THAT Baby

Have you ever been in a place where there's always this one kid who screams the house down? Where you stare icily at the mother thinking, "Control your child, woman!" Well, last Saturday that kid was Little B. 

She and I attended our first La Leche League meeting. We were the first ones there, aside from the 2 moderators. Women trickled in - some alone and some with their husbands, but always with their child in tow. The meeting started and Little B sat quietly on my lap, picking rice puffs from my hand. I peeked into the container - uh oh. Just a few pieces left! Thinking that maybe she would keep quiet longer, I gave her everything in it. A few minutes later, when she realized nothing more was coming, she began to squirm. Started to grunt and wriggle. Let out a couple of ear-piercing shrieks. So I put her on the floor. She crawled this way and that, trying to go under the chair. I kept picking her up to keep her close to me but she protested quite loudly. I gave her a water bottle to play with. Big mistake. She spied the water bottle of the woman sitting to my right, and went straight for that. I picked her up and she screamed. Oh lordy. This went on the entire time. Thank god the meeting was just an hour! I couldn't keep track of what the group was discussing, as I was busy trying to keep Little B from crawling between the legs of other people. 

I couldn't help noticing how the other babies were well-behaved and quiet. I suppose maybe because she was the oldest of the bunch (well, there was one who was older but her dad whisked her away) and the others were less than 6 months old. The woman sitting next to my right had her daughter, who was a month younger than Little B, with her. I was pretty happy that Little B was finally able to interact with another baby. I gave her a spoon to chew on and she would promptly hand it over to the other baby. Then the mother would take it from her and give it back to me, and I would give it back to Little B to play with. Then the whole pass-the-spoon thing would start all over again. I got the impression that maybe the woman might have been a bit wary about cleanliness because Little B had been crawling on the floor and put the spoon in her mouth.

I guess I won't be attending another meeting any time soon, not unless Little B learns how to behave in public!