« Book Review: Childhood's End |Main| Book Review: No Country for Old Men »
Week 223: Cancel, Lil' Ahab, and Vocab May 6, 2008
One thing I've noticed about Sam lately is that she has gotten very talkative. I mean more so. The other day when I called Geralyn at home to ask her something, Sam demanded that she hand over the phone and then proceeded to spend the next several minutes telling me all about her day in an uninterrupted stream of consciousness that was broken only by her pausing to ask, "You still there? Daddy?" to make sure I hadn't set the phone down and gotten back to work.
 |
 |
This is, of course, great. The only issue is that while I have no trouble understanding 99% of her adolescent enunciation, that last 1% still trips me up sometimes. The other day Sam wandered over to me and asked, casually, "Daddy, what does cancer mean?"
I looked at her askance for a moment, but generally I try to answer all her questions honestly and straight forwardly, unless they have to do with sex or Republicans. "Well," I began, "it's like a disease. It's when part of your body forgets how it's supposed to be, and kind of starts growing wrong. It's usually pretty bad news."
I prepared to go on about free radicals and cigarettes when I noticed that this explanation had rather stricken Samantha. She had a slightly paniced look on her face as she tried to absorb what I had said. "Honey, don't worry about it, though. Where did you hear about cancer?"
Her eyes snapped up to mine. "No, not cancer. Cancer."
"Um,"
Sam tucked her right elbow in against her side and stuck her index finger up in the air parallel to the ground, which is the pose she strikes whenever she tries to explain something. "Like," she said, "When Mommy cancered my play date with Mia."
I blinked for a second. "Sam, do you mean 'cancel?' When Mommy cancelled your play date?"
She gave me one of her "Yes, you idiot" looks and said, "Yes, that's what I said, Daddy. Cancer."
Of course, the fact that this confusion was born of my daughter's habit of replacing her "L" sounds with "OR" sounds would have been a lot more amusing if I hadn't just practically told her that her mother had given her a deadly disease. But it was still kinda funny anyway.
 |
 |
Mandy is doing fine. She has actually started to walk with her leg cast on, and she's getting pretty darn good at it as long as she stays away from the slippery hardwood floor. She just clomps around in it, awkwardly but effectively, like a pint-sized Captain Ahab. I've even taught her to go "Yaaarrr!" while she does it.
And it's not just that one. She knows a lot of other words, too. Her favorites seem to be baby, bird, please, peas, cat, car, meow, doggie, ball, cast, cup, and the incredibly versitile NNNNYYEEEAAAAAHHHHHYAAAA! The latter is pretty much used when none of the former seem appropriate. And sometimes when they are.
Comments (0) |
Permalink | 
File under:
Parenting
Tags: Amanda, Language, Samantha
