I have more power

"They must be very rich!" was what I imagined about my new employers when I was a "summer girl" in 1976 ("Play That Funky Music, White Boy"), when I first came into the house, and met the children and their mother.

I sort of knew, on another level, that this was actually the upper end of middle class -- I guess I knew the difference between a house with a swimming pool, vs. a palace, or something. 

Still I was very impressed, on an imaginative level -- partly, perhaps, because I am a person who LOVES to be impressed -- I don't know why -- and partly because when I first knocked on the door and entered, I came into an impressive, sort of cavernous entry-way...it was a split-level house, and only in the front-door entry-way area was the ceiling placed way high up, at the maximum height of the -- house....

Like, to the left and right, were -- the family room, and stairs leading up to a big living room next to the kitchen (and maybe a dining room behind that....)

Bedrooms and baths on upper level, a few more steps up, out of the kitchen.

So all those other rooms were just -- rooms, with regular-level ceilings, not particularly high....but that Entry-way was Impressive because the air-space extended up so high, overhead, and because of the cool, dark, stone floor -- squares, under your feet, and the décor.  Can hardly remember, but maybe a distinctive light fixture overhead, with some kind of imaginative, directional lighting, and something on the wall -- and on the floor, I think a plant in a pot, and a sort of pot or jar holding nothing, and also some kind of statue...exotic or strange....

The way that entry was built, and accessorized, made it instantly impressive when you walked in the front door.  It was the Impressive Entry.

The in-ground swimming pool was the other thing that sort of said,
"Wealth."
"Big money."
"We are rich."

Or at least it said that to me, and to my possibly overactive imagination.
("So we crashed the gate, doin' 98, I said Let-them-truckers-roll-TEN-four...")

When I told some of my high school classmates what my summer job was going to be, they said,

Why does the mom need a live-in baby-sitter?  Does she work?

No, she stays home full-time with the little kids.

..................... My friends assumed, along with me, then, that those people must be "rich."

Having your own swimming pool in your backyard, however, is a "double-edged sword" -- or maybe a tide that washes both ways...(?) -- I ask myself now, (having only slightly more real-estate savvy than I had at the age of 17...) if

an Impressive Entry, and

an in-ground swimming pool

are advantages that add to the "value" -- get-able buying price -- of a home, or ...not?

Looked at from a practical perspective, undazzled by the Beverly-Hills-like sparkle of having your own pool -- my goodness, when you factor in

1)  the maintenance (fuss) of the pool
and
2)  the risks and hazards

you start thinking maybe when a property has a pool. then that -- 

must --

knock a couple hundred-thousand-dollars off the price....? !

----------------- Looking it up...Forbes on-line, in an article, "6 Things You Think Add Value To Your Home -- But Really Don't" it says
1.  Swimming Pools.
Swimming pools are one of those things that may be nice to enjoy at your friend's or neighbor's house, but that can be a hassle to have at your own home.  Many potential homebuyers view swimming pools as dangerous, expensive to maintain and a lawsuit waiting to happen.

Families with young children in particular may turn down an otherwise perfect house because of the pool (and the fear of a child going in the pool unsupervised).  In fact, a would-be buyer's offer may be contingent on the home seller dismantling an above-ground pool or filling in an in-ground pool.------------------- [end Forbes excerpt]

...there we go....
And there we were, in Summer of '76 ("Country Boy--You Got Your Feet in L.A."), with a swimming pool and Two Little Kids!!
two girls -- one three years old, and
the toddler, 1-and-a-half years... The mom and I would take them into the pool with life preservers on, and a round ring thing that's filled with air, and the child can be in the middle of it...

They never had the neighbor children over to be in the pool, I don't think -- don't know if I can remember...

====================== I discovered satisfactions in the "summer girl" work mostly, I think, by problem-solving -- finding patterns of behavior and figuring out how to direct them, while letting them think it was their idea, & also having an unexpected situation where had to think on my feet....

One day little girls and I were outside in the front -- parents both gone -- and a man and woman approached, carrying pamphlets.  They were from one of those religions where they go door-to-door.  Wondering how to dissuade them, I let them give their intro, and then said,
"Well, my father is a Congregational minister, and -- the people who live here are Jewish, so..."

(I had hand gestures to go with it -- hand below neck, fingertips touching collarbone,
"My father is a Congregational minister, and --"
hand extended in the general direction of the house behind me, palm-up,
"...and the people who live here are Jewish, so...")

And off they went!  I didn't even get stuck with any of their literature.
(Jews!  Ministers!  Aaaaauuuugggghhhh!)

(It was the first time I had "Used Religion" to "manipulate" people. ...???)

= = = = = I never told the children's mother about that, because -- I got to know her style pretty quickly, and I just kind of knew that if I presented her with any information where --
there was no action to be taken
and
she wasn't there at the time it occurred...
she might start looking for something to fuss about.

My summer became "All About" Avoiding The Fuss.

I also never told her about the time the Three-Year-Old's little friend from across the street -- Robby W., who was also 3 -- locked the front door against his summer girl Lisa, and me.

"You can't come in!"

I said come on, we'll go in the garage and through the family room, quick before he remembers the other doors....
His three-year-old brain had not expanded to a Master Plan....locking out the summer girls by locking the One Door (in the Impressive Entry) was a Major Brainstorm and Act of Rebellion, and he was still glowing with the thrill and flush of that Big Step, when Lisa and I came into the Impressive Entry through the family room door.

"My" 3-year-old was unsurprised to see us, but Robby was gobsmacked.
He was just -- absolutely -- awestruck and frustrated.
(Where had his plan gone wrong??)
He stared up at me with milk-chocolate eyes so big his face almost could not contain them, and demanded, in his little voice,

"How did you get in here...?"

I bent down and said to him very seriously and calmly, "Summer girls can be everywhere."

We started organizing and moving the caravan of tots upstairs for coloring or a snack or whatever-it-was, and suddenly I felt a sort of "scritching" on my left leg.  Looked down, it was Robby tugging at the hem of my shorts.  When I leaned down to listen, he said,

"I have more power than you."

-30-