No German class next week. Should I tell my family or not? If I tell them that I have to go to class then at least I have those three mornings free. But then I have to wake up early and find somewhere to be. And Tuesday is a holiday. They’re not going to believe me if I say I have class on Tuesday. Okay, I’ll just tell them the truth I guess. I think I overheard Gabi saying that she’s taking the kids to Regensburg for a few days this week. God, I hope that’s true. You know you have a crappy job when you look forward to being left alone to clean. 
 
Ader went to Morocco for two weeks yesterday :( But then he comes to Munich :) And in these two weeks, either I’ll get my visa and can start more aggressively looking for a new job, or I won’t and I’ll go buy a plane ticket which I can change the date for. Doing either one of these things will feel pretty amazing.

If I ever get the money that’s owed to me, I have to go pay for next month’s metro card, my next German class (I’ll be up to B1!), and buy all my winter things-boots, gloves, a scarf, a hat…I saw a lot of cute, cheap, non-leather things at Forever 18. That’s what the Germans call Forever 21. And the money better come soon. I must have asked at least fifteen times now, verbally and in writing, “Can I get paid now?” Every time I get the same answer, “Ja, klar. Erinnere mich später.” I hope this doesn’t become any more of an issue than it already is.

I also hope that I find the time/workspace/inspiration to work on my novel soon. I heard back from my editor and I need to cut out some characters and then choose one perspective—first or third—and stick to it. So basically, rewriting will probably be as many hours of work as writing was. Can’t say I didn’t know it would be like that though. If my novel doesn’t make its way into a literary agent’s hands before the summer, it probably never will.

Unless every law school I applied to rejects me. That’s another thing I should know about soon. And once I know if and where I’m going to law school, then I can start looking for jobs for Ader and then an apartment for us. There will be so much planning for the future to be done! Which, in case you haven’t realized yet, is kind of my favorite thing to do.  

I’m majorly stressing about my visa. I sent all my paperwork three weeks ago and I was told I have to wait six to eight weeks, so in a way I guess I should chill out. But then all the other au pairs who needed visas tell me that they did something slightly different than what I’m doing to get my visa, plus I’m never 100% sure that I understand things correctly in German. 
 
Best case scenario: my visa gets here on time, I find another family who wants to hire me in January. I spend Christmas and New Years with Ader, and then work normal hours for a nice family as an au pair, not a maid.

Worst case scenario: My visa never gets here and I have to go back to New Jersey on December 12. As much as I don’t like being in the States, I would probably by that point know if I got into law school and I could concentrate on rewriting my novel and then finding an agent. Plus I wouldn’t miss family Hanukkah, and then it would still be possible for me to come back to Germany on January 11 and work six months more. Actually, I’m realizing just now as I’m writing this that my life will very likely get better shortly. Hmmm.

Speaking of things getting better, Ader is coming to Munich in less than a month! He’s only staying for a weekend, but then I probably don’t have to wait too long to see him again, so I think I can deal. Out hotel is booked, so for two nights I get to sleep in a room with heat and a lock on the door, and for two mornings I get to wake up to my own alarm or whenever I feel like it, not to screaming kids.

We’re doing a free walking tour on Saturday and then eating in a restaurant. I need to do some more research about which restaurant, which is my favorite kind of research. We might also do one meal in a beer garden, although I’m not sure how much fun that will be if it’s freezing out and we don’t partake in the beer or meat. Then on Sunday the museums only cost a euro, so we’ll probably do that until we have to go to the airport because the malls will be closed. And because I like museums. Actually, I like just about any activity with my boyfriend.

Next week is normal and then the week after that I don’t have my German class and I don’t have to pick the kids up from school because they have the week off too. I think that means I’ll have some extra free time, but we’ll see.

I’ve been here for over a month now. Time for another rant: I want to leave. I think I’ve given this job a fair chance. I’ve done my best, I really have. I save all my sarcastic comments in my head for later. Instead of my usual passive aggressiveness I try and talk my problems out, which isn’t usually successful and just generates more sarcastic comments for me to repress. 
 
The main problem is that I don’t like the family I work for. My first instinct is to say that I don’t like the children, but that’s not really fair. At five and seven years old, kids are still like dogs in that they can’t really be blamed for their own bad behavior. Who I really can’t stand are the parents who are doing a really half-assed job of teaching their kids basic manners: Saying please and thank you. Not yelling and throwing tantrums over minor things like the waitress bringing your sprite out two minutes later and in a different glass than your brother’s.

And they’re not even trying to teach their children to be grateful for what they have or cognizant of the people who clean up after them. I will die of shock the first time I see Sophie or Robin put their own toys away or stop and say, “Let’s not play with this right now because it just creates more of a mess for Aga and Rose, who work hard enough already.” Or the first time we go to a restaurant and Axel doesn’t bitch at the waiter because his wiener schnitzel isn’t coming out fast enough. Or the first time Gabi and Axel share a pot of tea instead of making two separate ones, thus leaving me with fewer dishes to wash...

