Why return from your vacation when you can evacuate it? Yesterday morning before the sun would have risen if it were feeling up to it, we packed up our barely large enough SUV and stopped at the BP down the road in Surf City, NC to top off our tank.  This morning, that BP looks a little different.

We made the 7-hour trip in about 9.5 hours, safe and somewhat sound. We tied down trash cans and brought in the outdoor furniture (and by we, I mean I unpacked while Daniel did such things).  He visited five stores to acquire bottled water, an overabundance of snacks, shelf stable milk for our little milk addicts, propane, candles, whatever batteries he could find for our existing flashlights (no additional flashlights or lanterns to be found, much less procured), ground coffee, a French press and powdered creamer, and an embarrassing amount of canned goods. As my mother-in-law pointed out while giving me hard-won hurricane survival tips, I'm not really a "can person."  When I tried to make the list for Daniel to take with him, I didn't even know what to put on it.  He said, "We need SpaghettiO's and stuff."  Oh. This is not the type of food my children are accustomed to and, while I do have somewhat fond memories of Chef Boyardee and SpaghettiO's from my childhood, I do not look forward to reliving them as an adult. 

Daniel's preparedness so overwhelmed me when he returned after 10:00 last night, that I couldn't even put the stuff away-- there was nowhere for it to go.  The prepackaged preparedness sits around my kitchen in boxes and shopping totes, hoping to get donated (though, with all the money we spent on it, dinner time might be a little different around here this week, power or not).

So far, we're getting drenched but little else.  The rain beats rhythmically on our red tin roof while everyone else naps (thanks to my really good in a crisis, real or imagined, husband, I squeezed my nap in earlier in the day).  Here's hoping Irene is gentle enough to make the preparation the most exciting part of the storm.

Twelve years ago tonight, I couldn't sleep.  I was preparing to drive 500 miles with the whole fam, to where I knew no one except Tim, my really Southern recruiter.  I was about to move in with Edie, the randomly selected roommate I had already tried to trade.  I was about to start my life.

That first night, driving to and through the tiny town, I lamented that no one would be like me.  The next day my dad pointed at a girl's meticulously labled boxes and mentioned my tupperware container marked "Nail Polish."  "I think you might not be the only one...like you," he said.  I was not convinced.

Eleven years and fifty-one weeks ago, I met some of the best friends of my life, I just didn't know it yet.  I still haven't figured out how to make friends like I did then.

And this matters because tonight, I am sitting beside my little sister who leaves for her freshman year of college in the morning. We are up too late, having discussed what she should wear while moving in, counseling her that she will not have enough closet space for all the clothes she has chosen to pack, rolling clothes to fit more into any vessel we could find, and having traveled to Walgreens in our jammies for prints to put in her twenty-eight frames, twenty-seven of which she will keep and one that she will give to my three and a half year old who adores her.  When I left, twelve years ago, Sarah was six and I was sad to leave her, scared of the change, excited for the fresh start.

I am scared, sad and excited all over again, and hoping the next fifteen years go a lot slower than the last twelve.

Searching for a nanny online is, to an unsettling degree, like online dating.  Having had the unfortunate occasion to have tried both now, I know what I’m talking about. Our beloved day care provider is retiring.  She is the only one who has ever watched our kids (for more than a couple of hours), aside from family. She is family.  She wants me to promise to let the girls stay with her one day a week after she retires so they can have "girl time."  Her daughters are trying to get her to pull a Brett Favre, but  I can’t count on it.

So,  I signed up for a free trial of Sittercity, an online nanny/babysitter search service.  This trial allowed me to create and post a job description and to see when people had applied, but not to actually read the applications.  Fine.  I guess, as in online dating, it’s not a terrible thing to know people had to pay to play.  So I paid (after finding an online coupon code, of course).

Whoa.  This enabled me not only to read the applications of the people who applied, but also to search for nannies that might meet my specifications, even supplying, in some cases, references, background check results, and reviews.  This is where it got weird. The profiles are pretty basic: a photo, first name and last initial, age, location, and basic certifications and credentials. From here, I began to establish my list of tips for prospective nannies:

1. Practice Photo Etiquette. You are trying to get a job, not a date.  And not a job dancing or waiting tables or posing provocatively, either.  You are trying to get a job caring for children in their parents’ absence.  There must be no cleavage, no seductive poses, no pouty lips, no risqué clothing, and never, under any circumstances, should you be wearing a bathing suit. Which brings me to,

2. Know your audience. Off hand, I’d say there’s a 95% chance the person perusing your profile is a woman, a mother, who is in the stressful and emotionally draining process of searching for someone to care for her child, a job she likely thinks no one is actually qualified to do.  In addition to that, the whole nanny and husband scenario is pretty done at this point.  You’re already at a disadvantage, perception wise.  Do not make it worse.

3. Learn to spell.  Really.  Or, at the very least, spell check.  If you tell me you are studying elementary education and can’t spell “church,” I will not hire you.  You can’t profess a love of learning and that you will teach my child to read and write if it doesn’t seem like you know how. Likewise,

4. No shorthand. This is not a text message, it’s a profile on a job site you had to pay to join.  Use punctuation, capital letters, and spell words out.  Be professional.

5. Don’t be gorgeous and 22.  Okay, this is only half serious, and it’s probably just me.  But while hiring a nanny is bound to make this next stage of our family’s life much more bearable, I do not relish it.  In our interviews, I have felt as if I am hiring someone to do what is actually my job.  The women we have interviewed have all been wonderful, professional, courteous, good with the kids, and sweet.  They are not the problem; I am.  And I can’t help but feel that if I walk into my house and see a young woman with my baby on her hip, wiping down the counter in my kitchen and laughing with my husband I might just turn around and walk out.  No one wants to feel replaceable, least of all in her most important roles.

This process was always going to be terrible.  It feels impossible to find someone great to watch my kids when I just want to be there and feel like I’m missing it.  The occasional email I would read aloud to Daniel that started, “Hi, I’m Gaby and I’m Brazilian” (that one got a raised eyebrow and a resolute “no, thank you” ) were funny, but this is a big deal.  This person will have a front-row view into our marriage, our family, our life.  It’s not always a pretty picture. I am not proud of my complicated feelings on the matter, and I didn’t intend to turn something that’s all about them into all about me. I’m not sure what the right way to go about this is, but not everything is better online.