Open Up!

I can’t help but laugh at myself whenever I feed a baby. I always open my own mouth as I guide the spoon towards the baby’s mouth. It must be that same reflex that causes people to lean to the right or left as they guide their racecar around a particularly sharp corner on a video game. Many times I have played at keeping my mouth shut, but the level of concentration it requires to force it from popping open is really not worth it. I’m sure I look like a fish in a tank, sitting there scooping sweet potatoes and blowing invisible bubbles into the air. The baby on the other end of the spoon is probably thinking one of two things: either that she’s pretty certain she doesn’t want to take food from a person who appears to be deranged, or that she is too amused by the faces to distract herself from them by opening her own mouth. There is always that chance that the baby actually learns more quickly to accept a spoon by mimicking the up-and-down motions of the parent’s lower jar. I just find it frustrating that even though the baby knows how to open her mouth I can’t stop opening my own.