Last weekend we were in a hotel in the mountains, and two things became clear to me: as awful as the children are, they aren’t any better behaved with their parents than they are with me. Therefore, it’s probably unrealistic of me to think I can bribe or discipline them into being any less terrible. I also realized that Gabi and Axel don’t get along very well and their marriage doesn’t seem to be a happy one. In the month that I’ve been here I don’t think they’ve spent more than one interrupted hour awake and in the same room before last weekend, and it’s because they bicker constantly…I guess if I can’t change jobs, I can just gossip a lot to make myself feel a little better.

This weekend, while nursing a cold, I finished The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. It’s the kind of book that makes me wish that I were still in a book club because I really want to hear other people’s thoughts about this. Basically the author spent a year trying out some conventional and some unconventional wisdom about how to make oneself happy and reported her findings.

I was ready to disagree with everything she had to say. Gretchen Rubin went to Yale law school (therefore she’s waaay smarter than me), wrote lots of books about American history (the most boring subject in the world to me), and has two daughters. While I have absolutely nothing against parents or want-to-be-someday parents (most people in the world whom I love are in these categories), I don’t ever want children and think of myself as fundamentally different than people who do. So I wasn’t feeling very receptive to Ms. Rubin’s advice.

But once I convinced myself that I probably shouldn’t switch jobs, only because there’s no guarantee that the switch would not be for the worse, I figured I need to find a way to make myself happier with the situation I’m in. I’d always heard that people can choose to be happy or unhappy, and this is one of the pretexts of The Happiness Project. But my happiness had always seemed to depend on external factors. I’m picnicking in a Parisian park with my boyfriend? I’m at the beach gossiping and tanning with my best friend? I’m watching Parks and Recreation with my mom after a tiring but productive day? The of course I’m happy, how could I not be? But my train is stalled at rush hour and people are stepping on my toes? It’s mid-April and I’m still wearing my winter jacket? I need quiet place to write and can’t find one because it’s Sunday and not a single fricking library is open? The of course I’m not happy, how could I be?

Turns out there are still things you can do. Singing in the morning, for example, can actually help. Okay, I haven’t starting singing in the morning, but I listen to a few uplifting songs instead of NPR while getting dressed now and it actually makes me feel better. I used to think (and I guess I still kind of do) that listening to a song you like too often will “wear out” that song. If I listen to any song I like too much, then logically, one day I’ll be incapable of extracting any pleasure from music. But reading this made me realize that that’s kind of a ridiculous idea. Plus I need to trust that there will be more good music in the future in case I “use up” today’s music, so I should just allow myself to enjoy music I like now freely.

I’m running out of time now, so go check this out for yourself: http://www.happiness-project.com/ and then let’s discuss!

Should I change jobs or not? Maybe writing this out will give me some clarity, because right now I’m so back and forth. In the same day I contemplate packing up my things and staying at the airport until the next flight to Paris that I can afford, and then a few hours later I figure I should just stick it out until the summer as planned.

So let me explain what I don’t like: The number one thing is my schedule. I work thirty hours a week, five hours each day except Sunday. Fine. But then I have to work overtime if Axel can’t bring the kids to school in the morning, if one of the kids is sick, or if Gabi and Axel are going somewhere and need a babysitter. I do get paid extra for this (theoretically, I haven’t gotten any money yet), but I can’t say no, regardless of what plans I had made. And it’s likely that I will have to cancel plans because they don’t give me much advanced notice. Plus I have to keep my cell phone on me so that I can accept work-related calls 24/7. So being in class/the library/the shower/out with friends/asleep…none of these are valid excuses for not being available.

The second problem is the youngest kid, Robin. He is, to say the least, poorly behaved. Just a few examples: Saturday morning I took the kids to the park. When I told Robin it was time to go he took a handful of pebbles from the ground and threw them at my face. He missed, but still. Once when I refused to let go of his hand in a busy train station he bit my hand. I know it’s lame to let a five year old bully me into leaving, but the real problem is his parents who don’t think this kind of behavior merits any real discipline, or maybe they do but for some reason never follow through with anything more than a stern talking-to.

The third thing (there are more, but I’ll stop after this one) is the amount and kind of housework I have to do. I scrub toilets, vacuum, and generally have to clean up after the whole family. The only person who helps me is Aga, the other hired help. Okay, and to be faire, Gabi helps a little. Some if it, like laundry and dishes aren’t so bad, but what I can’t stand is that children know that making their own beds, putting away their own toys, and clearing their own places at the table are all activities that are beneath them; foreigners have been hired to do that for them.

Of course it isn’t all bad. Right now “working” entails waiting for the laundry to be done while writing a blog entry and gnawing on some dried mango. I need to think on this some more.