Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Small Miracles


"You are my greatest adventure."
--Mr. Incredible

I used to get a chuckle out baby parents who talk about their kids' age in weeks or months, rather than just using years like everybody else. I still think it's funny, but I finally understand why. Katie's world has expanded more in the past three months than mine has in the past ten years.

Two weeks ago, I had the great blessing of being present when Katie discovered what her hands are for. She was playing on her floor gym, which at ten weeks (see, I'm doing it too!) means thrashing her arms and legs around randomly. While thus busily engaged, her hand happened to bump against a little turtle toy hanging down above her. It swung out a bit than bumped back against her hand. She froze, did a perfect double take, looked at her hand, then back at the turtle. I could almost see her thought process: "Well I'll be darned! When I hit that thing, it moves!" So she hit it again. And again. For fifteen minutes, she was completely enraptured as her hand smacked the daylights out of that poor little turtle. She was happy for hours afterward, no doubt overwhelmed with the thrill of scientific discovery.

This past weekend I got to spend more time than usual with Katie. She is on a fairly regular cycle by now: Eat. Play. Sleep. Repeat. She is, by now, an old pro at Smacking Stuff. She has even expanded her repertoire to include Grabbing Stuff. Her floor gym plays music for her, Twinkle Twinkle and Animal Fair and Skip to my Loo, in calypso/reggae arrangements that were charming and clever the first four hundred or so times we heard them. I want to expand her musical experience, of course, so yesterday during Play Time I got out one of my low whistles to play for her. Might as well start getting her used to the harsh realities of sharing a home with a whistle player.

I played through a couple of Irish tunes, which my sweet daughter completely ignored. That was actually a better result than I dared hope for, but not particularly entertaining. So on a whim, I started playing "Twinkle Twinkle," with the same rhythm as the music on her floor gym.

Katie's head instantly swiveled my direction, eyes and mouth wide. She watched me breathe, watched my fingers move, and as I cycled through her floor gym songs, she listened. And even though the sound was very different, she knew.

Parenthood makes adults and children of us all. Every day I see new textures in Jesus' teaching that I cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven unless I accept it as a little child. Let go of the old ways, and be exhilarated by the discoveries of learning a new way of life.

To my non-parental friends, I make this request: Try not to roll your eyes when parents rhapsodize about their children's most mundane accomplishments. Try to keep groans to a minimum when you hear young mothers discuss, with straight faces, how many diapers their tykes dirty in a twenty-four hour period. It's hard to believe, I know, but from this side it almost makes sense.

This is a time of epic discoveries for my young explorer. I'm glad I get to be along for the ride.

3 comments:

Tanya said...

I just have one word..."ditto."

Karly said...

{tsk}Oh. I could just cry. I have to say, seeing new parents discover the joy of being a parent is almost as exciting as watching your own children grow. (OK, there's a big gap between the two, but still-very cool post, and I TOTALLY understand!!

OK, I dropped in to give you this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQHX-SjgQvQ&feature=email

HILarious. Thought you might get a kick out of it. Enjoy.

Sparkz said...

Cute! I love the post!

I always thought that weeks or months was entertaining also until our son came home. I never could figure out how people kept up w/it!