It goes without saying that toddlers are incessantly curious creatures. From the moment they wake they are tirelessly investigating everything they see and touch, until they fall down exhausted at the end of the day and then sleep all night... (ahhhh sorry there just went into dreamland for a moment ... who am I kidding about that last part!?!).
Our boys are both fascinated by real world stuff - dinosaurs, birds, helicopters and bugs are all current favourites. But it's not just the large or airborne. Everything they can reach and touch interests them. The one year old puts grass, or even worse sand in his mouth (ick!) to see what will happen. Mr Almost 3 presses every button on the radio or smears peanut butter on the table NOT to annoy us (breathe, just breathe...), but because he is exploring and learning about the world.
Recently Mr Almost 3 has started asking Why? He asks 'Why' to absolutely EVERYTHING. Sometimes he asks 'Why?' twelve times before breakfast. Mostly we try to answer as honestly as we can, which for me does vary depending on whether my caffeine levels are sufficiently topped up. (You need to be pretty alert to answer stuff like - Why does the sun come up? or Why do starfish do poos?).
If "Why?" is the default toddler response, conversations will wander into all sorts of unexpected areas. On one long Why-filled conversation with Geek-Daddy (who you will see is aptly named), the questioning led all the way to the Big Bang. When you think about it this really is the ultimate answer to everything. It's either that or 42.
However there is one area where I'm being a bit cagey with my answers, and this is about the heavy stuff. Walking around historical monuments and museums in the great city of Washington D.C. I found myself steering conversations SHARPLY away from the heavy stuff more often than usual.
As far as I'm concerned, my little ones can take their good sweet time to find out about death. Of course I know the time will come when they realise that plants, insects, animals, people, and all living things die. Now that I have seen that sentence written down, I do hope that this realisation comes gradually, perhaps in that order and NOT in one overwhelming moment, like Lelu in the Fifth Element when she gets to letter W and discovers the horrors of War.
But until then, it seems to me that this is such a wonderfully innocent phase of life, when you actually know a heck of a lot about the world and yet you know nothing of death, war, torture, slavery, or any of the other darker sides of humanity.
So being in D.C through the inquisitive but wonderfully innocent eyes of a toddler was at times hard to reconcile. One moment you are walking through the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, being asked What's THAT Mummy (and quickly trying to read what it actually is before responding.... umm, a Pratt & Whitney J57 jet engine, like a really big one.... Maybe Geek-Daddy can tell you more about it when he gets back from the jet fighter simulator).
And yet you don't really want to talk about the purpose of war planes or ballistic missiles. So you might point out the Washington monument as a gentle distraction. What is a monument Mummy? Well, it's a way of remembering someone or something that happened. (Smugly feeling a bit pleased with that answer). Mr Almost 3: Why? (Me: ok, not so smug now).
Anyway, steering myself sharply back to some favourite memories from our time in D.C.
WASHINGTON D.C. BEST BITS
Staying 'on the Hill' in a quirky little apartment.
Seeing The Capitol whenever we walked out our front door.
Organic goodness at Eastern Market around the corner.
Drinking coffee at Pound (even if the service was a bit hipster-grump) on Pennsylvania Ave.
Seeing the Command module from Apollo 11.
Exploring some of the earliest passenger aircraft.
Having a picnic outside The Capitol one day, and then the White House the next.
Mr Almost 3 asking me if the President would have presents for us. (Me: Um, no. Him: Why?)
