Baby got promoted at day care to Sunfish, the group for one-year-olds, and man, it’s like going from the womb to Call of the Wild. This is the age where the kids bite and fling toys at your head. You might be lost in your own thoughts, gumming a banana, and then, BAM, some older one-year-old tackles you and you hit the ground. One mother told me tonight her kid has been bitten four times.
The day care folks keep saying the transition is tougher for parents than children, that though the classroom seems primal, the experience doesn’t feel significant for a toddler the way it does for the adult observers. I’ve told them I will try to keep an open mind, but that I have strong urges to body-check anyone who messes with Baby. Eeee gads. While it is probably true that being in an environment with other wild one-year-olds probably won’t scar Baby, I’m also sure that if he were never bitten at this age, he would grow up to be just fine too.
Tiger Mom would say keep your kids in difficult situations so they learn to navigate them, but I so don’t want to (though I will). I mean, this is someone whom I find charming even when he throws up on me. When he wakes up in the middle of the night, I want to scoop him up and say “Never mind, forget sleep. Let’s stay up all night and play!”
Your description of the Sunfish room reminds me of the daycare in ToyStory 3! Imagine the primal setting from a toy’s point of view. Scary.