A friend of ours recently had his first baby, and we asked him how it was going. I absolutely loved his reaction. He said:
Babies are totally amazing. They're completely helpless and immobile, and they make more noise than should be possible from something that small. Could it be more obvious that we are at the top of the food chain? Our babies are born yelling at the top of their lungs, "Hey, look at me! Totally helpless little morsel of food right here!!!"
Yep, we're lucky that we created tools to defend ourselves, because holy cow our children do everything in their power to try to bring about their own destruction. Ages one through five can basically be described as "I have the physical ability to kill myself in a bazillion different ways, and none of the intelligence to stop myself from doing it by accident." I am constantly amazed by how completely oblivious LL is to the dangers around him. Jump in front of speeding cars? Stuff handfuls of food into his mouth until he chokes? Grab at hot candles? Eat random leaves and flowers found outside? Climb really high onto things when he has no reasonable plan for getting down? Run as fast as he can, with his eyes closed? Yes, these are definitely the actions of someone concerned with his own survival.
Last week, Kermit crawled off the edge of a cliff without a moment's hesitation. Okay, not a cliff. A stair. Just one stair. But seriously, no hesitation, and he banged his forehead pretty bad when the ground ended up not being where he wanted it to be. (Also, S and I were both standing right there when it happened, so we're not exactly winning any parenting awards right now.)
Kermit's latest favorite game: he tosses his head waaaay back, to give me a chance to tickle his chin and neck. What kind of an animal has offspring who think that the most intelligent thing they can do is to purposely expose their jugular?
Children make a lot more sense when you think of them as The Top of the Food Chain. But I'm not entirely sure that they're better off for it.
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4 comments:
And that is totally why they are so cute. Because otherwise we would let things eat them.
this was too funny!
That was exactly my husband's response when we had mijo. It's funny that it is a common way of thinking. N was shocked at just how helpless human babies are (he'd had more experience with cats). I think we continue even longer than 5 years...what about all those studies that say our decision making skills and sense of mortality don't come in until after the teenage years? I think I'll take eating snails to drag racing. :p
haha, I love it!
word verification: zings.
Seems appropriate somehow.
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