Kidspeak

Dddragon was not that quick to talk. Said her first word at about twelve months. Said, "See? " That's "see" with a question mark. She was sitting in her walker – they call those things "walkers" but they're really "roller-arounders" if you ask me. Which you didn't. Just sayin'. Anyway. Where was I before I was so rudely interrupted? Oh, yeah. Dddragon was sitting in her walker, and she rolled (see what I'm sayin' about the rolling around part?) her little baby self right up to the television, pointed her little baby finger at something on the screen, and said, "See? "

Guess I'd overdone the "see? " on our little walks around the neighborhood. I would point at a flower, and say, "See? Flower." And " See? Doggie. " Trying to teach her things like flower and doggie, but instead she picked up on the "See? " part. You see what I had to work with.

By the time she was four, she was talking. A lot. A whole lot.

Once just the two of us were driving down the street from L.A. to a place in the San Gabriel Valley – actually I was driving, ddd was just riding – she was yakking away non-stop. This was a trip that was going to take about an hour. It wasn’t a trip that should have taken an hour, but it was a trip that was going to take an hour because my brother-in-law Gene was the one who told me how to make this trip, and he never used the freeway. Afterwards when I used the freeway it was a twenty-minute trip.
But I digress.
As usual.
Sidetracked again.

Anyhoo. Ddd is hanging half out the window – yeah, yeah, she was in the front seat, and we didn’t use seatbelts in those days either. Guess I was a neglectful mother. Ddd is talking, talking, talking, and I’m half listening, and she says, "Where are those letters ? "

"What letters? "

"Those letters on the street." What the…what is this kid talking about?

"There aren’t any letters on streets. Do you mean the words that tell you that people can walk across the street? Ped Xing? "

"No. Those letters. Those letters that are on the map and the globe."

Ah. She has seen us reading maps and had noticed that there are words on the lines that represent the streets. That kid. Had to laugh at that. She talked so much on that hour's trip that I remarked to Mama, "I thought she’d never talk. Now I’m afraid she’ll never shut up."

Not so far. Shut up, I mean. That’s why I learned to use the freeway system.

She had no clue that there was anything that normal folks didn’t shout right out loud either. Not sayin’ she was abnormal. A touch unusual maybe. Friendly. Like that.

About two years later a neighbor told me about seeing ddd walking to school. Emma, the neighbor, called out to ddd, saying, "How’s the new baby brother? "

Ddd shouts back, “He’s fine! He had some trouble with his penis, but it’s okay now."
Some kid, huh?.

Nivek’s circumcision had apparently made an impression. Emma 'bout fainted apparently. It’s possible that she herself had never said the word “penis” out loud. Her problem. Not ddd’s. Not mine either. As far as I was concerned ddd could tell the world. Actually she just might have done that. Talked a lot. Seriously. She was so cute.

Not sayin' she's not cute now of course. Just sayin' not as cute...