Famous First Words
those . . .
I’ve been flipping through The Baby Book, trying to find out if it is normal for a 16-month-old child to form a religion based on household appliances. Every morning and every evening our infant son grabs my wife or me by a finger and drags us to the cupboard where we keep our vacuum cleaner.
At first we thought he was encouraging us to clean the floor, which is hidden under a layer of stepped-on Jatz and Anzac biscuits. But then we noticed he approaches our upright Hoover with an attitude of reverence and devotion that I most often associate with visitors to the Holy Sepulchre or tourists gazing on the Mona Lisa for the first time. I wonder if it’s time to teach the boy about the first commandment (“Thou shalt have no other gods before me”).
During my reading, I also stumbled across this alarming piece of information: According to The Baby Book, “the average baby may speak only four to six intelligible words by 15 months.” This is alarming, because it indicates that “average” babies are speaking a month before our son. I’m afraid that even when he’s a teenager, he won’t ask to borrow the car keys. He’ll just grunt and point.
Now, I can hear some of you saying, “That is how teenagers ask to borrow the car keys,” but other less cynical and more reassuring readers are saying, “Don’t obsess over it; your child will talk soon enough.”
What you fail to understand is the pressure we are under. You see, we go to church with the Hansons. We had always had a warm and noncompetitive relationship with this couple—right up until the moment they mentioned that their granddaughter recited the Lord’s Prayer at the tender age of 18 months. We went home that day and said, “Son, you have two months to learn Hamlet’s soliloquy.”
So far it hasn’t worked. In fact, we’ve failed so utterly in teaching our son to speak English that he has given up and is trying to teach us baby language.
“Bap-umm”
The other morning we were reading a book about cats. He pointed to a picture of one of our feline friends and said, “Bap-umm.”
I said, “Cat.”
He pointed again and said, “Bap-umm.”
I replied, “No, it’s a cat.”
The child gave me a look that indicated he was trying hard to be patient with such a slow learner. He pointed again very insistently. “BAP-UMM!”
Now when we read The Cat in the Hat, it doesn’t have the same rhythm.
“Bap-umm” is a favourite word that can describe many things: a cat, a dog, the car and—for all I know—certain aspects of particle physics.
n Now, I should point out both grandmothers hold the opinion that our son has already spoken. Such as the time his stroller came around the corner in Target, and he saw a display of vacuum cleaners. “Bap-umm,” he declared, and my mother was certain he had said “vacuum.”
No, I thought. That’s Reef’s word for cats and the second law of thermodynamics.
At least that’s what I used to think. Then this past week Reef dragged me to the closet, pointed at the Hoover, and said, “Bap-umm.”
That’s when it dawned on me: “Vacuum” is his favourite word. Maybe he’s been talking all the time, and I haven’t been listening.
One of the most difficult activities—next to opening the plastic wrapper on a new CD—is to really, truly listen. To our family. To our workmates. To God.
“You shall have no other gods before me” is another way of saying, “Pay attention! Don’t get distracted by trivial things.”
Even if we’re not obsessed with the wonders of a Hoover Elite Supreme, the human mind is always ready to get hung up on something else. Which reminds me: If we’re going to beat this Hanson kid, we’ve got to find a sonnet or something that begins with “vacuum.”
Reprinted, with permission, from Women of Spirit.
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