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Wednesday, 29 July 2009

Am I becoming a creepy old lady?

I have always talked to strange, ("strange" as in hitherto unknown to me,) children, toddlers and infants I encounter.
I like them, they generally like me, and I find the interaction fascinating.
I tend to address them in language and tone no different than I would use with adults, (with the addition of various sound effects, if an infant is my conversational partner, not to mention raspberries, Spanky takes, etc.)
No one has ever seemed to mind, (except Himself, who was initially embarrassed by my brazen manner.)
Indeed, I have many times been a hero to an entire plane-load or department store-full of people, (including the battle-weary parents,) since I am often evince an uncanny ability to distract and quieten a screamer.

Well, today there were various small persons waiting for boarding at the airport, in my immediate vicinity, including two cheerfully noisy toddler sisters and a slightly younger boy.
The girls were babbling delightedly to the boy, as even the tiniest child is wont to do on discovery of an even tinier one, and the boy, rather than replying to them in kind was giving them the skunk eye.
I said that they all might as well get used to it, as women would likely continue to prattle incessantly to him that that way the rest of his life; and men would likely give them that look of dismayed confusion the rest of theirs.

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Both sets of parents looked at me as if I were something to be scraped off the bottom of a shoe....

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