut novel, “This Salted Soil,” and a delightful children’s book, “The Ballad of Poochie McVay,” are available on Amazon. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth,” is coming soon…