Conversations with a toddler | Enchanted Seashells by Princess Rosebud

A while back, the two of us sat on the floor contemplating a puzzle of wild animals.

“Don’t help me!” “I can do it by myself!”

“OK, I won’t, but I’m right here if you need me. All you have to do is ask.”

She cocks her head, slyly looks at me, and declares, “I’m smarter than you, Grandma.”

I laughed, “Oh, you are? How so?”

“I can do this puzzle without your help.”

“I know you’re very very smart, so I believe that you can, but I will always be here if you need any help at all.”

A couple minutes go by as we work together to turn over all the puzzle pieces.

“I’m smarter than everybody.”

“Really?” I ask. “Everybody?”

“Oh yes.”

“Are you smarter than Daddy?” “Cos you know MY little boy is pretty smart, right?”

She thinks for a nanosecond.

“Yup, I’m smarter than Daddy.”

“How about Mommy? Are you smarter than Mommy?”

Another second goes by with a nod, “Yes, I am.”

“And what about Theo? Are you smarter than he is, too?”

First a sigh, than a shake of her head as she wistfully says, “No, I’m not smarter than Theo. He can do anything.”

My goodness. I was speechless. I could feel the deep love she has for her big brother.

“Theo IS smart and so are you, my Angel Girl.”

Laughing, she says, “We’re both smarter than YOU, little Grandma!”

I can’t really argue with THAT three-year-old, that’s for sure.

No one can pinpoint the etymology of this phrase with regard to our extremely precocious almost 4.5 year-old, but yesterday was the first time I heard it.

We were FaceTiming so he could tell me about their week-long camping trip. He was regaling me with how much fun he had and how he went surfing and how his baby sister enjoyed her first time living on the feral, as we say.

As an aside, he started referring to his almost one-year-old sister as “Missy” and when I asked him who he was talking about, Mom took the phone and said he started calling her that after I sent an Amelia Bedelia book where the child she babysits for is called “Missy.” T has a very active imagination.

As, we’re chatting and he shows me some new crystals he got at a yard sale–green and purple, his two favorite colors–I heard Dad in the background say, “Tell Grandma about the lake we went to this morning.”

“Oh yeah, hey man, I jumped all the way in from really high, you would have been too scared, little Grandma!”

I said, “What lake?” and “What did you just say?”

And he replied, “Let me ask Daddy.”

He walks over to where Dad is sitting on the sofa (I’m dragged along on FaceTIme) and says, “Hey, man, what was the name of the lake we went to?”

My son started snickering and said. “It was Kachess Lake”.

T said, “Hey man, it was Kachess Lake”.

I replied, “Oh, I saw the pictures and thought it was Green Lake.”

He corrected me, “No, man, it was Kachess Lake. Hey man, did you see me jump?”

“I did. You are a brave boy. Hand the phone to Dad for a minute, please.”

“Hey J-boy. What’s up, man? Where did he get that?”

*snickering again*

“We have no idea; he must have heard it somewhere or maybe on Sesame Street, that’s all we can think of, but literally EVERY other word out of his mouth is ‘man this or man that’.”

“Hey man, I’m gonna hit the red button now. Is that OK, Grandma?”

“Yeah, man, that’s cool. Catch you later. Bye, Angel Boy.”

Have you ever heard a little one use that term in the proper context? He sounds so grown up, so sophisticated. SOOOO precocious. Heaven help us when he’s an actual teenager.