About 2 weeks or so ago a new kid started coming to my daughters bus stop. His Aunt (his guardian) brings him each morning. At first there was just a little polite conversation. Then one day she just started chatting and chatting. I found out the whole story behind this kid coming to live with her, what medications he takes, and other family dynamics. One of the things she told me was that this kid has siblings all over the place and one he doesn't even know about. I KNOW THIS BUT HE DOESN'T. I don't want to know this!
Now she stops to chat in front of my house (on the way back from the bus stop) fairly regularly. She makes me crazy! Don't get me wrong, she is nice and I find that we have several things in common, but she doesn't let me get a word in the conversation. She will go on and on and when there is an opening I will start to say something and she will just start talking over me. At first I would just stop. That did nothing. Then I would stop and just stare off into space. Nothing. I even tried to continue talking thinking that she would realize she had interrupted and stop. NOPE. It gets to be so infuriating!
TODAY she drops hints that she would like me to watch her nephew for an hour or two after school. She is looking for a new job and isn't sure if she will be home when he gets off the bus in the afternoon. She's known me for 2 weeks! I didn't know what to say so I kinda kept quiet at first, which is easy when she talks the whole time. Then I told her to get back to me when she has a job and knows her hours. We'd talk then. This makes me uncomfortable for a couple of reasons. One I don't enjoy taking care of other peoples kids. It isn't that I don't like the kids it's just that I don't like to be their caretakers. (That probably sounds awful.) Once in a while is ok but not all the time. Second, I have issues with taking money from them for watching their kid. I don't know what a fair price would be! It would only be a couple of hours a day after school for now. I don't want to take advantage of them and I don't want to be taken advantage of either. I'm hoping that this will blow over and I won't have to actually deal with it. *fingers crossed*
How do you deal with people who carry the whole conversation with out letting you speak?
How would you handle the babysitting question?
11 comments:
I have a friend who does that, but she's a long timer in our group of friends- we've all learned to kind of tune in and out. Don't worry so much about hurting her feelings - "talkers" don't really notice they're being tuned out, like they're immune to it or something. lol seriously.
As far as the babysitting thing, I'd just tell her your schedule is too full.
or could say your home owner's policy has some off the wall clause that prevents on-going child care services. :s
I hate when people tell me stuff like that.
I agree with catonya that you just say that you can't right now because you are too busy.
You can't let her rope you in for looking after her kids, I don't know if it's different over there but non-relatives have to register as childminders, get vetted etc etc.
Someone once told me that whenever someone is going on and you want to get away, say "well, I guess you're busy and I don't want to keep you". It works a lot of the time!
Question numero uno: I have no problem holding my finger up in a "Shhhh" type of manner when someone keeps rambling on. It's a bit rude, but it gets the point across and they usually shut up and let me speak. I do it to students all the time at work. They're usually pretty apologetic and rarely does it really piss someone off.
Question numero dos: I dunno. I'm not good at turning people down either. I suppose it all depends on your mood at the moment. If you've had a crumby day and you're in a fierce mood, I would tell her the way it is. If you're in a good mood and you don't mind helping a sista out, then cool. I don't know, yo. Good luck, shorty.
OY this sounds MISERABLE. I actually have a VERY good friend that talks and talks and always makes every conversation about her. It is very frustrating. My way of dealing is not talking to her that often unfortunately...so basically my advice is avoidance! ha ha...
In terms of the babysitting thing, you may have to just come right out and say no. Make something up if you have to but if you're not comfortable then you're just not comfortable. Don't stress yourself out about this!
Ask for a lot of money, like $40 an hour.
Ask for a hell of a lot of money...ok...I wrote that before I saw Paul's comment...now it just looks like I copied.
You hardly know her, so I don't think you have to be overly polite. You can either be more aggressive in talking yourself, or just bring your headphones for the walk home so you can pointedly tune her out.
And you shouldn't feel bad about saying no. You're right, it is weird for her to ask seeing how she hardly knows you.
I bet you are the only person who talks to this lady, it sounds like she just needs a friend. If it gets too much, just say in a loud voice, "Well, I have to get home, see you later."
It sounds like this child needs some good supervision....Does he play well with your kids? This is totally up to you, but if you don't feel good about it, just tell her no...IF you want to help and earn a few dollars, tell her you will give it a try and see how things work out. Or tell her you have too much going on in the afternoon to do extra child care. Maybe the school has an after hours program for working mothers. Good luck, go with your gut feeling.
I'm a little late here... I have neighbors who'll chat my ears off if I let them so I try to do the friendly neighbor wave and then walk fast and avoid them. It's rude but we're just neighbors, and I have no desire to be friends with them. If I do get caught up I always use the excuse of having an appointment or needing to call someone for something or whatever.
I can imagine it'll be tougher to get away from her in this situation, though, so there I wish you luck.
And, as far as babysitting goes, charge her minimum wage. It's like 5.25 or something now, right? So tell her it'd be minimum wage per hour. There's no reason to babysit for less than that because watching children requires all your attention during the hours you're watching them, and you would be a good, qualified caretaker with built-in playmates (if your kids get along with this kid).
If you don't want to watch the kid, there's nothing wrong with that. You're not related to her, you don't really know her, so there's no reason to feel guilty about saying you're too busy with your own family, or that you're not interested. Suggest to her looking on something like babysitter.com to find a sitter in the area.
*I meant sittercity.com
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