The Cat In The Motherfucker In The Hat

In the last week or two our baby turned one, which, you know, is kind of a big deal. One, it means we did it — we actually kept a child alive for a year. Two, it means we won't have to do this delicate ballet every four weeks or so where we try to take a picture of Mr. Baby without him looking too blurry or before he destroys the placard noting how many months he is. Three, it means I'll finally fully internalize how old a child is when they are 14 months (one-and-one-sixth years old) or 18 months (one-and-a-half years old) or 21 months (one-and-three-quarters-years) or whatever.

And I guess the other thing that will happen is that eventually Mr. Baby's development will be less mysterious and mystical and more, I don't know, is "banal" too terrible sounding a word? I'm kidding. But seriously, first word versus mastering times tables? It's no contest.

It's funny how fast some of these milestones are coming. Time was, we spent a lot of time wondering whether the kid could smile. Now things just cascade, one after another, and it's all we can do to remember what came when.

Like the first time he toasted with his sippy cup, for example. No kidding, he did this the other day. Fortunately our Child Protective Services caseworker was nowhere near the bar we were hanging out at, but I have to say, it was hilarious. Then I realized we did this three times in one day this past weekend and sort of figured, well of course he learns this before he can walk. And, well, what do you do? But look, he also seemed to blow his nose a few days ago — pretty cool, right? No, not nearly as awesome as toasting with a sippy. Duh.

But if you're not going to start walking — and really son, it's not something your mother or I are really looking forward to — then you have to look at talking as being the real big deal.

Is The Simpsons still on? OK, disingenuous, because I actually know the answer (yes) and I know this because I had football on this past weekend and Mr. Baby was suddenly transfixed by a spot for whatever latest Simpsons episode was showing later that day. It's not The Simpsons that he likes but rather the fact that it's a cartoon, period, which is probably because of the colors or something like that but which I always think is a really bizarre and probably really obvious fact about babies: They're, like, hardwired to watch cartoons.

The part about babies being seemingly hardwired to respond in a sort of narcotic stupor at the sight of goofy hand-drawn figures isn't really what I am interested in, though I am. Actually, it's the character of Maggie in The Simpsons that I started thinking about, the joke with Maggie (and I felt like I needed to look it up because I haven't seen an episode in a long time) being that she never does learn to talk (except, apparently, for small parts in little-watched late-model episodes).

Anyway, I think of Maggie Simpson's muteness sometimes when I watch Mr. Baby. For some time I assumed that at some point Mr. Baby's transition from flour sack to toddler would strike quickly, like an epiphany, and he would suddenly speak using a word in its proper context. And then there would be this mystical moment — like when construction crews tunneling on either side of the English Channel somehow met in the middle — when we would start communicating with him.

But the truth is that — like so much of child development — acquiring language is gradual. If we were to be honest, his first word was "ba-ba," the definition of which is not important except which to say that Dr. Sears would be pleased.

But ultimately, "ba-ba" is some meaningless bullshit babble that may or may not have meant what we thought it meant. So then the next candidate for first word was, if memory serves, "Up." As in, Mr. Baby would crawl over to your feet and demand to be lifted: "Up!" Of course, Mr. Baby seemed to use "up" in situations where "up" would not apply, most notably when he wanted to go "down," so . . . word? I don't know. 75 percent of the time, yes.

Then there's a word that he uses that we think we understand the provenance of: "Hot." "Hot" refers to food, and we figure he probably heard us say "It's hot" when we handed him some food. Thus, "hot." Does that count as a word? Probably not.

So that leaves what could be definitively Mr. Baby's first word: "Hat." As in, I'll put on a hat and he calls it a hat. I could quibble and say that Mr. Baby's use of "hat" occurred around the same time as something that sounds like a cross between "hat" and "cat," used when housecats appear, and that "cat" is his first word, but the "h" sound sounds more, uh, intentional.

Perhaps you notice a few words missing here. I guess a lot of parents hope that first word is either "mama" or "dada." And I'm sure when that happens those folks probably feel rather chuffed. But, really, that's kind of fucked up and narcissistic, isn't it? Of course, when I say "fucked up and narcissistic" I really mean, "You bet I'd be excited if his first word was 'dada.'"

And don't get me wrong — there were many times we heard him say "mama" or "dada" — sometimes even while looking at one of us. But then he'd go and call a lot of other things "mama" or "dada": the remote control, a cocktail shaker, the model advertising leggings on a poster in the window at Mandee. So I don't know, between "mama" and "up" or "dada" and "hat," I guess I have to be honest.

I guess it's just as well, given some of the language we use/continue to use around the child. I'll take "hat" any day over, say, "motherfucker." Then again, if it had been "the motherfucker with the hat," I'd probably call up the local news, but I guess that's just how things go.

Goodnight Mantle Decor, Or What Margaret Wise Brown Conveniently Overlooked

There's a children's book called Goodnight Moon, which if you don't have a child or don't remember your own childhood, because let's face it, that could have been quite a while ago, you at least might recognize from a certain Audi commercial.

