My son’s speech has exploded this past week. It started last Thursday when I picked him up out of bed and he said “So happy see you mama.” I said, “Whaaaatttt?” He said it again. I kissed him a thousand times and we high-fived, which we do a lot. I said, “Mama is so happy to see you too buddy!” I made him say it to everyone we saw that day. “So happy see you, Gaga.” “So happy see you, Dada.” “So happy see you, Pickles.” Pickles is our cat. Since then he’s been repeating everything I ask him to say. I’ve worked up a frenzy of language in him. It’s been exhilarating as a parent to watch him develop his skills, to hear word for word the daily explorations of his tiny little life. He has understood what I’ve been saying to him for so long and now I know exactly what he wants, when he wants it. “Let’s go other room” and “Let’s watch Super Why.” “Let’s go mall, mama” or “Lay down with you” (he’s still a little confused on his pronouns.) We were worried for so long that he might be behind, and now it’s as if the weight of the universe has been lifted off of our shoulders. He’s catching up. I breathe a huge sigh of relief. Thank you God. Thank you God that my son is talking. Then reality hits.
Oh crap. My son is talking.
A caveat which up until now has been ignored by my husband and I, this new development means that I’m going to have to stop saying things like “Oh crap” and “Well, that sucks” around my son. My little monkey is saying everything I ask him to say, but he also has the potential to expose me, to say things that I will never, ever want him to say. I’m thrilled to death he’s talking. I’m scared to death when it comes back to bite me in the…you know where.
I’m especially concerned about my son mimicking his mama’s “driving language.” Come on now. We all do it. When my father passed away, he passed the mantle of his road rage on to me. Now with a kid in the car who not only listens but talks, I’ve had to get creative. I’m getting pretty good at making up my own “curse” words, combining seemingly non-offensive words to create one gigantic put down like boogerwompus or buttsniffer. Yeah, I have the vocabulary of a ten year old boy. Trust me, given the opportunity I could really let it fly. I’m not proud of it. I inherited it. It’s almost an involuntary reaction to call the guy in front of me a stupid idiot because he just cut someone off without even realizing it. I have to go against my nature and calm myself down. I especially have to do this every time I see an elderly person pull out in front of me. (Now here’s where my husband would say that I’m being ageist and I need to have compassion on elderly people, which I do. Don’t get me wrong. Lord willing and the creek don’t rise, I’ll be old someday. It’s just, we have a history, myself and the elderly. About seven years ago I was rear-ended by a ninety one year old man who passed out behind the wheel of his car. My car was totaled. He was going about forty five miles per hour and I was completely stopped when it happened. I hit the car in front of me, they hit the car in front of them, and oh. It was a mess. The accident left me with a huge scar on my forehead. It thoroughly freaked me out, especially since my sister had died in a car accident and it took me so long to work up the courage to finally get my license. Ever since then, every time I leave my driveway I swear the bat signal is sent up to all of the St. Louis card carrying members of the AARP to finish off the job that ninety-one year old man started. “Carrie is leaving her house. Drive in front of her very slowly, never reaching the speed limit. Cut her off in traffic. Don’t turn on your signal before you change lanes. Pull out very slowly so she has to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting you.” Hey, do me a favor and tell your grandpa that the next time he leaves the house, to please watch out for Carrie. She has a baby in the car and she’s trying really hard not to curse. He might listen to you. God knows he doesn’t listen to me when I’m shaking my fist and calling him a boogerwompus.)
I think all children mimic their parents and it’s kind of a tell all of how creatively mommy and daddy can spin the English language. Parents have been spinning for years. It’s one of our instincts to turn those offensive words into cute little words for the sakes of our children and mostly for our sakes. Think about it. Calling it “poopie” and “tinkle” distracts us from the disgusting act of changing diapers. Calling it “spit up” is so much better than “puke.” Having an “accident” just sounds better than “peeing your pants.” Once you start in with the baby talk you’ll find it’s really hard to quit. Sometimes when I’m out in public with my single friends I’ll say, “Uh-oh. I have to go potty.” They look at me like I’ve just peed my pants, excuse me, had an accident.
My husband was taking a bath with my son the other day and my son noticed something he’s either never noticed before or for which he’s just discovered the language. “Dada’s winky,” he said. I think it’s time for my son to bathe by himself. We laughed at this, but then we remembered that we use the word “winky” about ten times a day to our son when we change him, when we bathe him, when he’s touching it too much. Of course he’s going to use it in a sentence. What else are we supposed to call it? What I know for sure about most parents, if not every parent, is that we take great pains to cultivate our own euphemisms. You know, those euphemisms. Winky. Hoo-haw. Front bottoms, back bottoms. Wee wees and pee pees. Parents were reminded in the movie “Kindergarten Cop” the consequences of teaching anatomically correct words to children, “Boys have a penis and girls have a vagina.” That kid scared every parent from then on to only use euphemisms when describing Junior’s private parts to him. And I can’t help it, I will always refer to a winky as a winky. I’m pretty confident that in thirty years from now unless my genius son becomes a doctor, he will probably still be using the word winky. I’m thirty two years old and I can’t say the “v” word. I have to call it a cookie. This made me the laughing stock at my former place of employment, especially during the holidays. My sister can’t say it either. She actually used the word “noonie” at her OBGYN’s office in regards to that very special place. I think I’ll always be uncomfortable using the correct verbiage for, well, those places. So, thanks mom. But it’s not just my mom, no, it’s pretty much every mom out there. My best friend since Junior High is an English teacher at a local urban high school, and she was actually called into the principal’s office one day after an assembly in which she addressed a group of girls and used the “v” word. She was told that using any other word for “that” would have been more “appropriate.” But using the word that doctors use to describe one’s womanly parts was just plain unacceptable.
My self awareness has increased tremendously this last week. My son began talking and now he holds a recorder up to my ears, in my face. I’m sure that even though I have a self-censoring button, I'm afraid the batteries are going to run out every now and then. I think this stage of development does more damage to the parents than it does to the children, anyway. When he’s sitting in the bathtub, it’s perfectly normal for my son to talk about his winky. I'm just waiting for the day soon when my nightmare will come true and my son combines his newfound mimicking skills with my childish euphemisms. What I’m worried about is that the first time he does this we'll be at church and he’ll say, “Dada’s winky. Well, that sucks.”
Oh, I just took it there.
No comments:
Post a Comment