The Paper Eaters

A friend came by yesterday, one whom I have seen only twice since Milo's birth. The first time was at Milo's bris, or as it has otherwise come to be known, The Worst Day Of My Life; the second time was at a party that Milo did not attend, since it was at a bar on the lower east side. So I was eager to show off the fact that I have now kept another human being alive for over seven months without losing my mind.

My friend is very thoughtful, and she came bearing lovely gifts for Milo, one of which was a stuffed lizard, which I handed to Milo without really inspecting, since we were in the middle of a conversation and I was so happy to have someone other than Milo or Steven to talk to.

A minute later my friend said, "Um ... I think he's eating the tag."

And I looked at the lizard and, sure enough, there was a large chunk of tag missing. I suppose a more seasoned mother would have removed the tag prior to handing it to her infant son, and if I'd thought about it I could have anticipated seeing that tag with the chunk bitten out of it, since exactly the same thing had happened only a few days eariler when I'd been talking to my mother and not totally paying attention to the contents of a box that Milo was playing with.

I opened Milo's mouth and fished the piece of tag out. He looked surprised. After my friend left I sat Milo down and explained to him that if in the future he could refrain from making me look totally incompetent infront of other people I would really appreciate it. So we were going to have to institute a No Eating Paper rule in the house. And then Milo explained to me that tags are tasty and have I ever tried one because then I would really understand what all the fuss is about. At which point I was forced to admit that I had in fact I'd gone through a weird paper eating phase during second grade. Not that weird, considering I also went through phases of eating snow, playdough, and raw eggs.

Um.

Okay, new rule. No eating paper until you have teeth. Deal?