Goodnight Moon was published — or maybe we should say "put together," since "writing" isn't a word I associate with a 130-word piece — in 1947 and it reads weirdly in that weird way that stuff from back then reads. Not that it's necessarily weird, just that children from the 1940s seem like they were probably weird (sorry, Mom and Dad!). Maybe it's just that for me stuff from the 1940s seems like the line between olden times (like the Civil War) and modern times (like, I don't know, Mad Men?). (Actually, wasn't this a plot line on Mad Men, that Don Draper was the demarcation line between old-school war hero U.S. culture and new school 1960s culture? See I knew this tangent wasn't totally off base. Thank you, Matthew Weiner! Even though you were born in 1965, so like what the fuck?)

Anyway, all of which is to say that Goodnight Moon feels like it's old. Like in the way Dashiell Hammett feels old — and maybe in a way Mad Men does not; one of my pet peeves with that show is that I've wondered whether there was too much anachronism in the motivations of the characters: Like this is a modern drama trapped in a 1960s set piece (and the attention to detail is distracting and diversionary). But let's not get sidetracked on Mad Men, because that would be stupid.

No, what I really am most interested in right now is what is left out of the text in Goodnight Moon, because as you're probably aware, Moon features a young bunny rabbit (don't ask) saying goodnight to all the random shit in his (his?) room. I don't know why this makes it a smart book — it's certainly not "smarter" than Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb, for example — but people really like this book.

I think what they like about it is the reason all well-done children's books are done well, which is that the language has some rhythm and cadence (think Dr. Seuss, because you probably haven't forgotten those). Because babies are dumb, I've noticed this is what they seem to glom on to. As an aside, it's funny how many children's books don't get this — a lot do, don't get me wrong, but so many are just pieces of shit. Without shit-talking too many children's books authors, some just really piss me off. There's one about a fucking pigeon, for example, that just plods along and is boring as all get out; and then the pictures suck, or rather the art work looks pretty to hipster parents but leaves babies cold, which makes the whole endeavor just about the most asinine, self-centered thing to do — write a children's book that a child won't read. Those people need to seriously fuck the fuck off. Please.

Anyway, back to Goodnight Moon, which I suppose succeeds in part because it's inscrutable to adults and seemingly scrutable to children, which is to say, when you read it you're like "What the fuck just happened?" Because as near as you can tell when you read it, all that happens is that a bunny rabbit says goodnight to a bunch of shit in his (his?) room not once but several times.

But see, here's the thing that bothers me about the book — there are so many things that the bunny rabbit — and let's be clear, is it even a bunny rabbit? Does an anthropomorphized bunny count as a bunny rabbit? — so many things that he (he?) omits, and omits in favor of stuff like "air" and "nobody," that you're kind of like, there's something odd here. And not "odd," but "odd" like this book is sneaking-messages-past-Nazi-code-crackers odd. Here's a list of those therein:

1) A sort of animal skin rug on the floor beside the bed. I don't know what kind of animal this would be; it sort of looks like a cross between a zebra and a tiger, or what happens when a zebra, tiger and bear have a sexual romp. Perhaps it's obvious why this item doesn't get said goodnight to: I don't know how it would sound, maybe something along the lines of, "Goodnight Zebra-Bear-Hybrid Rug." Or maybe Clement Hurd just correctly anticipated IKEA design.

2) Slippers next to the bed that look like Chuka-Uggs, as in "Goodnight Slippers That Look Like Three-Quarter Uggs."

3) A pile of logs by the fireplace, as in "Goodnight Logs, Goodnight Log Rack" . . .

4) Related, "Goodnight Fireplace Tools And Stand, But With Missing Fire Poker" . . .

5) And of course, the fireplace itself — including an active fire — which seems a little bit like an elephant in the room.

6) Except that there's an actual elephant in the room, or at least an elephant doll.

7) And then that brings us to "Goodnight Strange Naked Male Doll On The Bookshelf" . . .

8) And "Goodnight Giraffe Doll" . . .

9) Also, "Goodnight Strange Partially Clothed Female Doll On The Bookshelf" . . .

10) And speaking of which, there's a pretty large bookshelf there that escapes scrutiny, but whatever.

11) Except forget "whatever" because there's also this self-reflexive copy of Goodnight Moon sitting on the nightstand next to the telephone, which I've been meaning to bring up, actually, because what is a telephone doing in a child's room? The 1948 FCC Annual Report (page 89 in this .pdf) shows there to be 20,499,920 residential telephones in the United States in 1947 out of a population of roughly 144 million, meaning about one phone for every seven people. And you want to tell me that a fucking bunny rabbit has one of these things in his (his?) room? I call bullshit. Or is this not a "child's" room after all? Are his parents dead? Did the Nazis take them? The best thing about children's books is that it's perfectly acceptable to raise more questions than get answered. In a "normal" book, an editor would say something like "You can't distract a reader with a telephone without explaining what it's doing there" but this is a different kind of writing, I suppose.

