Les Enfants Terribles
Kids from generation baby-boom saw more than a few newborns coming up. One thing the unsentimental ones can tell you is that infantile antics don’t always cut it as “awwww-ain’t-that-cute” behavior. Little people are barely out of the womb and already trying to tell everybody something. Some of them can be disturbingly demanding about it–without speaking an intelligible word. No one—not even the late Dr. Jean Piaget—has translated the messages they try putting across. But, personally, I’d never rule out the possibility of “shut up and listen to me.”
Somewhere on that bridge between crawling and toddling is where plucky imps take a first windy shot at public address. You might be reading or watching TV as the tirade busts loose— it’ll get your attention—there’s something unsettlingly eerie about pre-linguistic oratory. Holding the playpen rail—like a mini-Mussolini on a balcony—a torrent of emphatic, uncompromising and incomprehensible sounds are inflicted on a captive audience. The most megalomaniacal baby blabber mouths can command real drama and reach true emotional heights. They mean something—drastically—whatever in hell it may be is safer left a mystery into the ages.