Discs and discretion

Mabel sat up in bed at five mumble-mumble this morning and whispered to me: "Why do squirrels run so fast?"

Who knows how the mind of a two-year-old works? She gets fixated on the tiniest details when she's tired, like why the red boy (boy in red t-shirt, that is) fell down the slide, or why Monkey wanted to have his face painted, or why she herself wouldn't share her popcorn with her brother that one time. (These are the current preocupations. The slide-falling incident happened before Easter, the face painting was two weekends ago, and the popcorn was about two months ago. Her memory is long and elephantine.)

She was so nice at music and art class this morning; the good twin of the girl who hit everyone last week. My hopes are raised. Maybe it really was the tooth, and maybe the tooth has made it all the way out. (It was halfway out when I last put my finger in the lion's gaping jaws to check. I don't do that too often.)

She seems to have intuited, somehow, though I don't think I've expressly said it and certainly I try never to make a big thing of it, that nursing is something we do in private, when other people don't see us. We had visitors in the house a few weeks ago and Mabel dragged at my hand, saying "Come over here, Mummy. Come into the front room with me." When I finally went with her, she said "...so I can have mumeet here." She was so discreet that she didn't even want to mention it in public. Such diplomacy.

On the other hand, then we went to pick Monkey up from school last Friday. Mabel pointed at Miss P's breasts and said, "Oh, you have those too. Mummy has those. She gives me mumeet." So that was perhaps a tad less discreet. If we were ever in any doubt as to whether small children differentiate men and women by noticing longer hair or how they dress or any cultural significators, I think we can lay those thoughts to rest: Mabel looks straight for the bazongas.

We will not speak of the time she asked me to show her my nipple as we crossed the road. At least nobody was in earshot, becuase it's not as if she has some cutesy code word for nipple. Oh no.