Shark Patrol

When Lillia bites, she bites hard. This is not an unusual event in the life of a one-year-old though it caught us by surprise.
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Act 1, Scene 1. Enter Lillia, stage left, crawling about living room floor as her slightly addled older parents watch her in deep admiration. Lillia moves about floor in Roomba fashion, putting shoes, pens, magazines, objets d’art and other interesting items in her mouth, complaining bitterly whenever they are taken away or placed out of her reach.

Suzanne: Oh look, Tom, Lillia is kissing mommy’s toes.

Tom (laughing): HO HO! It appears that our daughter has developed a cute new foot fetish.

Suzanne (screaming): Ow! No! Stop! Don’t bite!
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Act 1, Scene 2. Naptime in the Nursery. Tom is holding a smiling, laughing Lillia as the nap turtle plays a lullaby in the background.

Tom: Oh, how sweet. You want to give daddy a good night kiss.

Suzanne: Tom, I’d be careful if I were you…

Tom: Ow! No! Stop! Don’t bite!
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Act 1, Scene 3. In the bathroom.

Suzanne (warily): One of us has to brush her teeth.

Tom: Or so the dental police would have you believe.

Suzanne: Look, we have to do this. And she only has seven of them.

Tom: Which she uses to quite good effect.

Suzanne: Tom…

Tom: Suzanne, you’re the one who saw her gnawing on the kitchen cabinets this morning. I swear the girl is developing a dorsal fin. I’d be afraid to go in the water if I came across her at the beach.

Suzanne (louder, holding Lillia): TOM!

Tom (with finger toothbrush in Lillia’s mouth): Ow! No! Stop! Don’t bite!”
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The books say that this is a stage (yes, all the world's a stage) that she is going through, and to overreact is to provide reinforcement. So Suzanne and I are keeping it cool, wearing shoes and long-sleeve shirts and re-enforced gloves, watching for signs of her dorsal fin receding.

I will continue to update this blog as long as I have fingers left to do so.

Tom