"Say Mama"

I say this over and over again to my six month old throughout each and every day. I guess I am hoping that somehow by hearing it she will decide to say mama before she says dada. The little man said dada first, despite the reality that I spent 24 hours a day with him, every day of his first year. Now I know what the child development books tell you. It is much easier for a baby to form the "dah" sound than it is for them to form the "ma" sound. That didn't make the disappointment any less. And my daughter already says "Ma" anyway. It matters not that she is saying it while pursing her lips in a cry from the teething pain. I know deep down inside she knows it is my name and she is therefore crying out to the one person she feels can bring her comfort in her time of distress.

Okay, I know that isn't true. But since she is already forming the word she is halfway there. I simply need to teach her the association between the word and the person. Easy! Who am I kidding. I thought until recently that all my son's incredible knowledge had come from you know who. When he was younger, people would tell me how smart he was and how a child his age couldn't possibly know so much. I would beam, (inwardly, of course. I am nothing if not humble.) I would conjure up images in my head of all the hundreds of books I had read to him from the time he was born until that very day. I would imagine all the trips he and I had taken to the zoo, the library, countless museums and aquariums. He didn't read yet. He didn't attend school. His dad mostly took him to Chuck E Cheese. Who else could have taught him so much?

TV. That's right. It turns out the AAP is wrong. TV does not rot the brain but rather enriches it. In a recent conversation my son mentioned a fact about eagles and the eggs they lay. His dad asked him where he had learned this information. I stood smiling by, waiting to hear my husband applaud my incredible talent at teaching our son.

TV he said. To be more exact, Diego had taught him. He also taught him about whale sharks. Do you know mom what a whale shark is, my son asked? Sadly I could not reply. Not only did I have absolutely no idea what in the world a whale shark was, but neither could I believe that TV had also been teaching my son. Okay, I had already known that Spongebob had taught him the word stupid. But he could have done without that little tidbit of information. It turns out he had also learned new things, good things, from Little Bill, Wow Wow Wubbzy, Maggie and the Beast and many other shows for preschoolers.

I have come to terms with the fact that I am not nor will I ever be my son's only teacher. He not only learns from mom and dad, and apparently the TV as well, but whether directly or indirectly, he also learns from his friends and the many people that are part of his small world. And I am mostly okay with that. I have taught him many things and one of those things is that the world around us offers opportunities to learn and grow every day, if we allow ourselves to receive it. And as long as I get to see him develop into his own little person with his own ideas and thoughts, I will be content. He is now in preschool, after all, and he has teachers there that are working diligently to prepare him for kindergarten next year.

But the baby is all mine for at least another year. Well, mine and Baby Einstein's. I do need to shower now and again, after all.