Number Two child is working on his speaking skills. This involves yelling EVERYTHING AT MAXIMUM VOLUME. Requests for food are similar to that of a bull elephant trumpeting an immediate charge. Denials of questions about wanting more water/food/face-wiping are met with a drawn out “Nooooooooo” that leaves you with no questions and little functioning apparatus in your inner ear. All hopes my wife and I had for a quiet introverted second child are being trampled. But it still may come to pass. Now the important question that has been hovering on the lips of all you readers: what is it like to take Mr. Noisy to a smorgasbord at IKEA? Let’s start from the ground and work up.
Even though it looks like most of his food is on the floor I can assure you five times as much made it into his stomach, sometimes detouring across his face and through his hair. It was really a horrifying amount of food he consumed. Mr. Noisy yelled, smacked his hands on the table, rocked his high chair back and forth to the point of severe consternation of reasonable adults. MORE MORE MORE! We gave him smoked salmon, toast points, grapes, potatoes, meatballs, broiled salmon, blueberries, watermelon, pickled beets, lingonberry sauce, deviled eggs, and still he ate. My God, the consumption was something to behold. Did he enjoy his meal? The Social Smile says…yes!
Wait, I’ve seen that face somewhere before. I think he’s picking it up from his big sister. Now it all makes sense: the noise, the thousand-megawatt smile, it’s all trickling down in the household. Where is an introvert to hide? My wife has recently been buying grownup drink-making supplies, from rum to muddlers, mixers to jiggers. At first I made fun but now I see how a few hours with the mini-human noise machines will send even the calmest soul reaching for the bottle. YAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Writer, architect, father, husband.
MAAAAAAAAAAAAAMMMMAAAAAAAAAAA!