My daughter is cursed with a cute mug. She's at that stage right now where she can't communicate her needs with words and is easily frustrated. Trouble is that when she gets bummed she turns her mouth down and starts to cry and, I'm sorry, it's adorable. It's sort of like a cartoon of a crying baby. So you want to soothe her and help her and take her seriously (and I do, I really do), but inside you are smiling. Am I somehow insincere?
It's hard to know precisely what Mia knows about what she is communicating. Like pets, we ascribe qualities to pre-verbal children that fulfill what we want them to be thinking: she's saying hi to you! she likes you! she really loves her peas! But that might not be the case at all. Mia loves to prance around with things on her head. Yesterday, she put a pair of her bloomers on her head and picked up the broom and headed for the kitchen. She was the spitting image of Carol Burnett's washerwoman. She'll spend hours in front of the mirror in her room, posing with blankets on her head, talking to her stuffed animals. I've heard her say the same thing to each of them, so I know she thinks she is saying something consistent to them. But what could it be?
I try to take that sweet face seriously. Cause I'm trying real hard not to mess up her life and give her the freedom to figure out how to grow. So I read all the books and magazines and web sites and approach the subject cautiously. But Mia's rambunctious spirit is infectious, not cautious. Smiley face, down face, it's always her face and I just beam.
