Geek projects, bad parenting, and other adventures gone awry
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My son turned one month old a couple of days back. We had intended to celebrate, but Pooper kept us up the night before, which means our ability to remember things like that was greatly diminished. (Other things that got skipped that day: Celebrating his grandparents’ anniversary, taking the first in a series of monthly pictures to show growth, blogging about his first month, and showering.) The one thing that I did remember to do was jot down some of his development milestones. I’ve shared them on my Facebook and I’m going to share them here, too. Why? Because nothing in the world is as fascinating to me as child development. After I’d met my wife and I found out that she was a Psychology major, I must have grilled her for weeks to squeeze every drop of Developmental Psychology she’d learned in her time at university. The most counter-intuitive thing I’ve learned about child development is how little of it that there is. I got my first taste of it when the flower girl at my wedding was born. When she entered the world, she was not at all what I expected of a baby: She didn’t develop her personality slowly over time, she came with one. And a strong-headed one at that. At barely a few days old, she already had the stubborn streak and independent traits that still define the largest parts of her personality today. I’d been told that babies come with hats. I hadn’t been told that babies come with personalities. So now I get to watch this all unfold in minute detail, and it’s even more acute than I’d thought. My son already has a personality. Worse, it’s very much like mine and my wife’s (though early indications are that he’s likely more musically inclined than either of us). Additionally, he has my facial expressions. I’d always thought those were environmental that I’d picked up by watching my own father. Nope, I apparently got those through genetic material. (All these years of everybody shouting, “Smile!” as they pass me in hallways isn’t my fault after all!) So what this means to me is that these developmental milestones I’ve been looking forward to be revealed don’t mean all that much. It doesn’t seem that these are learned so much as they’re waiting to be unlocked until better levels of coordination are reached. I’ve heard more and more that in the Nature vs. Nurture debate, Nature’s been kicking ass in research studies for years. Now I’m watching it up close. Anyway, to catalog the meaningless milestones he’d reached by the end of his first month for his future curiosity:
In other news: Remember the horribly incomplete list of vetoed baby names I proposed? Well, now that he’s here, I’ve discovered something wonderful! Nobody gets to veto a father’s nicknames for his children! I get to call him:
… and dozens of others my wife would poke me for repeating. |
CrankyPants is my favorite.
I loved reading your blog about Devon. I can’t believe he’s this old already. Reading about his milestones are so exciting, you manage to capture all the exciting aspects of it. What a joy he must be! BTW..I liked Sgt. Stinker for a nickname. We call Danika “Stinky”, but don’t tell her I told you. =)