Kid Amnesiac

Simon has a new adorable habit of late. Pretty regularly, he will pick up a book and hold it out to me. This means that he wants to sit in my lap and have us read the book together. He especially likes doing this with Curious George’s ABCs, where he can show me the penguin a few (hundred) times and trace his finger along the coil of the “slow sliding snail.”

I eat this snuggly time up. Pictured here with more in the Gallery.

Simon turned 17 months old today, an occasion he marked by being pretty crabby for half the day, spending the entire day in his PJs (Matt was up until 3:30 a.m. on a work call last night, so we were a lazy household today), and waving bye-bye for the first time.

My mom came over to dinner, and after crabbing a bit, perking up long enough to eat Caribbean black beans with a spoon at the table like the rest of the family, having us read his two favorite books these days (I’ll Teach my Dog a Lot Words and Curious George ABCs), throwing all his toys in the bathtub and pointing out every light in the house, it was time for my mom to leave. She grabbed her coat and headed for the door, and Simon began opening and closing his hand. It wasn’t a back-and-forth wave with his arm raised, so it took me a while to realize what he was up to.

He clearly knew what he was up to, though, because once he folded and unfolded his fingers a few times, he looked up at us and waited for us to clap for him. Which of course, we did wildly. Then mom actually walked out the door, and Simon sat in place completely motionless. We’ll have to work on his timing. Still, between the waving and the self-feeding of the family dinner, I’m considering the day a rousing success despite any crabbiness and the fact that he didn’t even bother to get dressed.

If Simon is to continue being an only child, it’s important to me that he learn to share and play well with others. That’s one of the reasons I began looking into pre-schools last summer and put him on the pre-registration list at Kenneseth Israel (KI).

Friday, February 29, I went to check the program out in person and process our official paperwork. Things are fine now, but on that day we ran into a huge obstacle right out the gate on the road to cooperation: Me.

That Friday, it really hit home that I’ve been raising Simon in a bubble. I’ve had strong opinions about what he eats, how he’s diapered, and what he reads and plays with, and because Matt has agreed with me, I’ve always gotten my way. Beginning with classes next August, my streak is going to come to an end, and I’m pretty anxious about it.

KI doesn’t allow cloth diapers right now, and they’re pretty sure that they can’t and/or won’t make an exception for me. That means that for 4 hours or so 4 days a week, Simon will be in Seventh Generation disposables instead of his Fuzzi Bunz. I’m wasn’t happy to hear that.

Then there is the food. Simon will be getting snacks during the day and having lunch at least twice a week. I looked at the menu, and the vast majority of it was what Simon eats now. With two HUGE exceptions: The first is that they serve meat-heavily processed non-organic, non pastured meat. The easy fix to that is to check the “vegetarian” box on his school registration sheet.

But the next issue, and one without a tidy solution, is that they also serve non-organic milk, cheese, and yogurt-products that are full of the hormones I have steadfastly avoided feeding my family. I put on a reasonably decent face about being relaxed about my eating preferences in public because I understand that what you eat is personal, and like politics and religion, it is best left out of the discussion unless you are surrounded by like minds. But the truth is, I’m a zealot at heart, and the KI cupboard is a source of distress to me.

By the evening of the day of my visit, I was so upset that I began to consider using a nanny for one more year. It seemed to me that the KI pre-school encapsulated the problems of coming home and/or joining any institution from my youth. Specifically, that while I have connections and a history with the place, I don’t necessarily share its values any more. I have a pretty good idea of where I could find the pre-school of my dreams, but I don’t live in the Bay Area any more, either. The day of my first visit, I was very much feeling that “You can’t go home again.”

Then I picked up Terry Brazelton’s book Touchpoints over the weekend and read the section on children Simon’s age and in their second year. He wrote convincingly about how important socialization is after 18 months and discussed all the things you should look for in pre-school or outside care or provide yourself.

Keneseth has it all. They have music daily. They have hands-on exploration (they call it science) every day. Arts and crafts. Quiet time. Play time. All of it. They have 5 teachers for 13-15 children. The head teacher has been in the same class for at least 12 years, and one of the other teachers, Laura, grew up with my brother Steve. I’ve known the office administrator my whole life, and when I showed up with my paperwork she smiled at me warmly, pointed to my brothers’ names on the Bar Mitzvah plaque outside her office, and said a hearty “Welcome back to Keneseth Israel. We’ve missed you.” She then looked at the address on my check and began chatting about my neighbors two doors down who sent their daughter to KI and what a nice family they are.

That same day, I saw a group of parents and teachers working in the kitchen getting lunch ready, the littlest kids munching away in their room, and the older kids running around the auditorium just before their meal began. Backpacks lined the halls. Baskets of toys, food, and household furnishings were stacked on the unused tables in preparation for a coming auction. The rabbi walked by on his way from performing the kids’ Shabbat program. And when I asked the school director about the auction, she laughed and told me I’d be helping out next year.

