kid talk

i admit i'm not a kid-conversation-loving person. when a kid is around, i just smile back at them and ask some boring, staple questions just to make conversation. i've never been good in baby-talk, or kid-talk, or make-believe-talk, or any kind of talk with kids.

this afternoon, my teammate's feisty daughter is in the building. she wandered around, hopping from cube to cube, her tiny voice echoing along the hall.

my turn came and she stood in front of my cube. i gave her my sweetest smile and asked her what her name is. after that, there was some small (boring) chitchat about her hair clip and my Dory stuffed toy. then my cubemate placed his plastic toy rat on top of the cube dividers, facing us... soliciting a shriek from both of us.

then he proceeded to tell the little girl, "go take this home and scare your mommy". the inevitable "why" came... "why should i scare mommy?", and their conversation became more animated as my cubemate demonstrated what to do with the toy rat.

my cubemate is a tall guy, so when he tiptoes, we can see his head to his shoulders behind my cube wall. i admit i admired his way of "entertaining" the kid. at some point, the kid said "my daddy will be angry", to which my cubemate inquired, "what does your daddy do to you when he's angry?". uh-oh. i see a red flag threatening to waver in the air, then before i can make a statement to stop the conversation from going crazy, the little girl blurted out "he hits me!".

and we burst out laughing. =P parenting 101.

after that, she left. a few minutes later, she's back, carried on her father's arms. and my teammate started the conversation this time...

teammate: "she has a question for you..."

little girl: "since you're the only girl here, do the boys tease you?"

me: "only when i tease them first"

i thought i made a semi-smart comeback, but then, she broke my heart:

little girl: "you can't tease them, your jokes won't be funny, you won't be good in teasing."

ulk!

i just gave out a short laugh and told her, "you should ask your father if she teases me". and she asked, and her father denied it. along came another victim, errr, teammate, and i said "go ahead and ask him if he teases me".

the newest victim just pointed his finger at her father again. i told her, "see? maybe you should listen to "cubemate" , and use the rat to scare your father instead. so you can get even with him for teasing girls."

they walked away still discussing who teases who. i was left to wonder, geez, i really have no humor to kids. =P

i have been raised throwing back polite remarks. and i guess at the back of my mind, i was thinking maybe i should talk back to kids politely too. i wanted to bring in my dark humor the moment my cubemate started his spiels, but i wasn't sure how the parents would react, or if the kid will pick up my joke or find it simply insulting.

maybe i should work on my kid-skills before i should even consider having a baby. i don't want my baby to be too uptight. but i also don't want her to be like a train off the tracks when talking with people. but first of all, i need to know how to talk with kids, because i believe how i talk with them will somehow set their minds on how people "should" talk.

little things like these about having kids scare me. =) to my preggy friends, i wish you luck! =)