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Best holiday ever for a (nearly) one-year-old. Chins got to look awesome and go trick-or-treating with some BIG kids, who are all of about 2 and a half. But he thinks big kids are the simply the coolest people in the entire world, so he couldn't have been happier. And he got to chew on a box of raisins the whole time, so that was quite the bonus.
And he was pretty damn cute, so it was kind of a bonus for d.w. and me, too.
So we were driving down to Des Moines today to spend a beautiful fall Saturday doing beautiful fall Saturday things, when traffic on the interstate came to a complete and abrupt halt. After a minute or so, I saw necks craning out of cars. Then idling engines turning off. Then car doors opening and people getting out to take a look. There was an accident ahead, it seemed, and no clear way through.
All with a sleep-deprived, irritable baby in the backseat.
We finally resigned ourselves to the situation when a medivac helicopter landed in the highway just ahead of us. Chins was mercifully released from bondage and we all piled out of the car, figuring that if we were going to be stuck there, we might as well enjoy the sunshine. But what do you do for what ended up being close to an hour on the side of the interstate with a short-tempered baby to entertain?
Well, if you're lucky (as we turned out to be), you will have accidentally left some books in the car. Chins and d.w. spent quite a while feeling the lamb's thick wooly coat and tickling the dog's furry tummy. He's been absolutely obsessed with books recently, wanting us to read the same ones over and over and over again. Of course, not even fuzzy books can sustain Chins forever.
So he humored me for a little while walking through the grass, listening to me drone on about the prairie. Luckily for us (or me, at least) we were stopped along a stretch of interstate that has been the focus of extensive prairie restoration efforts. As a result, Chins got a lesson on big bluestem, smooth brome, and various goldenrods.
His response? "Yeah, grass is cool and all Dad, but more importantly, how does it taste?"
Chins seems to be developing at an alarming rate, every day making him less like a little baby and more like a real person. d.w. hates it when I put it that way, but it's true. Babies are way more like really expensive, demanding, adorable pets than anything else. Sort of like a cage-free diaper-wearing chinchilla.
Sorry, I'm getting off track.
We've made kind of a half-hearted attempt to teach Chins some signs so that he can better communicate with us, but so far the only one he's really picked up is "light", which has become the sign he gives us for fan, window, cat, dog, tv, Mom, Dad, car, tree, food, and various other things. It has kind of metamorphosed into an all-encompassing motion for anything remotely interesting to an 11-month-old. Thankfully it kind of resembles a wave, so it is at least a moderately natural sign to give, rather than something requiring a synchronized flourish of both arms followed by a twirl on the balls of his feet. This way strangers just think he's waving at them, which I suppose he is, in his way.
And while Chins may be a little slow in the ol' language department, I've taken to calling him Bubba, because of his penchant for having long one-sided conversations with a variety of inanimate objects. He just sits there syaing, "buh buh buh buh buh", occasionally switching it up with a forceful "N'duh!" or a high pitched "Awoo!" And he's tantalizingly close to his first real word, reserving "ma ma ma ma ma" for when he is looking up a d.w., unhappy about something or other. I've figured out that "ma ma ma ma ma" is a call to the righter of wrongs, the healer of misery, the wiper of bums. But that's what language is all about, isn't it?
Oh, and he's so close to walking. He totally could if he really applied himself. It's all mental at this point. He can stand on his own until he realizes he's standing, then he's like, "Oh shit, I'm standing!" and crumples to the floor. He has this little cart thing he pushes around the house, which seems to be building his confidence a bit. We'll see. The cats are eyeing him with a degree of alarm these days, knowing their days freely wandering the house are numbered
But you now what makes Chins the most proud? His impressive facility for climbing stairs. Especially since we have none in our house, at least where he can get to them. There is little he likes better then going to the playground, showing off for anyone who will watch. We're going to have to be careful with this one.
For being less than a year old, Chins is really taking his responsibility as an Iowan seriously. Monday night he attended his very first political event, when Hillary Clinton came to Main St. to give a speech on a suitably Rockwellian (Whoa. I first typed "Orwellian". Whoa.) street corner. It wasn't set to start until 7:00, so Chins had his bath, donned his jammies (or rather screamed and writhed while d.w. tried to maneuver his hands and feet into their respective compartments), and the three of us set off, stroller and Ergo in tow.
A better-managed campaign event you will not find. The crowd was herded into the street between police barricades, packed densely below a banner with some vague, forgettable slogan scrawled across it. There were bleachers, too, positioned exactly to fall within the camera frames of the bevy of press and campaign photographers. It was a little odd, though, being in an audience completely behind and to one side of the candidate (the side opposite the press area, naturally). The sight of a candidate speaking passionately in the direction opposite from those assembled was, frankly, a little surreal.
Chins did great actually, considering Clinton arrived an hour late, an hour overflowing with the most tedious filler one can imagine. One of our local politicians droning on about...something. An old lady, who I think was the county Democratic chair, relating the most soul-crushingly boring story about...something. Then there was the middle school girl haltingly reading something clearly intended to be inspirational. Maybe it was, but by that point my heart had turned to stone.
(But you know, that's how these things usually are. Obama was late to an event here a couple of weeks ago, so we the assembled were subjected to the impromptu, pulled-out-of-the-ass speeches of self-important political science majors. Kill. Me. Now.)
Shortly before Clinton arrived, the late hour, the lack of toys, and the standing around finally caught up to Chins, so d.w. and the be-Ergo'ed, jammie-bound baby made their way, bouncing and singing, through the crowd. We had been offered a spot on the dais with the other nuggets of the political gold mine (union members, old people, any people of color they could find), but I have a feeling the sight of a crazed, sleep-deprived woman bouncing her crazed, sleep-deprived giant of a baby would have drawn the ire of all assembled. Or at least campaign handlers.
But then again, Chins probably could have single-handedly sealed the deal on Clinton getting elected — I mean, what politician could resist those cheeks? And what politician wouldn't get elected in a landslide, with a photo of something like that?
Maybe I'm on to something here.