12) Right, speaking of which: Nightstand.

13) Did I mention the billowy drapes? Or does "Goodnight Billowy Drapes" not have a ring to it?

14) "Goodnight Woven Area Rug."

15) I could talk about the picture of the bunny fishing for another bunny next to a felled tree, but the whole idea sort of creeps me the fuck out.

16) And finally, the mantle holds two items next to one of the clocks that I honestly don't understand what they are. Perhaps urns for the ashes of the bunny's dead rabbit parents? I'd call them candlesticks but they really don't look like candlesticks. Maybe just "Goodnight Mantle Decor"?

Next up, an evaluation of the political subtexts of Caps For Sale, followed by a critical appreciation of Sandra Boynton.

Peanut: From Term Of Endearment To Imminent Anaphylactic Risk

Back before we were feeding solid food to Mr. Baby, the possibility of certain food allergies freaked us out. Not so much stuff like shrimp or milk, because let's face it, shrimp are for rings and milk is basically gross, but rather the threat of what in our minds was the worst possible allergy of all: peanuts.

I mean, not for nothing, but avoiding peanuts is kind of crappy and depressing. Do I enjoy peanut butter? Not often. Do I stockpile Snickers bars? I guess those commercials are memorable. But you know how it is: You just don't want to be inhibited.

So one day we were neuroticizing about waiting two years to introduce peanuts with some friends who have a year's head start on child stuff and they asked if we had read that New Yorker article, the one about how everyone is wrong about peanut allergies, and we hadn't, but it was kind of thought provoking and made us check out different countries' health recommendations.

We started with places that spoke English: In Hong Kong, for example (see page 19 of this .pdf), health officials say it's OK to introduce peanuts (and birds' nests) after six months. It went on like this. In fact, recommendations from US doctors seem to be the most conservative of any place in the world. Sometimes it's kind of obvious — you think Scandinavians are going to put off serving fish for more than a year? Other times it just seems arbitrary — what three more months will do to protect a child from honey in Queens versus Belize, I don't know.

Then Jen talked to a friend of hers whose child had been recently diagnosed with a peanut allergy. She asked the doctor if it was because they had waited to introduce peanuts and the doctor wouldn't really come out and say yes or no. She pressed him: If they have another child, should they wait to introduce peanuts? The doctor only allowed that the guidelines were probably going to change very soon.

Now we wondered whether we should actually rush to introduce peanuts in Mr. Baby's diet. We thought about going to the lobby of the emergency room and feeding him a spoonful of Jif. As it happens, Jen's cousin and his wife visited us with their three boys — one of whom has several food allergies — so we got to grill them about it. As far as they could tell, they had no idea why their oldest had allergies and the others didn't. None of the armchair hypotheses panned out — e.g., eating peanuts during pregnancy versus avoiding them.

One bit of information was helpful: Children with peanut allergies never just drop dead on the spot. In addition to making our emergency room picnic idea seem awfully silly, it emboldened us to just give the kid some damn peanut butter already; the worst that tends to happen the first time is hives, at which point you take the kid to the doctor and they run tests; subsequent exposures get worse.

The New Yorker article talked about how Israeli children were practically weaned (someone should do a list of things that babies are "practically weaned" on) on a snack food called Bamba, which is sort of like a peanut butter Cheeto. We thought we might find some somewhere in the city, but before we did we just bit the bullet, mixed some old peanut butter with some breast milk and took Mr. Baby to the park to feed him his first peanuts. Why the park? It had something to do with being quickly able to run off to the hospital. This even though the park isn't really on the way to the hospital. But whatever.

We sat on a bench and fed Mr. Baby the peanut butter-breastmilk slurry and waited for hives to appear, which they of course did not, because I wouldn't be writing about it this way if they did come. Six hours, then 24 hours passed and nothing bad happened and we high-fived and felt good that Mr. Baby did not have a peanut allergy.

We did find Bamba, by the way — the Eastern European store on Ditmars sells it. It is even fortified with vitamins, which if you think about it is pretty fucked up: Can you imagine if Frito-Lay sold a version of Doritos with added vitamin A? Ralph Nader would cry. And you know what else? They're really good! And kids do take to them like nobody's business — they kind of crunch in a way that is relatively clean and disintegrate in a way that makes choking impossible. We bought a big box from Amazon, though they sent us the "adult" unfortified version; I don't think they really sell the kind with vitamins; we just sort of came to terms with it.

We still have the pediatrician's food recommendations on the fridge: no egg whites until 12 months, no fish until 15 months, wait 24 months for shellfish and peanut butter is not to be introduced until after 24 months. And every time we see the pediatrician and he asks us what Mr. Baby has been eating, I have to sort of lie and say avocados and rice cereal and selectively forget that Mr. Baby enjoyed his first langoustine at a tasting menu last August. Fortunately Mr. Baby understands little, if any, English. For the time being at least.