Can You Say Hi to the Nice Lady?

There's something so disarming about having a new baby. Complete strangers feel the need to talk in strange voices around you, all in hopes of evoking some sort of a happy expression from the baby. I can have entire conversations with people without actually saying a word to them. All I have to do is tell Maya to say things to the nice people. "Say hi to the lady." or "Tell the nice man what you think about his toupee" It's really amazing if you think about it. She obviously doesn't ever say anything to them, and neither do I, but no one seems to care. They all leave happy to have seen a baby.

It really has been surprising to see how universally people of all different kinds are drawn to babies. The other day I was at Hollywood Video and this Hell's Angel type guy was behind us in line. Maya was smiling at him, which then inspired him to talk in a baby voice to her, which didn't surprise me until I really thought about it. It took a second to hit me that this tough guy had resorted to baby talk in a public place, all because Maya started smiling at him. Seeing the way people react to Maya in public places leaves me hopeful that most people, no matter what they look like, really are good people with good hearts.

However, people's reactions to Maya are not always heart warming. Some people just shouldn't ever try to talk in baby talk. They look like nice people, but then they start to talk to Maya, and it seems like they become possessed by some evil reincarnation of Barney the dinosaur and/or Poe from the teletubbies. It's really kinda creepy. All Maya can do is look at them with a weird look on her face. Bless her heart, she can't judge people yet, but I can. All I can tell myself is that their intentions are good. So there's that.

Overall though it really is inspiring to see how a new baby seems to foster love and acceptance from so many different kinds of people. And it's always nice to be able to disarm awkward situations by talking to people through my baby.