Kid Amnesiac

We witnessed another delightful first today: Simon sang a song. We’ve been singing “Frere Jacques” for months around here, sometimes in French, sometimes in English, and often with on-the-spot, made-up words. We sing about the color red, we sing about Simon’s name, and we sing about lunch. “Frere Jacques” has one of those tunes that can be shaped to almost anything, a trait we fully exploit daily.

Well, today Matt started to sing a version, and Simon echoed him. He had the tune right, he repeated the words correctly, and even his pitch was good. We were thrilled. Then later in the day, I sang another version of the song, and when I finished, Simon sang it back to me as best he could. He had to fit in some of his own words, as “Whitworth” doesn’t trip off of his tongue just yet, but he did fit words into the correct tune and improvised until he got to the very end. His version seemed to be about purple diapers and poop. As we were changing his diaper at the time, we thought the improvisation to be wholly appropriate.

I was floored; moments like this put me in Simon’s thrall. Then the spell was broken, we all clapped and cheered, and Matt and I put Simon down for the night feeling a super-abundance of love and pride.

First, a disclaimer. Despite the title, this post is not about Chanukah. Christmas is the next holiday I need to catch up on over here, and it’s not about that either. I’ll get to the non-Chanukah han-kah part soon enough.

Everything about this is wrong for a small child. The setting, Matt’s allergen-filled, dusy office, is wrong. The background music, some rather hard sounding rock, is wrong. The medium, a YouTube video viewed on a lap-top computer, is wrong. The sponsor, Red Bull, is no good for anyone but especially wrong for a toddler.

And yet, the scene as a whole is so funny I can’t help indulging myself and Simon. The most recent story over here is that Simon has fallen in love with a YouTube video of a red helicopter doing back-flips . Matt found it online one day when Simon wanted to sit on his lap and bang on his computer and Matt went looking for something to show him. He ran a search for “helicopter” on YouTube and up came this rock-scored video of a Red Bull branded helicopter doing aerial tricks. And for three minutes and 51 seconds, Simon was mesmerized.

As this happened about the same time we began to celebrate Chanukah, the words got all mixed up and “Han-kah” came to mean: (1) a menorah, and (2) a helicopter. In theory this could get confusing, but in actuality the only helicopter Simon cares about is the “dee-dee” or red one.

So once or twice a day, Simon runs into Matt’s office, jiggles the mouse on his desk, and calls out “Dee-dee han-kah! Dee-dee han-kah” until we distract him or show it to him. During a viewing, Simon looks like a tiny movie director, arms flailing, feet twitching, and finger pointing like mad as though he wants to direct the action and make sure his dumb parents see everything going on in front of them. He’s very vocal, too. “Oh no! Oh no! Dee-dee han-kah! Han-kah! Uh-oh! Uh-oh! Wow!”

It is absolutely hilarious. Being the concerned parents we are, we are of course taking active measures to limit Simon’s screen time. We limit Simon to two airings of dee-dee han-kah at a time.

Then we move on to the laughing babies…

Last year Simon had a great time at my family’s Chanukah parties. Thanks to pretty lights, his cousins, mandel bread, things that spun, and things that were shiny, he had much to entertain him.

Which isn’t necessarily to say he understood anything about what was going on. He was one, so it was a bit premature to start explaining things like the Hasmonean and Seleucid dynasties, temple revolts, or the significance of the Menorah. Heck, he didn’t realize that Chanukah gelt was chocolate beneath the shiny gold wrapper or that all the pretty boxes lying around were supposed to be unwrapped and opened.

I had expected only a slight increase in understanding this year, but once again-thanks to preschool-Simon is way ahead of where I expected him to be. This Wednesday KIP had its annual holiday party, an event featuring school-wide games, music, treats, and a gift exchange. Based on the global Itsy-Bitsy freak-out I witnessed at Halloween, I assumed the day’s events would be a party for those aged three and up and more of an ordeal for the younger set.

You know what they say about assuming… When I arrived at KIP to pick Simon up after lunch, I was immediately greeting by Ms. Inessa, the music teacher, who regaled me with an account of Simon jumping and dancing and squealing while she sang and played piano for the children. I get the distinct impression that Simon is either more animated than most of the children during music time, or that he is a particular favorite of Ms. Inessa. Of course, the one could certainly explain the other, so maybe both are true.

When I got to his room, Ms. Laura and Ms. Jean were suiting him up to come home, and Simon was yammering away happily. I couldn’t tell what he was trying to tell me, but the yammering got even more animated when I asked him about the electronic, giddy-up pony that was attached to his back-pack. Then he squeezed the pony’s ear so I could hear the whinnying, the neighing, and the snuffling the electronic, giddy-up pony makes when activated. His whole face lit up. Thank you Baron, and thank you and Baron’s parents! The teachers were concerned that the noise would get to me, but how can I resent anything that makes him so happy? I’ll save my annoyance for screaming.

