Babysitting” by Nancy Newman

 

Ballerina Nancy with her mom, dad, and big brother

In past generations, childcare provided by fathers was known as babysitting. Mine would have been fired. As evidence, I submit the following.

At the age of four, I believed I had great artistic talent. My landscapes were brilliant, and when my catalogue grew too large to be contained in my small bedroom, I decided to share my talent with the neighbours. I hopped on my sky-blue tricycle (a recent delivery by train from Grandad, thanks to his Eaton’s Employee Discount) and went from door to door, depositing one piece of paper in each neighbour’s mailbox.

When I got to the Browns’, Mr. Brown stepped out onto his porch. “What have we here?” he asked, reaching for my offering.

I hadn’t been sure of the etiquette of distributing artwork and now having been caught, I silently handed over my drawing.

Mr. Brown admired my work. “Talent such as this should be rewarded!” he said, handing me a dime.

A dime! I had no idea how far a dime would go, but I did know where I wanted to spend it. The toy store was only a short trip down the Trans Canada Highway.

It is Mom’s memories that I count on for the balance of this story. She left me with Dad and went to the same shopping centre where the toy store was. As she would tell the story repeatedly in years to come, she was driving back along the Trans Canada Highway and saw a small child riding a tricycle towards her on the side of the road.

She thought, what sort of lunatic would let their child ride a bike out here? As she got closer, she realized she and my father were the lunatics. I have a vague recollection of a hysterical woman pulling me off my bike and throwing me and the bike in the back of the car.

The ride home was silent, except that Mom kept mumbling to herself.

Over the years, I have repeatedly asked Dad how long it was before Mom spoke to him again. He always gets this glint in his eye and a little smirk on his face but never answers the question.

The funny thing is that this wasn’t the first time my father had failed at “babysitting”. Not long before this, we had all been at a neighbour’s cottage, some would say cabin, just outside of Sioux Ste. Marie. It was a place we frequented often. The cottage was on St. Mary’s River, a shipping lane joining Lake Huron and Lake Superior. On the other side of the river was the great state of Michigan, and in 1961, this border was wide open. `

This neighbour was more than a neighbour. We called them Uncle Ken and Aunty Noreen. Their son Danny was my brother Tom’s age (6 at the time), and their daughter, Karen, was my age (3). This made for instant friendships. On the day in question, the moms had gone off to town to get all the essentials of a good summer vacation: groceries, cigarettes, ice, and alcohol.

Tom and Danny were throwing their homemade spears in the yard as usual. They managed to hit the plastic pipe that carried water from the lake to the cottage. An inch either way and they wouldn’t have destined us to a thirsty summer.

Dad and Uncle Ken decided that the best solution was for them both to go to the local general store to get the replacement parts, leaving the four of us alone. More than 60 years later, no one can answer, “Why did it take two adult men to carry two feet of plastic pipe and two clamps?”

Once alone, the four of us decided to take the motorboat, one of those small fishing boats with a 10 hp motor and go across to the landing on the Michigan side for ice cream. We could be back before our dads! We searched the cottage for loose change. Scrounged from the cushions of the overstuffed chesterfield and the pockets of various raincoats hanging on nails by the door, we put together a sufficient treasure, we hoped. Down to the boat, a couple of tugs on the pull chord, and we were on our way.

It was all a great success until the outboard motor hit something just short of the wharf at the landing. We were no longer moving, just floating, staring down cargo ships. Out came the oars, and with considerable uncoordinated paddling, we made it to the wharf.

Having spent enough time around boats, the boys knew the problem with he motor was the sheer pin. In no time, they dismantled the propeller and removed the remaining bits. We now knew that our money for ice cream would be spent in the hardware store for repairs, but more importantly, we needed to get it repaired and be back home before any of the parents returned!

St. Mary's River

Meanwhile, back at the cottage, the dads had returned to find no children AND no boat! That was the only boat they had. But Uncle Ken’s filthy rich brother Frank owned the nice cottage next door, and he had two (!) boats….and a phone!

The cottage was locked, but so what? They broke a window and searched for keys. When they couldn’t find them, Uncle Ken called Frank.

“Frank, Frank! Where are the keys to your boat?”

“Ken? Where are you?”

“I’m in your cottage, Frank! I need your boat! I can’t find the kids, and my boat is gone!”

“You broke into my cottage?”

“Frank, that is not what matters right now, right?”

Somewhere in all that, Frank gave up the hiding spot for the boat keys, and the dads headed off into the open waters. Up and down the shore, they searched for any sign of us.

“Where do you think they’d have gone?” Dad asked.

“They could be anywhere,” Uncle Ken replied, barely audible over the racing engine.

Eventually, they decided we might have headed to the landing, and as they approached the wharf, they saw the boat with the engine raised out of the water.

They clambered out of the boat, secured it to the dock, and ran out onto the main street. There, they spotted two little girls standing outside the hardware store. When they entered the store, they found two little boys successfully negotiating with the man behind the counter for the required shear pin.

With everything repaired and with our promises to never tell our mothers, we returned to the cottage. It wasn’t long before the secret leaked out. All it takes is for someone to ask a child “And what did you do today?” for it to unravel.

I don’t remember my father sleeping on the couch or babysitting me again.

***

Nancy Newman is a retired teacher, mother of three, and grandmother of one, residing most of the year in Gravenhurst, Ontario. She loves all things done in or on the water. Earlier this year her father celebrated his 100th birthday inspiring Nancy to take some writing courses to help her put his stories down on paper.

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