The Mastery of. ... the Farting Noise

There are those accomplishments which make you glow with excitement - first step, first word, first piano concerto - and those that make you sigh with relief - first doctors appointment, first poop, first laugh. And there are those that make you beam with pride. Those differ from parent to parent, and more specifically from gender to gender. For a mother it may be the first boyfriend/girlfriend they bring home. For a father of daughters this is definitely not one of them. For a mother it may also be their first recital or their first woman's empowerment speech. For a dad. ... it's much more simplistic. Like the first farty noise you teach them to make with their mouth. Now that's something to show off. Yesterday, seemingly out of the blue, Arianna woke up having mastered this talent, and she spent a good part of the day showing it off. All morning while Gina was at the gym it was "thbt, thbt, thbt." Then all the way up to LA to see Gina's dad for lunch it was "thbt, thbt, thbt." Then all through lunch at Houston's it was "thbt, thbt, thbt." You think this got old? Of course not! I'm still giggling just thinking about it now. She took a little break when we got to Gina's mom's house for her birthday dinner. I think the large audience intimidated her. But by the end of the evening I could hear in some other corner of the house "thbt, thbt, thbt" and then someone else laughing at the accomplishment. This highlights two different things. One is that a child recognizes laughter as a reward. The more you laugh, the more they do it. Second is the difference between men and women. Women start as babies, turn to kids, become girls shortly after and then turn in to women. Men, we also start as babies and make our way to kids, become boys shortly after. But then something strange happens. We start to look like men, but we never truly become them. We stay boys for ever finding, finding an unreasonable amount of humor in teaching our own babies to make farting noises. Hehe. ... fart.