Baby Talk

Sophie isn't talking yet, unless you count the incoherent babbles that have begun to come from her little mouth. Personally I do. I mean they sure seem to have meaning and be in response to her wants and needs. It is interesting the struggles and successes. Sophie started smiling over the break, and now she is almost laughing. It is really hard to pin down, but they seem like little laughs. They are frequently over the strangest things, like the ceiling fan, or a shadow on the wall. I like to think that they are laughs of discover. As though she has finally fingured out that a shadow is just that a shadow. Maybe such epiphenomena are beyond the ken of an infant, but you never know.
We still have bouts of inconsolable crying. Nothing really surprising about that. Only now some of the old tricks are not working so well. The bouncing still works, but the jaguar hold (on her belly cradled in my arm) is not, nor do other traditional tricks work. She is rarely so affected but when she is, it seems hard to fix the situation. What makes this worthy of note is the wrinkle, she has begun to shed real tears. I've got to say, that makes the situation so much worse. The sight of my baby girl crying is very very difficult for me. I forsee a dangerous adolescence full of Neville Chamberlain-like behavior on my part: a car?, new prom dress? Poland? Maybe I will toughen up over the years, but I doubt it. Baby tears so cruel. Take an innocent and subject her to such pain to evoke tears, it is so wrong. Suffice to say, baby tears have been known to lead to adult tears.