The Mighty Maw

I have always been a fan of the great philosophers They Might Be Giants. The past few weeks one of their sage musings has seemed particularly applicable to Genevieve: “There's only one thing that I know how to do well, And I've often been told that you only can do what you know how to do well; And that's be you, Be what you're like, Be like yourself; And so I'm having a wonderful time; But I'd rather be whistling in the dark.” Except of course in Genevieve’s case it is not whistling in the dark but rather open-jawed “mouthing” everything, under any light conditions.

Assuming her obsession with placing anything she can get in her hot little hands into her mouth is normal, it really makes me think about how we as humans, evolutionarily speaking, have made it so far. I mean isn’t this nubile tendency to place any object in one’s mouth just a tad bit dangerous? In the past few weeks Evie, who is under pretty tight supervision mind you, has managed to get a cat’s tail, her dad’s forehead, the edge of the table, grass, countless toys and goodness knows what else into her maw. All of this and she isn’t even really mobile yet! I cringe to think of the items she will try to ingest once she can make her way through the world more efficiently.

A coworker of mine told me a great story about another colleague whose toddler ingested (unbeknownst to him) at least half of a San Diego beach worth of sand. The sand consumption was only noted later in the day (and in the days to follow) in the abnormally large amount of sand-encrusted-poo. How did early humans possibly survive this early oral stage? Sand is fairly benign, just think of all the potentially lethal items there are in this world that a young tot could ingest! (Well I guess in some ways early-man’s world was a safer place, no Chinese lead painted toys to chew on).

Well anyway thankfully for Evie she has a cadre of willing and able watchers to ensure that she (for the most part) only places pre-screened items in her mouth. Speaking of Evie watchers, the other eventful occurrence of the past week is our nanny Nicole started! We are very excited to have her and her daughter Riley taking care of our little Evie. Stay tuned for more on this exciting new development.....