Antonia Gets a Job

Once there was a young girl named Antonia Gigglegoose. Antonia came from a very large family. There were Gigglegoose brothers in the first and second grade, and Gigglegoose sisters in the fourth and fifth grade, and there were even Gigglegoose triplets in kindergarten! Antonia herself had just finished the third grade. 

That summer Antonia’s older sisters got jobs. Anastasia Gigglegoose (who was just about to start the sixth grade) was getting paid for babysitting the Gigglegoose triplets when mother and father were busy. You see the Gigglegoose triplets were MONSTERS wrecking everything and making all sorts of sticky, gooey messes in their wake. Antonia did NOT want a job taking care of the monsters. Antonia’s other sister Arabella Gigglegoose (who was about to go into in the 5th grade) got paid five cents every time she washed and dried the supper dishes and kept track of her pay in a little orange notebook she had gotten for Christmas.

“I want a job”, Antonia demanded to her mother.

“When you are in 5th grade, you can have your sister’s dishwashing job. For now, you are going to have to make do with your allowance, “Mrs Gigglegoose quipped as she was changing the light bulb above the bathroom sink. 

“Fine. I’ll get a job on my own,” Antonia huffed and marched out of the bathroom.

“Let me know how it goes! I’ll need to know how much to charge you rent!” Teased Mrs Gigglegoose.

Antonia went off to her Breadbox home to contemplate her job opportunities. Antonia’s breadbox home was indeed just that, an old bread crate she had converted into a little “home of her own”.

“I could be a snow shoveller,” Antonia mused, but snow only existed a few months of the year, and Antonia figured she would need to work more than that if she were ever going to be considered a career woman.

“A shoe tier?” Possible. But most of the Gigglegoose children had Velcro on their shoes and therefore didn’t need anyone to help them put on their shoes. However, they usually frolicked about in bare feet, paying no attention to footwear.

“I’ve always wanted to be a bus driver,” thought Antonia. “The only thing is that I don’t know how to drive. I guess Oh well, I guess I’ll have to practice.”

So, Antonia went to retrieve her bike from under the patio and proceeded to pedal her bike up and down the driveway until she felt she was skilled enough to responsibly transport children to and from school.

“Hmmm. Now I’ll need to find some kids to pick up”. To solve this problem, Antonia went into the house and came back with her Winnie Walker doll.

Skipping rope in hand, Antonia proceeded to tie Winne to the back of her bike. Then, after Winnie was secure, Antonia neatly got on her seat and peddled away down the driveway. 

“Why hello Hammersmith children. Welcome to my bus” Antonia had stopped and pretended to open the door of the bus. “Be sure to keep your feet off the back of the seat in front of you. I don’t want to kick you off my bus and have you walk to school”.

Antonia peddled a bit further down the road. “Nice to see you made it on time to catch the bus this fine morning Yoloyellows. Make sure you remember to take your lunch with you into school this morning Yanny Yoloyellow. You don’t want to leave it on the bus like you did yesterday and then feel hungry all day”.

Her final stop was the Barterbertals. “Wade Barterbertal, I want NO more farts from you today. You almost exterminated the entire bus yesterday. Be sure to open your seat window so that we don’t faint if you do let one go and I unconsciously drive the bus into the ditch”. 

Antonia drove up and down the driveway making her way to “school”. Making sure to be safety conscious, every once in a while Antonia would stop at imaginary traffic lights and crosswalks.. Antonia was almost all the way to school when there was an awful crunching noise, and her bike came to a standstill. She could no longer pedal. Something was caught in the spokes of her back tire. “Oh, no!” Antonia thought to herself, “I hope that isn’t a flat tire”.

Antonia stopped, stepped off of her bike carefully, put the kickstand down and turned to look to see what the problem was.

To her horror, Antonia noticed that Winnie’s leg had gotten caught in the spokes. Big tire scrape marks could be seen crisscrossing down Winnie’s leg. “Oh, no! Winnie. Noooooo!” Antonia quickly untied the skipping rope that had been holding Winne to her banana seat then grabbed Winnie by the hair and ran to the house sobbing uncontrollably. “Winnnnnnnnnnnnnnnieeeeeeeee is dying.” She cried.

Antonia’s mother came running from the garage to see what all the bellowing was about. “Antonia! What is the matter? What is wrong?” 

“It’s Winnie! She got caught in my school bus!” Antonia wailed an buried her face into her mother’s shoulder.

“Caught where?”

“In my school bus. I was practicing being a school bus driver with my bike, and Winne’s leg got caught in the wheel.” Antonia howled.

“Antonia calm down, calm down. Let’s take a look”. Antonia’s mother gently took Winnie from Antonia’s arms. Well. I don’t think she’ll lose her leg, but she will have a scar. Come with me, and we will patch her up”. 

Antonio followed her mother and Winnie to the bathroom. Antonia’s mother placed Winnie on the clothes hamper then opened one of the drawers and pulled out the toothpaste.

“Why, toothpaste? Winnie’s teeth aren’t broken.” Antonia asked her voice, muffled by her hanky. 

“Well”, her mother said, “Let’s pretend its antibiotic ointment that will help keep the germs away from Winnies wound”. Then Antonia’s mother put a little bit of toothpaste on her finger and gently wiped it all over the tire marks imprinted on Winnie’s let. She then squirted a tiny bit of toothpaste on Antonia’s finger and had her wipe it all over Winnie’s wound as well.

Next, Antonia’s mom took out the Band-Aids. Gave two to Antonia and instructed, “I think two of these will work. Leave them on for two days and then wipe off the ointment. Winnie should be fully recovered by then.”

Winnie seemed much improved with the toothpaste and band-aid treatment. Antonia hugged her mother “Thank-you. I thought I lost Winnie for good and I haven’t been a bus driver long enough to make enough money to pay for a funeral.”

“Good grief Antonia, getting hurt by a bike doesn’t cause sudden death.” Her mother said in exasperation. 

“It wasn’t a bike accident. It was a bus accident”, Antonia responded curtly, and with that, she took Winnie and went back outside to park her bus properly.

…..

The next day Antonia’s mother went to brush her teeth and noticed the toothpaste was missing. She looked everywhere, even in the clothes hamper and in the bath tub. But she could not find the toothpaste anywhere. “Gigglegoose children! Where is the toothpaste?” Mrs Gigglegoose bellowed from the bathroom.

“I dunno” yelled Anatasia Gigglegoose. “It was there this morning”.

As Mrs Gigglegoose was slamming a bathroom drawer, she happened to glance out the window. There she saw Antonia riding her bike up and down the driveway at full speed stopping to tend to the various dolls that happened to be scattered about the yard. 

“Weeeeoooooo, wheeeeeeoooooooo”, Antonia was yelling. “Out of the way people, the Ambulance is here. Weeeeeoooooooo, weeeeeeooooooo.”

“I guess Winnie has decided that driving a bus wasn’t for her. Mrs Gigglegoose smiled to herself then promptly went to the kitchen and wrote “t-o-o-t-h-p-a-s-t-e” on the shopping list that was stuck to the refrigerator. “Hmmm, I wonder how dollies will require medical attention this week? I better buy 10 tubes.”