3 Things I Learned from Spending the Day with an Almost 2-Year-Old

I would like to preface this post with a special thank you to the superhero baby-making duo, Marisa & John, who created this perfect human being. 

1. Include Those You Love in the Things You Love

When it comes to Luca's interests, the list is pretty short and can be summed up in one word: transportation. All day long all I heard was, "Bee truck! Ra car! Train! Dum truck! Rane truck!" If we played with his water table, it was "Kean trucks!" If we played with his blocks, it was "Gar (garage) for trucks!" If we drew pictures, it was "Draw truck Ke, Draw train Ke!" All. Day. Now, to most people, this might sound like a small nightmare, and maybe it should have felt like one. But to be perfectly honest, by the end of the day, I was starting to look at these things in a new light. His infectious love for all things cars, trucks, and trains had me thinking to myself, "Holy shit, cars are pretty fucking cool." The fact that Luca was so eager to grab my hand and include me in every car and truck activity he could imagine, the fact that he was convinced that since cars and trucks are everything to him that they must be everything to me, completely changed my view. As he stared wide-eyed out the window at the garbage truck, I began to marvel at the technology, variety, and function of trucks. This made me think, what a magnificent thing it is to love something so much that you literally need everyone around you to care that much, too. What if we all shared like that? What if we all used the things we love to open the minds of those we love, to grab their hand and spend a little more time with them? Even better, what if we listened a little closer the next time our loved one rambles on about that thing their so obsessed with? What if we went with them to events, read the things they read, watched the shows they watch? We would open up our minds to the wonder and beauty in things we never looked at twice, while creating shared experiences and memories with the ones we love. Really, is there anything better than that?

2. Repeat Yourself When You Don't Feel Heard

So often in life do we have something important we need to say, a point we want to get across, an opinion we want heard. So often are we bombarded by fear and insecurities that stop us from making sure we are heard. To an almost 2-year-old, these fears are non-existent. When they need something, you know it, and you won't stop knowing it until they have it. Yesterday, I heard, "Kean hands" repeated 20 times until I was practically sprinting from the kitchen to the high-chair with a wet paper towel. I was pulled and grabbed and dragged with the demands, "Ke seet heah, Ke play, Ke come!" until I was sitting in a seat way to small for me, crashing trucks together with (seemingly) sheer delight. I looked at this mini-human, so new to the world and so beautifully unaware of insecurities or second guesses and I began to wonder, When did we lose the ability to stand up for ourselves and what we want in such a confident, passionate way? There are so many situations where we may go unheard, maybe we feel we deserve a promotion at work, maybe our server at a restaurant brings us the wrong dish, maybe we feel hurt by a friend. We grow up surrounded by societal pressures and norms that make us second guess ourselves and become overly accommodating, which can help us end up in a situation where we're unhappy, whether that's with life or with the food on our plate. I suggest you all take a bit of advice from Luca, and become a little more aggressive, (cutely) annoying, and persistent until you get what is is you know you deserve- whether that's a promotion at work, or clean hands.

3. Never Let the Things You Love Lose Their Wonder

This may go without saying, and I risk sounding redundant and cliché with this last one, but really, is there anything more completely innocent and wonderful than a child's amazement? No matter how many times Luca sees a car, each one still seems to be more fascinating than the last. His little fingers wrap around the same toy truck for hours, days, weeks- getting cleaned, crashing into other toys, "parking" in a block garage. When we were younger, we didn't let anything stand in the way of doing the things we loved. What we wanted to do always came before what we had to to. We don't stop loving things, but what disappears is our unrelenting wonder for it. We get busy and we don't have time to see the beauty in things anymore. We get so caught up doing the things we have to do, that we stop making time and pursuing the things we want to do. Think a little more like an almost 2-year-old, and start making the things you love more of a priority. Whatever your truck is, play with it every damn day, and be a little happier because of it.