"Okay, Sam, it's time to go. Get me your shoes." I say this type of thing on a regular basis, though it usually falls on deaf ears unless I'm feeling patient enough to repeat myself in short phrases until his selective hearing kicks in. Today is different, though; without protest, delay, or a second glance, he brings me a matching pair of his own shoes and expectantly lifts his foot.
We're getting ready to run errands. Before I even have much time to muse on his unexpected cooperativeness, I'm opening the closet door to get our coats. I hand him his coat, turn to get mine, and when I turn back around, he's already got his halfway on. Admittedly, he's putting it on backwards, but I'm flabbergasted nonetheless. This is a first for him, and I never saw it coming.
Okay, maybe I did have an inkling this was coming. Sam's been dutifully working on removing his PJ's every morning, struggling with the zipper but usually only managing to get it down just below his navel. (On the one occasion on which he successfully got it completely down, he disappeared into the closet until I knocked on the door, and then he flung open the door and jumped out wearing nothing but his diaper.) He tries to put our shoes on our feet (and remove them while in public), and he puts his own arms into his sleeves after I pull his shirts over his head.
So, yeah, maybe I could have predicted that his initiative was going to take him to new levels in the near future, but I was still taken aback. He's growing up and becoming so much more capable that I can see. He probably could have done this coat trick last week, but I've moved to dress him without giving him the chance to show me. How much more can he do that I'm not allowing him to show me?
For a long time, I wondered whether or not I was inadvertently stunting his vocabulary. For most of the day, it's just him and me together, and I have real difficulties keeping up a constant, mostly one-sided, chatter. It's easier now, but when he was a baby, I felt like a fool jabbering away all the time. When I fell silent, though, I felt guilty. Was the lack of stimulation going to delay his speech? Seeing my chatterbox niece during the holidays seemed to validate my worries.
Now he's talking away like a pro (well, a really good amateur), and every day he comes out with a new word. Yesterday's word was "pizza," and he said it three times while vigorously pointing at and demanding some of the dinner I was preparing. He's always babbling and making noise, and I feel a little foolish for worrying so much. Maybe I could have enjoyed his first words even more had I not been so focused on waiting for them.
This whole "growing up" thing is really throwing me for a loop. Sometimes it's difficult to catch the firsts before they become old-hat to him. One minute, we're saying, "Did he just say what I think he did?" and the next, it's a part of his daily conversation, so clear that it seems odd that we had to ask in the first place. His same-aged best friend Zach, just a few days ago, declared to his grandmother, "Sam's my friend." Just like that, clear as a bell, leaving his whole family gaping open-mouthed. Kids can do that to you without even trying.
When did he learn to play with his cars like a big kid? He races them around his train tracks or across the floor, yelling "Beep, beep!" and crashing them with realistic sound effects: "Ksh, kshhhhhh!" When did he discover how to open their teensy little doors, and when did he learn to identify the various parts of the car? (We're talking "wheel" and "door" here, not "carburetor" or "manifold.") I don't know if I'm witnessing the firsts for these developments, or if I missed them. He performs them so smoothly, he might have been born with a car in either hand.
Mom says that neither I nor my brother ever babbled at all. One minute we weren't making noise, and in the next we were speaking in sentences. I imagine that we left her head spinning; Sam's innate speed is somewhat slower, but I still can't catch my breath.
Now Eric and Sam are sitting on the couch, looking at an old Commodore magazine. Eric is showing him the pictures, telling him about the old computers. Suddenly, Eric calls out to me. "I think he's actually naming these letters!" he says with a stunned look.
I turn and see Sam pointing at random to the letters in the title. "E...r...o...e...e..." he says while gesturing. Eric's mouth is hanging open.
"Is he saying the right ones?" I ask.
"Some of them!"
"Well, then, keep reading to him," I say, chuckling. Poor Eric; he doesn't see Sam nearly as much as I do, so he misses many of the firsts. At the rate Sam's growing, it must seem like Eric comes home to a different little boy each night. I call him to tell him important things, but hearing about them and seeing them with your own eyes are two very different things.
Perhaps the most dizzying part, though, isn't merely the speed with which he's growing. Even with as many firsts as Sam is having, I'm having many myself. This is my first time as the mom of a toddler; this is my first time as the mom to a boy who dresses himself. As he changes, I have to change my own thought processes. Now he does this, so now I have to respond in this way. I'm learning as I go, developing each day.
This is my first time as a mom. Have patience, Sam.
This entry is a piece for On Display. The topic this month was "Firsts."
| previous |
one year ago:
Some stories are best realized with the benefit of the distancing that hindsight provides.
two years ago:
Eventually I promised to try to be more mindful of our finances and Eric swore to try to be more positive about the fact that this was a child, not a payment plan.
three years ago:
Every year, the coach would schedule our first game with the local private school because they were the only team we could even come close to beating. |
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On the Stereo:
Nothing
On the Bookshelf:
Nothing
Gratuitous Sam
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