Simon is all signed up, so I suppose I will indeed. What I still have to figure out-and I think it will be long journey-is how to reconcile my coming home and returning to Keneseth Israel (for pre-school anyway) with my not-so-secret inner zealot who likes to go her own way. If I can figure out the right balance, I think Simon and I will both learn much along the way.

I think Simon had his first nightmare last night. We put him down at 8:00 or so, and at 8:30, just when I’d expect him to be moving from light to deeper sleep, he awoke shrieking. There were no little muffled cries or whimpers that escalated; he began full on.

I rushed upstairs, half-way expecting to find him on the floor or caught in the crib rails. Instead he was sitting up in bed, holding onto his dirty dog and pacifier and sobbing inconsolably. I can’t explain why, but he looked scared to me.

It took a few minutes for him to calm down in my arms, but he did eventually relax. Then I laid him on our bed with the lights off except for what came in from the hallway, laid down next to him, and sang a few songs. He fell asleep on his back.  I couldn’t really watch him since the lights were out, so I put my head on his chest and listened to his heart beat–a sound I hadn’t heard since my last pre-natal checkup in October 2006.

Then, just as I went to move him back into his crib, something funny happened. He awoke part-way. He rolled over to his side, lifted an arm, pointed up into the air and said “light”, then pushed up on his arms to raise his whole chest. At this point, he spun his pacifier in his mouth and I was convinced he was totally awake, only to be confused by his total limpness once I picked him up.

He slept uneventfully for the rest of the night, but I’m left today wondering what the heck is going on in that crib at night!

I’m beginning to feel more secure in my prediction that Simon is developing quickly these days, as yesterday we enjoyed a couple more firsts.

One came during the UK basketball game Matt was watching yesterday. Simon looked up at the screen and, casual as anything, said “ball” a few times. So he now understands that his toy and the game on the screen are related. We thought that was pretty cool.

Then dinner time rolled around. Simon ate his dinner while I finished cooking mine and Matt’s. I really didn’t think a sixteen-month old would be interested in tofu and black bean chili. But I was wrong! Once we sat down, Simon kept fussing until we let him in on the action. We didn’t let him share our beer, but he did enjoy the chili, the cornbread that went with it, and some licorice I got out as a treat afterwards.

Funnier still, he went on to imitate me. After I fed him a few bites of cornbread, he insisted on returning the favor, tidily placing a morsel into my mouth, sometimes immediately after putting it into his own. (I can’t decide what’s grosser: eating out of his mouth or eating off of his hands; both are nightmare-worthy.) Then, when I came time to clean up our mess, he wanted to “help” with that, too, and took a turn with the hand-vac.

Now today he pulled up as casually as anything to cruise around our ottoman. I haven’t seen him do this for over a month I’m sure.

Yesterday was also eventful on the sleeping front, as bedtime was a total comedy of errors. First, we got to bed an hour late because none of us had adjusted to daylight saving time. Frankly, “springing ahead” with a foot of snow on the ground struck a discordant note for us all. Against our better knowledge, we put Simon down to bed at 9:00 p.m. Within ten minutes, we heard wailing. I went to check things out and discovered that the crib aquarium batteries had died again. These days, with Simon smacking the thing countless times per night, we go through batteries like water.

Aquarium fixed, we left the room once more. An hour or so went by, and we heard more wailing. Only this time the loudest wail came from Tristan, who we accidentally locked in the room, while Simon picked up the harmony with a confused, half-asleep cry. Thinking everyone could settle in for the night uneventfully at last, we were both surprised to hear the alarm go off in Simon’s room at midnight. It seems that when I changed the clock for the ridiculously early daylight savings time, I accidentally turned the alarm on, too.

Simon had now awakened at least three times in an as many hours. Poor little guy. When he awoke this morning at seven, I knew he was too tired to really be up. So for the first time in ages, I picked him up, tucked him into bed between Matt and me with his paci and dirty dog, and enjoyed watching him fall back asleep before I joined him for a bit. It’s the closest look I’ve had at his sleeping face in ages, a sweeter sight than I remember, and a lovely call-back to snuggly mornings we shared this time last year.

Right now, I’m about 2/3 of the way through Tete-Michel Kpomassie’s memoir An African in Greenland. I last left Tete-Michel in Sukkertoppen (Maniitsoq), where he has arrived in September, just in time for the”the polar hysteria of the arctic autumn.” Basically, the arctic is difficult in September because the sea is too full of ice to kayak, the young ice is too fragile to allow for sledges, the light is eerie and faint, and everyone is horribly sleep deprived after months of endless arctic sunlight. So they sit around cooped up inside their tiny houses and go mad.

