um...(jibber jabber)

Gibby jabs nonstop. As in, jibber jabber. Her nickname, given to her by one of the kids at daycare (Bridget morphed to Gibert, which became Gibby—both pronounced with a soft g like a j), seems fitting.

Lately, Bridget holds long, serious, one-on-one conversations with Al and me. She'll either be sitting on our laps or laying on us, stomach to stomach, with her face right in ours and those big hazel eyes open wide. Every conversation—well, every sentence, actually—begins with "Um..." Then she launches into whatever it is she's trying to say. I use the word sentence loosely here—her jibber is about as long as a sentence, after which she'll pause and look at us waiting for us to reply. And sometimes she's definitely not satisfied with our reply, like it doesn't seem to fit and she's onto us—onto the fact that we can't understand a word she's saying. Because in her mind, it's obvious that she's actually saying something. Something that we should understand. Those sentences come out sounding awfully alike each time she starts a conversation; it's just that she's not speaking English. American English, standard English, none of the above. But she'll continue trying, looking at us each time for a response, and so I try to alternate between things like "What?" "Really?" "Wow." "Uh-huh." "No." "Yeah?" and "Bridget, I can't understand a word you're saying."

The funny thing is that I feel so bad—guilty, almost—that I can't understand her. Maybe this stems from the fact that I do understand a lot more of her words than other people do. Unlike her cousin, Lily, Bridget's not big in the enunciation department so words like "outside" come out like "ah-iye." But she's said them often enough within context—say, when Mya's going outside, or she goes to the door to look at Mya outside and points at her and says it—that I know the word she's trying to pronounce. And it's unfortunate that she's not too good at the "sssss" sound yet, because some words come out sounding, well, not that great (as in What are you teaching your daughter? as I'm sure some people think when sock comes out sounding like cock and it's not obvious what she's talking about since she alternates between calling her slippers socks and sjhoooozzz). But I'm confident that in a few months I'll be able to understand her better and so will others—I hope. (There's a kid at her daycare that's two-something and I still can't understand him very well.) And since I talk more (in general) than her daddy, I'm hoping she picks up on my good grammar, too! (Let's just say as an English teacher, listening to some phrases that come out of Al's mouth or listening to him tell a story only using vague pronouns instead of differentiating between characters drives me crazy.) Until then, I'll just stare into those big eyes and love listening to the sound of her voice.