Meteor Showers

It has been a wily and weird few days (weeks?), centered mostly on much low-grade but disgusting illness for everyone, full of biological functions I'd rather not discuss for fear of sparking a flashback, and somewhere in there, Number One's 9th birthday has become an ongoing celebration that never... quite... ends - since we keep postponing various parts "until everyone is better". The kid will be 40 before he finally has his party, apparently.

However... this is not one of those griping-about-puke posts. (Hooray!)

This, instead, is a celebration of the interesting flashes of language we are seeing in Jamesy lately! We can't get him to repeat them (he just shakes his head "no" at you and grins, the little ratfink), but every few days, he comes out with something amazing, and so clear that it is indisputably whatever we think he is saying.

For example:

While having his diaper changed, listening to Dumb Ole Mom cooing "We're going to change your diaper, stinky man, yes we are, time for a diaper change, gonna put a new diaper on" and similarly stimulating banter, he looked up at me with those big blue eyes and said "dipe on". Quite emphatically. And then waited to see what I would do. (I, of course, reacted as if he had just started spontaneously spouting winning Megamillions numbers.) This one was heard by his brother and father as well.

Of course, now, every time his diaper needs changing, I babble on and on and ON about "diaper ON, dipe ON?" and he just looks at me as if to say "If I aim just.. right... I'm pretty sure I could pee right into that mouth you won't close."

He also, after being heartily congratulated by D.O.M. for his failure to thrash like a tackled alligator during a particularly onerous (and odorous) diaper change, said "eye fi" when I made him high-five me. Again - witnesses! But he won't repeat it. And now, when I'm done "Dipe ON"-ing him, I am a high-five fanatic.

(It occurs to me that perhaps my insistence on repetition is not exactly positive reinforcement for having said something once. He's probably all "Woman, PLEASE" and dreading every word he says because he knows I'll turn it into an obsession. Who could blame him for resisting?)

So TODAY, while be diaper-changed (are we seeing a theme here?), before I had a chance to go through my usual shtick, I asked Number One to read me the names of the therapists due for a visit today off the giant white board we have set up for just that purpose, so he said "Rebecca at 12:15"... and James dutifully repeated "ah beck ah" and laughed at me.

While I could dwell on the obvious insurrection lurking beneath the placid surface of my deviant toddler, I will instead simply say that knowing this stuff is in there - even if it has trouble coming out currently - fills me with great joy :)