Well, it didn’t take long to figure out that no babysitter would take me

I couldn’t find my left shoe anywhere. Chaim, Yosef, and Yisroel were already halfway down the block to the school bus, and I was stuck with one shoe. It wasn’t under the bed, and it most definitely was not in my closet — even though Mommy always tells me that if I can’t find something I should first look in the place where it belongs. Oh well. Mommy really wouldn’t like it if I came to school half dressed. But today had to be an exception. If I kept looking for my shoe, I’d really be late.

So, ignoring the voice in my head that sounded an awful lot like Mommy’s, I sat down at the desk in my room, completely shoeless. It’s not like I was coming to school in pajamas! I mean seriously, no one could even see my shoes. If there would have been someone else in the room, I would have rolled my eyes.

I heard the doorbell ring and Mommy greeting one of the babies being dropped off for babysitting. It’s really ‘cuz of me that Mommy stopped working in the office and switched to babysitting. You see, way back when I was a baby, I was that baby who always screamed and cried and had terrible stomach pain. The family went crazy. Mommy tried everything, but I just wouldn’t stop screaming. Then one day we went to an allergist. Turns out I was allergic to mostly everything. “He’ll probably grow out of it,” the allergist said. But here I was, in fifth grade and ten years later, and I had still not grown out of it. Worse than that: I wasn’t just unable to eat a million and a half foods. I couldn’t even be in the same room as a lot of them. I couldn’t have honey or nuts or wheat or eggs or a whole bunch of fruits or vegetables. And most candy and snacks have something in it that I’m allergic to, so I couldn’t have those either. If I went to a babysitter or school and someone there had a food I couldn’t have, I would stop breathing. And that’s pretty dangerous.

Well, it didn’t take long to figure out that no babysitter would take me. So Mommy had to quit her job. It was then that she decided to babysit other kids too. The only rule was “no outside food.” For me, that made the difference between life and death.