After two weeks or so of what seemed like endless drizzly weather here in Louisville–our own little “midwestern hysteria of the Ohio Valley winter”–I could identify. It hasn’t been warm enough to go out and enjoy spring, but we hadn’t had any fun snow to play in either.

After two weeks or so of constant overcast, dreary weather, things finally looked up. We got several days that were warm and dry enough to take Simon out for long walks in his stroller. And then yesterday and today we got a genuine winter wonderland in the form of 12″ of glorious, pure, powdery snow.

Once the snow stopped falling around noon today, we gave Simon his lunch and headed out to play. Funny thing about pulling a sled in the snow: it’s much easier to do when you have a thin layer of ice over an inch or two of snow. A month ago, our sad little snow made for fast and easy sledding. Today, with a foot to tredge through, it was prettier but very slow going. We found that things actually worked best when we took to the streets, that is until we hit a dry patch on Bardstown Road where the sun and cars conspired to melt a bit too much.

Thus we had to abandon our plans to haul Simon all the way to a cafe. Which is probably just as well, as we had no idea what to do with the sled once we got there and would have all overheated quickly in our many layers of clothing. So instead Matt and I (mostly Matt) pulled Simon back home, I made my first snow angel in ages, we all enjoyed some hot cocoa (Matt and me more than Simon, who was confused by it), and thereby carried out an important winter ritual. Now I’m ready for spring.

Babies are funny. For the most part, from my point of view, they either seem to change dramatically overnight or not at all. I mean, one day they sit up and stay up for the first time, and the whole world seems different, and then (in our case) it seems like that’s the last trick they master for the better part of a year. There’s nothing predictable about the pattern except, to be trite and clichéd, its unpredictability. Change. Stop. Change again. Stop.

Today, though, I think I saw hints of change-or the suggestion that more change is on the horizon. To be more specific, today Simon gave hints of a tsunami of change headed our way. My forecast might be off, but I have a strong feeling his world is about to transform and mine along with it.

First, there is language/cognition and the use of symbols. Two nights ago, Simon associated the light in a book with the light in our room. Then last night he went one step further. He pointed to the floor light in the book (the one he always points out), then turned the page and pointed to the table light in a second picture, then looked around the room for a table light and pointed to the one on Matt’s bedside table. It was clear to me that he was making the association between different types of lights and understood that the two lights in the room and the two lights in the book are all related. He knows how our light switches work as well, both the traditional toggle switches and the antique push-button ones.

Then there is his Little People Farm. He got it for Chanukah, and for ages now it’s just been a storage game. Put the animals in the silo. Open the door and take the animals out. Repeat ad nauseum. A few days ago he seemed to actually look at the animals, so I began making the associated animal noises. Today it began to click for him. When he held the pig and I oinked, he knew which gate to open on the toy to make it “oink.” When I made a “baaaa” sound, he knew exactly which part of the toy to maneuver to hear it make the same noise. He still puts the animals in the silo, but he also puts them in their stalls and pens, albeit randomly.

We’ve also seen changes on the eating front. Once Simon began to self-feed, he rejected 99% of his baby food and we got into a horrible rut. The last few days, I’ve been even more worried as he’s been rejecting his bananas and mac and cheese, two of the few foods left in his diet. During a snack yesterday, he reached for my Panda black licorice. I broke off a bit and gave it to him, awaiting a horrible “how could you do this to me?” stare. Instead, he reached for more. We ended up splitting the bar.

Later, at dinner time, he threw a fit over and rejected his mac and cheese, only to reach out for my spicy sweet potato, kale, tomato, and corn chowder. He loved it, and I fed him the better part of a bowl. Tonight I pureed it for him so he’d eat more of the veggies, and he not only ate it, but he did so in part with a spoon.

Simon has even debuted a new expression. Matt and I are calling it the “coy smile.” It reminds me very much of the look the late Princess Diana gave in many photos: head down, eyes up, mischievous smile on face. It’s a look that suggests secrets shared and secret intimacy-very flirtatious and hilarious coming from a 16-month old.

Add to all of this that Simon now spends most of his time kneeling, sings a little “laddle little laydl” song to himself, knows how to play ball with himself using the stairwell wall, tried to take off his shirt two days ago, and gave his stuffed frog a “drink” from his cup today, and you have a picture of a very funny little baby who is going to wake up a little boy any day now.

Tonight Simon made a connection for the first time between an object in a book and an object in the room. It was just before bedtime, and we were going through Pat the Bunny, Sleepy Bunny as we always do. We got to a page where Simon likes to point out a light, and as he pointed to the lamp in the picture, we said “light.”

Then, when he would normally point to a million other things on the page and have us explain them, too,  he instead looked up and pointed to the overhead light. “Light,” we called out to him.

His little brow furrowed. He again pointed to the light in the book with his right index finger, then arched back and pointed back up at the light with his left.

