MagicMum’s Daddy blogger Colm O’ Regan on…'baby socialising'
A baby is the catalyst for a series of social situations you normally wouldn’t find yourself in. And it makes sense – they’re curious, sociable and completely devoid of shame.
MagicMum’s Daddy blogger Colm O’Regan knows this all too well, and in his newest post he observes the ritual that is ‘baby socialising’ – as both sets of parents look on and wonder what on earth the rules are…
An extrovert with two introverted parents
I used to think I had it all figured out. I’m in my thirties (just about, actually closer to the ‘WW2’ side of the thirties) so I thought I knew the rules for most of the common social situations required to get through life. I had mastered crucial skills such as small-talk with taxi-drivers about whether it’s worth their while joining the ‘airport rank’. I know how near the person behind me can be before they qualify for a complimentary ‘swinging-door-hold. The unwritten code for reasonably harmonious living. Turns out I was wrong.
Having a child has led me (literally by the hand) into new uncertain and unfamiliar social situations and the rules are being learnt as I go.
As she has gotten older and her personality has emerged we’ve discovered that baby Ruby is an extrovert with two introverted parents. We are like two people with one stone-mad friend who’s fierce for going to parties and we’re both like, “Actually we were hoping to just stay in and read?”
New situations with new rules
We were at the park recently to get a bit of a break from interiors with their sharp corners and breakable objects. “You can’t fall off the ground” goes the old saying which I just made up. There’s a place in the park we like to go to. It’s sheltered from the wind and baby-stealers. The grass neatly trimmed so it doesn’t hide any surprises left by dog-owners WHO APPARENTLY CAN’T EFFING READ signs about dog poo and toxocariasis.
There’s someone else in ‘our’ section. It’s fair enough. It’s a public space and we didn’t sign any lease on it. They also have a baby who’s tottering around.
Our daughter makes a bee-line for the other baby and crawls over, giggling. It’s the kind of way you could never approach a stranger as an adult unless you were a bit hammered or both of you were wearing the same fancy dress at Electric Picnic. Or both.
And this bee-line that she makes is the one that brings me into new situations with new rules. How closely should you follow? You can’t run over shouting “STAY AWAY FROM THEM, WE DON’T KNOW THEIR PEOPLE”. Neither can you let her off and watch benignly from a distance while opening a can of Devil’s Bit.
Like diplomats at a summit
So both sets of parents approach each other at what we’ve worked out to be a respectful distance.
We are like diplomats at a summit between two nations who have no historical ties, no common language and no idea whether they’re at war or allies. Just led into contact by two babies.
It’s still a nice situation. Watching two babies communicate by vaguely pawing one another’s faces, leaning on each other. Both sets of parents are smiling. But at the same time there's a little bit of tension because neither side knows how their baby is going to react. Our ‘president’ shouts at her counterpart but that could be her saying, “WELL GIRL, WHAT’S THE CRAIC?”
There are various points of diplomacy to be worked out on the fly: once contact has been made, what are the rules for intervention if they start to tussle in earnest over a stolen soother? You don’t want to be a special-snowflakey-helicoptery neurotic by diving in immediately. Neither can you be all “To become a true child of Sparta, a baby must learn to master others from day one.”
The main trick is to pass gentle instructions to the baby that the baby completely ignores but are there to show that we do aim to have some sort of rules. Don’t grab now Ruby. Ruby will grab anyway but you can’t show that you condone it. It’s like when she won’t wear a hat, we carry the hat to show that we tried.
And all of this has to be processed in about 0.8 seconds while smiling in the park as two babies compare snot.
Strangers but with a shared experience
If your baby is younger you have a bit of a get out clause for worse behaviour or lack of progress. It used to be harder to tell the other baby’s age, but thankfully a growing number of parents get their child’s date of birth tattooed on themselves in handwritey script. Look for it on the neck or on the inside of the forearm.
This other baby can walk a little bit more. But turns out she’s 14 months old which leaves us three months to get our daughter up to speed with a baby she may never see again because ‘milestones’. This other baby’s parents are from abroad so they speak to her in two languages. Dammit she has us beaten all ends up. I resolve to start speaking Irish to my daughter as soon as we get out of earshot.
And then without warning the meeting seems to be over. The babies turn around and crawl away from each other leaving us adults sitting on the ground close enough so that it looks like we’re rolling joints. Meeting is over. So we are left just sitting there on the grass, strangers but with a shared experience. It’s just that we’re not sure how to end our own interaction.
But still we are smiling. It’s good to be sociable. Or to have someone be sociable for us.