MARK MY WORDS: PARENTS STUCK IN PLAYBACK

As the parents of a 2-year-old, Joni and I are constantly repeating ourselves.

It isn't that we want to be stuck in the playback mode. It is just that once is not enough when it comes to our daughter, Becca.

Talking to her is like reading the same book over and over. You know the punch line, but does she?

A typical, getting-ready-for-work conversation in our house goes something like this.

Me: "Rebecca, please put on your shoes." Instead, she continues playing with her doll house. "Rebecca, please put on your shoes. Daddy is late for work. We need to get going."

Joni: "Becca, please listen to your daddy. We need to get going. Please put on your shoes.

After numerous refrains, we are both wondering if the shoes will ever go on.

We could declare martial law and shove the shoes on ourselves. But in that case, we could be in for heavy duty crying.

At the last minute, Becca heeds our call and we get to leave the house after all.

I've often wondered if it might not be handy for parents to just record their initial remarks to their children and then play them back repeatedly on a tape recorder.

You can tell the difference between parents and single people.

Single people arrive at work in the morning with a look of freshness. Parents of young children arrive at work with that harried, I-barely-had-time-to-brush-my-teeth look.

At our daughter's age, bodily functions are a big item. "I go potty," our daughter regularly exclaims since she discovered the role of toilets.

She is getting better about unrolling the toilet paper. She used to want to wipe with enough toilet paper to destroy a whole forest.

At this point, I figure we will soon be out of the disposable diaper stage, which will improve the bottom line of our family budget.

Diapers never make it to the political arena. None of our national leaders, not even the president, has suggested diaper tax credits for parents. Maybe they should.

By the time Congress rafts through the political rapids of the Whitewater affair, America's parents will have changed millions of diapers and spent their life savings getting Junior onto the toilet seat.

I know our daughter is growing up because she has noticed dirt. It intrigues her.

Whenever she is in the car and we drive by a construction site, she never fails to point out the exposed earth.

One day after a heavy rain, she giggled all the way home. "It muddy. It muddy," she sang out over and over and over.

I've decided that this repeating stuff is contagious.

Joni says she is used to it. She says wives constantly have to repeat whole conversations to their husbands. I presume it is one of those unspoken rules of wedded bliss.

But there is a difference between husbands and 2-year-olds. Husbands don't have to be told to put on their shoes.

~Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.