I'm sorry, you're just not sitter-worthy

Do you remember that episode of Seinfeld where Elaine snags a case of her discontinued contraceptive of choice, and has to ration them out?  Casual sex becomes a thing of the past as she evaluates each potential partner and decides whether or not he is sponge-worthy. I feel like that about hiring a babysitter for an evening out. 

My husband and I just don't go out much anymore.  I mean, one of us will go out with friends while the other one stays home with the kids, but it takes a pretty special event or occasion for us to call up a babysitter to come over for an entire evening.

A decent sitter in our neighborhood costs $15 and hour, and if it's an evening job, some also ask for car fare home.  So before we've bought dinner, drinks, tickets to something, or paid for cab fare, we know that we're already into a sitter for at least $75, so we don't take the decision to go out lightly.

Leisurely dinners are hard to enjoy, because getting an appetizer or dessert means another hour on the clock.  A romantic request to take a walk along the waterfront is met with "Well, if we walk for 15 minutes that's going to put us into the sixth hour.  Does this sitter round up to the next hour or go in 15-minute increments?"  This has sucked the last little bit of spontaneity out of our lives.

When I first became a mom I didn't realize how important it was to choose events carefully.  My husband would invite me out with friends of his from work and I'd say sure, not realizing that I could stay home and buy a really nice pair of jeans instead of sit in a bar yelling small talk to people I didn't know and would never see again.  I would say yes to having dinner with people I didn't particularly like thinking that it would be fun just to get out of the house, but in reality I would be watching the clock thinking "Wow, I could be bored at home for free."

It took a little while, but we're much more judicious now about our evenings out.  Someone in from out of town I forgot had even moved away wants to have dinner with us?  Sorry!  Your band is playing and there's a rumor an agent might stop by so you need to pack the house?  Nope! You can have one of us, but you're just not sitter worthy.

So what is sitter worthy?  If we both show up to your party, together, you should be incredibly flattered, because increasingly it's events having nothing to do with other people.  When we go out for an expensive evening together, we want to focus on each other.  If it's a movie, it has to be a sure-fire, great review, not-to-be-watched-on-video hit.  Same with live theater. We have to know walking in that we're going to walk out saying "That was so worth handing over a small fortune to a semi-stranger who's probably going through our mail right now." 

We went to the movies and dinner last week, and just bought tickets for a show next month.  Unless we win the lottery, don't expect to see us at your dinner party any time soon.

This is an original post to NYC Moms Blog. Amy also blogs about parenting in Brooklyn, blogging full time without making any money, and keeping herself sane and comfortable at Selfish Mom, and attempts to keep one step ahead of the stalkers and paparazzi at  Filming in Brooklyn.