Simon has been able to identify lights in our house and lights in books for a while now. But this is the first time he’s made the connection that his book has pictures of objects in our house and that they both have the same name. This is probably the most mundane thing in the world, but somehow it seemed big and significant to Matt and me tonight.

Now that Simon is over sixteen months old, his list of favorites has changed once more. As of this March, Simon’s day is brightened by the following:

Stuffed Animals: Dirty Duck and Dirty Dog are still our workhorse attachment sleep objects, but Simon is beginning to love and appreciate other stuffed animals, too. Specific favorites are My Baby Bunny (named on the animal itself), Super Speedy (a frog we named based on his similarity to a frog with this name stitched on one of Simon’s outfits last summer), and Annabelle, an organic cotton lamb that is a favorite of mine. He holds them and kisses them, which is adorable. Then he throws them down with little care or consideration to remind us that he is still not quite one-and-a-half years old.

Ball!: Simon is a ball-hog. He loves to roll the ball, bounce the ball, throw the ball, and kick the ball. Our play basket-ball is the hands-down favorite, but he’s also a fan of a hard ball with pebbles inside, tennis balls, open-weaved balls, and pretty much anything spherical and light-weight. In fact, right now his favorite word is “ball.” Two weeks ago, inside the zoo’s gorilla exhibit, Simon showed very little interest in the giant apes but got very excited when he saw a ball inside their living space.

Cups: Simon can now drink from a cup. He can also crush a cup, stack a cup, put things in cups, and throw cups down stairs. In fact, he loves doing these things. I bought him plastic tumblers with frogs and dinosaurs that he likes OK, but his favorite cup is always the one I’m driking from, a fact that is making it more challenging than ever to get in my morning cup of tea.

TV Remote Controls: Is this a man-thing showing up early? The boy loves the cable and audio remotes. For that matter, he also loves the controls on the TV and receiver themselves. No remote is safe from him, and we’re considering using the close captioning to make up for his uncanny ability to find and turn off the audio controls.

Pacifiers: Oy. We were pretty proud of having a baby who only used pacifiers to get to sleep and for the occasional, serious, crying jag. Now we have a baby that can cry with a pacifier in his mouth, but who likes them more than ever. He reaches for them and plays with them all the time. Matt hates this because when he’s “corked”, he can’t talk. I understand and agree, but what are you going to do when the kid really wants it and will wail unless he has it? We’re trying for an out-of-sight strategy of just not leaving them around. I’m also mindful that this increased interest in pacifiers popped up right about the time Simon weaned and started getting new teeth at an expedited rate, and so there may be a very good reason for it.

Bluegrass Music: Hilarious but true. Simon loves most music, has excellent rhythm with drumsticks, and adores it when I dance with him, which we do daily. But he’s developing a particular soft spot for anything with a banjo. We have an activity table in the upstairs sitting room, and one of the gadgets on it is a little guitar you can move the handle on. That handle functions as a switch, and it plays a variety of old-time songs like “She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain” with a bluegrass sound to them. He goes nuts whenever this happens: He bounces on his knees, shakes his head back and forth, bites his lower lip, and squints his eyes. He’ll do this for a good 15-20 minutes, too. The kid is mad for anything with a banjo and has mad dance moves to accompany his favorite tunes.

Recycling Bin and Pet Dishes: His toy kitchen cannot hold a candle to the pet dishes or recycling bin where Simon is concerned. He loves to splash in the water dish, throw the food dishes, and on occasion sample their contents. He also derives great joy from emptying the contents of the recycling bin. Newspapers get thrown about the kitchen, and empty bottles and cans become nesting and stacking toys. I’ve seen him spend the better part of an evening putting a frapuccino bottle inside a yogurt tub and taking it back out again. He’s also incorporated these non-traditional materials into his architectural play. We have to make sure any rough edged cans or breakable glass are confiscated, but otherwise this makes for a very cheap way to keep him into new toys!

Nesting Boxes: The box says “Ages 3 and up.” Are they kidding? Simon loved these at one year, and his ardor has only increased. Favorite toy in the house, hands down, and he’s now capable of building towers six-blocks high.

Books: Still a favorite. He loves his own books and ours as well. And these days, the more the better. A favorite past-time is yanking every book off of a shelf and going through them one by one very quickly. Recent favorites include “The Polite Elephant,” “Daddy Hugs,” and “Good Night San Francisco.”

The Cats: Poor Percival and Tristan. Simon loves them in that baby/toddler imitable way. He loves to scoot after them, reach for them, grab their tails, point at their faces, and slap their backs. We’re trying very hard to teach “nice touching”, but the subtleties are lost on him. Worse, the cats really don’t like having to flee the scene, and so much time is spent with child and pets running around in vicious circles, one in pursuit while the other two try to establish a safe distance. (The cats themselves are in complete heaven from the hours of 8 p.m. – 12 a.m. for obvious reasons.)