I remember feeling excited in the months leading up to Azmu’s birthday. Not because I was waiting to throw a Minnie mouse themed party, nor because I was eager to buy Azmu her very own first pair of walking shoes, but simply so that I could have her start talking to me. Yes, understanding a crying baby is hard. Harder than that alien language in the movie Arrival; made up of circles of randomly splattered ink. Even with these so-called super powers known as ‘maternal instinct’, I wasn’t getting very far.

I was so eager to communicate with Azmu that I even practised baby sign language with her for a while. Although, that didn’t last very long mainly because I couldn’t remember the signs for the words at the right time and also because hubby-bi would laugh at me performing various hand gestures. I was just going to have to wait for Azmu to take her sweet time.

Fast forward a year, and she has surprised me with her development in language skills. She can sing numerous nursery rhymes, count upto 10, identify shapes and animals (we’re still working on colours) and is a confident bi-lingualist, MashAllah.

However, I do wonder if she could string together more complex sentences, what she’d have to say. Hopefully not something like this, even though her actions prove otherwise:

• I love holding your hand, but mummy, when you take me to new places, such as the electronics section in Carrefour, I simply must touch everything that is on display and run off to explore the adjacent aisles.
• I love how you keep the house so clean, but mummy, I simply must have all my toys spread in each corner of the house to help me decide what I would like to play with at every 10 minute interval.
• I know you lock all your makeup away in drawers and put all those colourful red and pink tubes out of my reach, but mummy, I really want to play with your makeup brushes, twist open all the tubes and put some stuff on my face.
• I love that you encourage me to colour and paint, but mummy, if you are going to give me the same wonder-struck reaction even when I just scribble, I know you are only pretending to like my creative masterpieces.
• I know you are always teaching me good manners such as sharing, but mummy, you never share your shiny and sparkly jewellery with me, especially the ones you carefully keep in pretty velvet boxes.
• I know you are always following me around the house and checking up on me, especially when I am working in silence, but mummy, don’t you think you are a tad bit obsessed with me.

For now, let me enjoy Azmu’s uncomplicated simple sentences, such as ‘I like pink shoes’ or ‘I love Mummy’ for in them lies an amplitude of honesty and true feelings.

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