sap fest

One popular complaint among the interns about our survey is that it, or any survey, is a completely inadequate way of getting a snapshot of a person. How much can you really gather about a person based on their multiple-choice answers? By far the coolest part about administering the survey for me has been all of the interaction with the kids. Even then though, we only see most kids one time over the course of the summer, usually for an hour and a half, max. But sometimes, you just have a moment with one of them. It's probably stupid to attach a lot of sentimental value to one conversation, or one glance, or one joke with a kid. I'm not saying that any connecting moment should be used as some cheesy symbol for what it's like to work with these kids; because, really that's not much different from thinking that their completed surveys are accurate depictions of who they are.





"Do you have a boyfriend or a girlfriend right now? Or are you talking to someone, or a couple of people, but you don't have a girlfriend or boyfriend right now?"

She filled in the bubble next to the latter before I could read the other options. I told her that she could mark "A. I don't have a boyfriend or girlfriend" for the rest of the page, flip it, and mark the same for the whole next page.

"I had a boyfriend yesterday..." She mumbles more as she's bubbling down the page.

"Oh yea?" I thought I heard something about getting rid of him. "Did you break up with him?

"Yes ma'am."

"Yea? Why?" She looked at me. I am thinking that I shouldn't have asked that.

"He was talking to other girls on the phone." No big deal.

"Ahh... And you didn't like that?" I say, smiling.

She smiles, "No." Still bubbling.

"How long were you two together?"

"Eleven months."

I say, "Woww" mindlessly, but she's already on the next page, pointing to the next question and asking me, "What do they mean here?"


So I finished the survey with her and went outside for Arianne to pick me up. I didn't have my phone with me, but I knew it wouldn't be long until she was back.

The girl sees me out on the curb, and comes out of the house. "You can wait inside until your ride gets here!" she offers.

I figure she's just being polite. Inside, she kept calling me "Ma'am" until I said, "Hey, I'm not that much older than you. You don't have to call me that." I tell her not to worry about it and that it won't be long at all. I start doodling on the manila envelope that her survey is in, but I feel like I'm being watched.

She's standing on the porch. "I'm just gonna wait until your friend gets here." She's protecting me.

"Oh don't worry about it. I'm great here... Do you want me to knock when she gets here?"

"Yea." She goes back inside.

A few cars go by on the street in front of me. From one of them, I hear a male voice, "Hey girl!" Instinctively, I look up. I'm sort of asking for it, sitting on the curb at 10:45 in the morning with a clipboard and a name tag and my fair skin and blonde hair. I probably look completely out of place.

The car stops and reverses. "What are you doing, girl?"

"Oh I'm just working," I say, thinking how I look like the last thing I'm doing right now is working.

"Survey?"

Relief. "Yea, survey." He smiles and drives off.

I turn around just in time to see her retreating back into the house, quickly so that I can't see that she's still watching out for me. She's thirteen years old.