For the Rich

he bungalow is for the rich, you think, as you turn up the steep hill to your quaint, rundown cottage, home for the summer. You climb the musty wooden steps, turn the lock-less knob, shove the door in with your shoulder, and step inside. You breathe in the smell of mildew and freshly cut grass, and catch a faint whiff of chipmunks. You flick on the lights, one blinking rapidly like a nervous twitch, and survey the accommodations. Yup, definitely for the rich.

The younger children sleep in the kitchen while the older ones fight for a space on Babby’s couch next door, where there’s a higher chance of midnight popcorn or a toasted marshmallow fluff snack. The kitchen/bedroom boasts an oven from the 1960s that sits tall and proud and takes up half the one-bedroom accommodations. It hasn’t worked since the 1980s, but at this point, it’s a family heirloom. The countertop is mainly sink, but the water emerges in drips (depending on its mood, of course) and the drain doesn’t do much draining. Did you say for the rich?

Bathtime is an ordeal, one that can reduce even the toughest of women to tears. You wear your brave face (read: shut your eyes tight) and turn the knob. Alas, when freezing water rains down on your two-year-old’s head, it is no surprise. You valiantly turn the knob to the left — no, the other left! — and sink to the floor in relief. Why was he already in the tub, one might ask? Ah, that was to keep the bright-orange slimy salamanders in his chubby little hands instead of in our beds. The rich most certainly do not wake up to salamanders slithering up their ears, do they?

Some days are long and hot, and calculating how long you can withstand the loud, obnoxious clunking of the AC window unit is essential to your mental health. Others are rainy and cold, the kind that can be described as “chilled to the bone” — but the children definitely don’t feel that way as they squeal with glee and splash in the wet, muddy grass. BRRRR… the ri-ri-rich?