Dude

The fact that Abbie can’t/won’t talk really bothers me; if she never learns to talk, she may never move out of the house. Despite hearing the same words several times everyday, words like “no” and “dog” and “no dog food,” she still doesn’t say anything that I could call a word without stretching the definition of “word” to include “argh.” I dread her 15-month checkup seven weeks from now, because her doctor said that if she hadn’t spoken yet they’d start trying to figure out why, which I interpret as “you’ve slacked off teaching her language for this first year so you’ve got 3 months to kick it in gear.” I know that she can hear well enough; she points to pictures in books when I ask and when I tell her “no dog food” she looks at me long enough that I know she’s choosing to ignore my command. I know some kids are just late talkers, especially when they have as little exposure to other little chatterboxes as she does. Unfortunately, I also know I didn’t talk to her enough in her first few months.

I’m a guy, and as a guy, I can have meaningful conversations with other guys using very few words, sometimes only the word “dude.” For example:

Ding-dong
“Dude.” (The pizza is here.)
“Dude.” (I’m watching TV, can you get it?)
“Dude.” (I need some money first.)
“Dude.” (I don’t have any money, I’ll pay you back.)
“Dude.” (You’re the one who said you wanted pizza in the first place.)
“Dude.” (So?)
“Dude.” (Douche.)

This works fine for communicating with my ilk, but Abbie isn’t a guy and needs to know lots of words to succeed. Once she tolerated books, I talked to her a lot more, but I knew she still needed to hear more language, I just didn’t know what to say.

One day on the mall playground, Abbie wandered up to another mom, and I saw what baby communication is supposed to be. Abbie caught her attention, and this woman let loose with a string of toddler babble that, with daily exposure, would have any infant talking by 6 months, if for no other reason that to shut her up. Here’s a close reproduction:

”Hi! What’s your name? (I tell her) Abbie? That’s a really good name. My name is Suzy (or whatever she said). My pants are blue, just like your dress is blue. Your dress has such pretty flowers. Do you like flowers? I like flowers. I have lots of pretty flowers at home. My favorite flowers are roses. They can be red, or white, or pink, or yellow, or …”

And so on. She may still be there talking, I don’t know. What I do know is she let loose with a phenomenal stream of consciousness sprinkled with colors. I’m doing my best to emulate that style by just saying whatever comes to mind. Sometimes I’ll describe the dressing process as I dress her, or say the colors of things as she touches them, or even try to teach her how to order a pizza and let a friend pay for it.