Once we got home, Simon wanted to watch me spin a dreidel. It’s funny how such a simple toy can be such a delight to a small child. Then I asked, I assumed rhetorically, whether he wanted to open the present in his backpack that came from his teachers. I was getting ready to pick it up when Simon ran over, made it clear that he understood what “present” meant, brought it over to me, plopped down in my lap, and started picking at the paper corners.

We may have had to open Simon’s birthday presents for him two months ago, but it looks like he has got the concept down in time for Chanukah and Christmas.

In fact, he’s been so animated by all the trappings of holidays-the songs, the treats, the decorations, the toys, etc.-that I think he is going to have the time of his life at Chanukah and Christmas this year. All five times.

That’s right, we’ve got Chanukah with Bubbie, Chanukah with friends, Christmas Eve at our house, Christmas day at Jim and Evie’s, and Chanukah with Zadie coming in the next eight days. I’m cooking for one, grating potatoes and making applesauce for two, bringing an unknown item to one and-sorry Evie!-sitting on my tush for one. I’m tired just thinking about it all. But if it had to happen, I’m glad it’s happening in a year when holiday cheer is new and exciting for Simon, and not when he was too young to understand it or too jaded to care. His enthusiasm might just be what buoys me.

Happy Chanukah!

They really do. I’ve given up counting Simon’s words because each day he pops up with several new ones, words like “owl” and “moon” or “pizza” and “orange”. He doesn’t say these words as though they are grand discoveries the way he said “light” or “bus” the first time. These new utterances are accompanied by a certain nonchalance-a posture that indicates Simon has known them for ages and simply hasn’t bothered to say them before. Which may well be the case!

He’s also taken to narrating his day, much like I did when he was a baby and I wanted to expose him to language. At least once a day, something he says or the way he says it makes me laugh out loud. Herewith, a few favorite moments from the last month or so:

1. “Bye, Moon”: What Simon has begun calling the book “Goodnight Moon”
2. “Shleep Book”: Simon’s name for “Ready for Bed”
3. “Bye, Poop”: This when emptying the contents of a diaper into the toilet. Part of the earlier discussed potty awareness campaign. At this point, Simon says “bye poop” whenever he passes a bathroom.
4. “Bup, bup, bup”: Said at the dinner table with increasing speed and desperation. Followed by an actual burp, then a helpful summary. “Bup!”
5. “Bubbie cup”: Upon seeing my Heine Brother’s travel mug, which I don’t use very often but looks exactly like the one my mom brings to the house every week. Now safely towed away because “Bubbie cup” is soon followed by “Bubbie car”, looking out the front window, and general, plaintive cries for Bubbie.
6. “Hewo!”:  Said to a battery that looked (to him) like a cell phone. Also said into my real cell phone, our kitchen phone (thank goodness he can now manage to get the phone back on the cradle; I’m afraid our line was probably dead for the better part of two days) and my calculator. If it’s the color of electronics and smaller than a bread-box, it’s a phone.
7. “Boodle”: Said to Tristan, after deciding that his proper name is hard to pronounce but that his nickname is very easy. Lately, he’s been giving it the old-preschool try, the result sounding something like “Ti-tin.”
8. “Good-BYE, Mommy”: This one is not sweet. When Simon is sweetly saying goodbye to me, he says “Bye bye, Mommy.”  The full goodbye is reserved for when Simon is angry at me and wants me to leave the room. I laugh it off and obey when he wants me to clear out so he can be alone with my mom. But when he’s just being cussed, I stake out my ground and tell him that if he wants to be away from Mommy, he can do the leaving himself. Typically, he falls into a heap of sobs after I tell him this.
9. “Hup, Peas”: Simon’s newfound ability to ask for help. After a month or so of grilling, he’s discovered that the “help” word, especially when followed by “please” is a thousand times more effective than just grunting and pointing.
10. “On”: Problematically, “on” can mean “on” as well as “off.” I’m all for double-duty words, I mean, Shalom works just fine for hello and goodbye and no one is ever confused, but this one has negative practical implications.
11. “Pooh! Pooh! Eyoh. Owl. Oh no. Pooh stuck. Pooh seep. Bee! Bee! Dee-dee bawoon. Cake! Cake!”:  This is the running commentary that accompanies our Winnie the Pooh DVD (the original Disney featurettes). Simon adores it, and can (and does) watch most of it every day. By now, I can tell what scene is on by listening to Simon from another room.

