Oh...you mean 18 months???

Chapter 7 – Oh...you mean 18 months???

I don’t really like math all that much, nor do I think any random strangers really need to know the EXACT age of my kids, so when someone on the bus asks me how old my kids are (and people do like to ask that a lot) – I usually just estimate.  But when I’ve said, for example: “She’s a year and a half old”, more than once I’ve had people then try to guess her birthdate.  (I guess I’m supposed to be impressed with your quick-thinking math skills?  Your impressive ability to count backwards?  Are you that bored?  Can’t you get a suduko puzzle book or something like everyone else instead of trying to show off and make me look dumb in the process??)    “Oh, so she was born last September???”, and I say , “No, late November actually”.  Then I sound like a moron for either not being able to handle simple math, or not knowing quite how old my child is. 

There’s this other thing that some new parents do where they tell you their kid's age in months.  I’m not really into that (again, I’m on this bus to get to work, not to do math problems).  That makes sense when your child is a baby, but once they turn a year old, I think I'm allowed to give an estimate, right??  One morning Lily and I were sitting across from another lady with a kid.  He was a little boy, looked to be about the same age as Lily, and the Mom and I started talking.  She asked how old Lily was, and I said,  “She’s a year and a half ” and this lady says to me “Oh, you mean 18 months?”.   No, I really didn’t mean 18 months, because she wasn’t EXACTLY a year and a half.  (And why was she correcting my answer anyway??)  Honestly, she was probably closer to a year and ¾, but who says that?  One of these days I’m going to better prepare myself and really show off what a great mother I am by answering in weeks, or better yet, in days.  Stranger: “How old is your daughter?”   Me: “Oh, she’s 1,161 days ….” Or perhaps I’ll answer in fractions.  “Yes, my daughter is 3 and 13/73rds”.   Check me out, I’m good at math AND I love my kid.  Can’t wait for someone to ask me again…