My nephew Aiden, who turns three next month, wants me to call him Barack Obama.  This request, which he’s made several times (when he’s feeling especially presidential I suppose), marks just one of many amusing moments from my family’s fun-filled vacation to Florida last week.

Quite honestly, I don’t know what we did before there was an Aiden around to entertain us, what we talked about before him or what in the world I took pictures of (if the kid didn’t know any better, he might think his Aunt Em was a paparazzo considering I snapped nearly 400 pictures over the course of FIVE DAYS – a little insane).  In my defense, though, there were quite a few camera-worthy moments – Aiden’s first flight, Aiden’s first trip to the beach, Aiden eating (and loving!) raw oysters for the first time, Aiden wearing a headlamp and going to the beach at night to chase crabs (which he has a strange obsession with), etc. 

But even though many of these experiences seem like such a big deal to me (as well as to his parents and grandparents), I still can’t believe how everyday and commonplace many of them seemed to Aiden.  And I guess this makes sense – when you’re not even three years old yet, you’re constantly having new experiences and encountering new things.  At this point in his life, holding a live starfish, a horseshoe crab and a giant snail that his dad found for him on a canoe trip in the Gulf, has about the same coolness factor as having a (temporary) tattoo of a shark on his belly.  Kids his age, understandably, just don’t have a perception of what’s rare…and though part of me wanted to help him realize that – more than likely – he won’t be able to round up any crabs to chase in Illinois, I also appreciate the fact that even the most ordinary things are cool to him.

In fact, Aiden’s reaction to new encounters inspired me to be more like him in some ways.  Not only would I love to allow myself to be entertained (and save ridiculous amounts of money) by watching a bug crawl by my foot, or pretending that a log is a balance beam for the 17^th time or playing a “game” that involves waiting for a battery charger light to change from red to green (this paparazzaunt may or may not have invented this game with a camera charger to keep him busy before dinner), I also really admire how he unabashedly asks what new words mean.  Though his vocabulary is already pretty impressive for his age, he constantly hears words that are new to him.  His reaction is just what it should be – “What does that mean?”  And then after you explain the meaning of the word in question, you see him think it over, nod a little and file it away in his rapidly expanding Aiden the Great Dictionary.

I, on the other hand, am usually unwilling to admit when I am unfamiliar with the meaning of a word that I hear or read.  In these instances, I typically make a mental note to look up the definition, and then promptly forget said mental note. 

Why not just ask??  I think I will next time.