22 Months and Counting

So the wife harangued me into getting this thing going again. Meh. We'll see how it goes. It's true that I should probably be writing for pleasure again more than I have been. This'd be more pleasureful if I actually got commentary that evoked more desire to write, but hey, nothing like internet-exhibitionism, right?

(Just be glad I'm only exposing myself textually, no? Yeesh.)

Lucas, the munchy dood, the terror on two legs, he-who-loads-diapers, Lord of the Crib, Emperor of the High Chair, Wielder-of-Small-Wooden-Objects, Chaser-of-Dogs, Tipper-of-Plates-of-Food, is now approaching his second birthday. He's becoming noticeably more verbose; I've stopped bothering to find out how this compares to the child average, but somewhere between the ages of one and two, children - or at least this child - starts showing steady progress. I think it's that the brain has figured out the extreme complexity that is basic locomotion, and can now apply itself to more complicated issues like speech and understanding the world around him. We're starting to see a LOT more imitation...

(Pssst. Never use the phrase "Nice boobies" in front of a toddler. S'all I'm gonna say, ya dig? K. It's totally funny but man oh man does your wife give you a LOOK.)

...and a lot more of "I do it" and "I got it" behaviors. He's trying to become like his parents (poor sap, such lousy role models he has, at least for his dad) and it's becoming more obvious. He's even starting to adopt some of the facial expressions and remarks - "Aw, man!" - that he sees around him. I'm sure I've said this before somewhere, but there's something deeply humbling about seeing your own behaviors in someone else who's replicating them as faithfully as possible. Makes you look a bit more carefully at what you do.

Lucas is getting to the point now where playing with him, as a dad, is a bit less silly. He'll show up with a book in his hands and start tapping it on my knee and saying "Book!" until I read it to him. Well gee, darn. I'll just have to read to my kid. The difference now is that you no longer feel as though you're reading into a vacuum. He'll repeat words, point at things, identify pictures.

Speaking of repeating things, I've never quite gotten how parents can stand watching the same film a bajillion times - at least until now. I mean, seriously, how do you not rock back and forth, humming and biting your fingernails the 1000th time Barney prances across your screen? I remember reading an article about a guy who beat up someone in a Barney outfit once; I can sympathize. Anyhow, Lucas, you see, has a certain fondness for the movie "Cars" and all things "Cars" related. (The fact that this may or may not have been introduced/encouraged by his mother seems utterly unimportant to him.) So that movie has graced our television screen more times than adult stars have graced Charlie Sheen's house. (Ha! See, I used topical humor there. Be amazed.)

I've started to notice, though, that many times while Cars is on, I don't watch the film - I watch Lucas. His reactions, his responses, the things he repeats and the things he loses interest in. That changes with every watching of the movie. Used to be, in the big car-crashing scene early in the movie, Lucas got very agitated - he didn't like seeing cars smashed - but later on, that didn't bother him. Now, though, seeing Lightning crashing through Radiator Springs agitated the heck out of him. It's interesting to see what fascinates him one day and becomes old hat the next - and vice versa.

Here's the closing thought that I wonder about, though:

When Lucas is watching a TV show with us (or rather, we're watching one while we eat and Lucas is there), most of our shows go into breaks of scene with a dramatic revelation. (You know, the typical cliffhanger at commercial or end-of-episode.) Here's the thing... there's no way Lucas is following the plot. Can't be, yet. All the same, though, whenever there's a big scene break, he stops watching the TV, looks at us, and says,

"Uh oh!"

...how's he do that?

I know so little about kids.