(Sigh) We're Babysitting Again

I was eating Thursday night when Father looked at the "ding" that came from his cellphone.  He usually doesn't bring his cell to the dinner table.  When he picked it up, he said something to Mother in Chinese.  I didn't get everything he said, but I knew: My brother and sister-in-law are coming by Saturday to drop off my niece for a few hours.  Then Father showed Mother the text: She's coming over at around 5:30, right in the middle of the two football playoff games.

I know I'm going to hell for saying this, but I would rather not babysit my niece for the three or so hours they'll be gone.  And I'll be brutally honest: If they didn't drop her off for us to take care of, if they opted for an actual babysitter that they would pay, that would be more than fine by me.

The reasons are manifold.  I love my niece, I really do.  But by God, she's a holy terror.  She has boundless energy, more than I have at my advanced age.  (Knowing that I probably had the same amount of energy when I was 3, I would understand why Grandmother and my parents would be fed up with my antics.)  She wears me out.  Every time my niece comes by to play, I get so tired that I have to run away into my bedroom to nap.  Serious.  I have to let my folks (well, Mother) take care of her while I recuperate.

And I feel terrible about saying this because retreating away from interacting with my niece is what Father does.  It's weird how she doesn't do anything with her.  When she comes over, Mother is actively playing (and, to be honest, bothering her; she gets a little too overbearing sometimes when she wants to get a reaction from my niece) with her.  In those cases, Father oftentimes just sits in the dining room table, watching from afar -- whenever he doesn't go down to the master bedroom.  Compounding that weirdness, Mother continues to say that Father always asks if my brother is sent her photos of their granddaughter.  He loves him from a distance, but never up close.

That is how I see My Father had parented me, and that's bad.  And so I don't want to propagate that neglect by refusing to play with my niece.  But I have that urge to stay away from her and watch football by myself in peace is sure proof that I am My Father's son, dammit.

Now that I have typed that, I know what I have to do.  I'll keep the TV on while I play with my niece.  I just hope she's not staying overnight.