With T constantly traveling, each weekend leaves him flummoxed with how much little L has changed within just a few days. And two weekends ago was no exception. T came home Saturday morning from a long week away at work and my sister in law was visiting. We had a fantastic time playing with L and the strangest part about it was realizing how much he grew dring the course of a single day. For example, he has been joining 2 and 3 words together frequently, but a lot of his speech is not necessarily a reciprocal conversation, it is simply phrases here and there, yet on Saturday before we were leaving to go out, he initiated a conversation.
His shoes on and holding some of his favorite toys, L asked us, “Ready, guys?”
“Yes,” I replied. “We are about to go out, L.”
“Hooray!”
Seriously, how is this even possible? How is it that there is this cute little impish creature in the world with whom I fell in love a year and a half ago, and all of a sudden he has independent thoughts and ideas, is anticipating going outside and all the adventures he will have. And how he already remembers things he has done. Two weeks ago we went to Chicago to visit his Dadima, and on a particularly beautiful Sunday we headed downtown to Millenium Park. Because various things now frighten him, we are very careful with our choices of words. This even includes the word, “scary,” to the point at which I cannot say something is scary because then he will immediately interpret that object or animal as something to be feared. Before approaching Anish Kapoor’s lovely huge bean-like sculpture “Cloudgate,” we enthusiastically told L how much he would love to see the “bean.” Unfortunately, he took our telling him about the “bean” as a “Bee” and persistently repeated “No Bee! No Bee!” and shuddered in fear.
“No, it’s not a ‘bee,” we told him. “It is a ‘bea-NAH.'”
Not quite getting this distinction, he still wasn’t a huge fan. But once he got to Cloudgate and proceeded to play there for a half an hour, he could not forget the amazing “Bean-nah!” Yes, that’s what he calls it, certainly not a “bee” but a “Bea-Nah”. Even today, a few weeks from that time, he still talks about it and when he sees himself in pictures by the Bea-nah he enthusiastically identifies the object.
Beyond that he has started to associate photographs and images with different people, and if he assigns a name to a character in a book (for example, children and ladies dressed in pink immediately are versions of his Buaji (his father’s sister). And he gets so excited and points to the character in question, with Bua riding a bicycle in one book or turning on her “thinker” in a Dr. Seuss book. Aye me.
Another fun story about our little L came last weekend when my father was truly overwhelmed with my son’s personality one evening at my parents’ home.
L was running around the family room, playing with some of my parents’ friends. In the midst of it all, my father exclaimed excitedly, “L listens so well. He follows directions perfectly. L, go and give your auntie a hug.”
After looking squarely at my father, my son sauntered over to me and buried his head in my lap.
My father’s response? “Ah, L is such a smart boy. He knows what he wants and he went straight to his mama.”