Your Baby Can Read

Yesterday was uneventful with the exception of me having to read Fox in Socks, The Cat in the Hat, Oh, The Places You'll Go!, and One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish a total of 23 times. It was only because of the sheer intrigue of seeing a glimmer of myself in my daughter that I kept reading those things over and over and over and...

When I was about three I developed the unique skill of pissing people off. It's a skill that I continue to perfect to this very day. Back then it was more cute than it is now. People used to come from far and wide (Southeast DC and PG County) to see the amazing three year old me read a book. The books of choice: Snoopy Come Home, The Wuzzles: Bumblelion's Funny Money, and Tony the Tiger's Clubhouse Blues. 

What they didn't know was that my literary skill was made possible by "books on record." That's how long ago it was...they weren't even on tape. Back then people didn't treat kids like they were slow. I put the record in my Fisher Price player and some voice came through saying, "Hey, I'm a record and you have a book in your hands. I'm gonna read it to you, because you don't know how to read and when you hear this sound (chime) turn the page."

Well, me being the smart little guy that I was, I memorized the record. I also figured out that the pauses between words aligned with the spaces in between the words on the page, so I started pointing at the words as the record played. I kept doing this long after I lost the record. To the casual observer, I could read. To my family, "He's a con artist." Either way, it was fun seeing people's reactions at church or wherever I took my book...until they handed me something else to read. Then I just acted like I was tired.

My daughter is starting to do the same thing. She knows most of all of those books by heart, even though she sounds like English is her second language. I found it hilarious that when I tried to skip pages (thinking she wasn't paying attention), she quickly grabbed the book out of my hand and turned back to the correct page and then "cued" me as to what the next word was. "Look at me sid the cat, look at me sid uh cat in uh hat!" She was pointing at the words and everything. (The wrong words, but words nonetheless)

Real recognizes real...and she's looking familiar.