We’ve been working on numbers lately, and the results are mixed. Funny, but mixed.

Simon knows three numbers: one, two, and eight. We started working with two right before his birthday. “How old will you be, Simon?” we’d ask. “Tea” would come his smiling response.

A few weeks ago, he started to understand that one and two follow each other; that if we say “one,” he should respond with “two,” and vice-versa. And just last week he let us know that he really understands the concept of two when he saw an old picture of himself holding two Dirty Dogs and nonchalantly announced “Tea dir dah.” As in Chinese, note the lack of an “s” at the end of the multiplied word. If only English really worked this way, we could spare him the hassles of “tires” verses “dresses” versus “mice” verses “moose.” Really, it’s a crazy language we have.

Since the “two dir dah” incident he’s been on the lookout for pairs and announces them whenever he finds them. One day Hundley’s doggie twin showed up on Curious George and Simon shouted out “Tea dah”. Saturday he realized he has two Thomas engines and he yelled out “Tea Ta-ta”. Which brings up another interesting point: For Simon “tea” mainly refers to matched items. So maybe he doesn’t have the plural ironed out after all, and is instead working on the Hebrew dual form.

This new understanding has inspired Matt to up the ante to three. Turns out, Simon is dedicated to a base-two mathematical system. If we show him one item, he will say “un.” Present the second, and he dutifully says “tea.” Put a third in front of him and he looks a bit perplexed and says “un.” We’ll get there in good time. Maybe he’s destined to be a computer programmer and we should have started with zero?

Part of our numbers game has involved counting down for him. We count down before turning off his light at night, before turning him upside down when we play, and the like. If Matt starts at five, Simon will usually take over at the end to say “two” and “one”. Last night Matt merely made mention of the word countdown when Simon looked up and brightly added “un,” altogether dispensing with five through two. Being a busy toddler, he decided to jump straight to the point I suppose.

As for eight, I have no idea why he knows this. We have not focused on eight at all. My best-and frankly only-guess is that he is learning about the eight days of Chanukah at school. It never occurred to us that he would know it, but in his bath last week he picked up a foam eight and surprised us by telling us it was a “boo eight.” Then he scrounged a second one and explained it was a “pupul eight.” After his bath, he shouted out behind him while leaving the room, “bye, boo eight.” So not only a number, but possibly a favorite number, and maybe even a friend.

We’ll see if he’s still entranced when it’s time for trig.

Somewhere along the line, be it from friends or books or mere wishful thinking, I got the idea that I wouldn’t have to think about potty training until Simon was 2 ½, and probably closer to three. This notion gave me great comfort; no one seems to find potty training easy or enjoyable, and diapers are easy.

I still don’t think we’re ready to train full-on, but Simon is showing signs-lots of them-that he’s approaching readiness and is ready to start pre-training if such a thing exists. We’ll call it potty-awareness. Besides the usual signs of physical readiness, things like how long he can stay dry, whether he walks well, and whether he meets a minimum age requirement, he’s letting us know that he’s interested in and aware of what’s going on down there.

Which isn’t to say that he always gets it right. Yesterday he told Evie that he pooped four times and he had. The day before, he was less clear with me. He’d get a certain look, and I’d ask if he was pooping. Once he said yes, and once he said no. Interestingly enough, both times he’d answer correctly if I subsequently asked if there was poop in his diaper. At the end of the day, for poop number three, he looked up at me and said “Poop! Poop! Poop!” in a tone that was quite urgent. And when I asked if he was pooping, he nodded his head frenetically.

He’s also started to talk about who poops, but I can’t tell if he’s telling me or asking. He’ll look up at me with a very serious face and say: “Mommy, poop. Daddy, poop. Bubbie, poop.” This last one cracks me up because it’s the one he’s the most likely to repeat. Why the fascination with my mom’s possibly pooping is beyond me. Maybe it’s because she doesn’t live here so he can’t barge in on her the way he does with us. Maybe he just like the way the word “Bubbie” sounds.  I don’t know, but it makes me laugh.

Matt and I have talked about the toilet and been open about what happens there from early days. For the past few weeks, we’ve been escorting Simon to the bathroom after we change his diaper and showing him where the poop goes. He thinks this is a fun game, says “bye, poop!” when we deposit his diaper’s contents into the toilet, and then wants to flush.

I’m quite nervous about this next step and don’t want to push for too much too soon. But I think it may be time to buy some underwear, buy a potty chair, read a few books, and set the stage for training. Who knows, maybe he’ll be trained in a month or so. Or maybe he’ll lose interest and we’ll drop the whole thing until spring or summer. Either way, I have nothing to lose (I hope!) by exposing him to the process now while he’s interested and eager to please.