Babies are shady, petty and dramatic, and I love it

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Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own. Read more opinions on theGrio.

I have a newly minted 3-year-old. He celebrated his third birthday a few weeks back and has been enjoying whatever newfound freedoms come with ascending up the ladder toward senior citizenship. The thing is, he is the youngest of my four children so everybody looks at him and views him as the baby. People call him, “Baby (his name)” and if you ask him what his name is, he’ll tell you that it’s “Baby.” In fact, short of making him say his name, I don’t think he ever says his own name out loud. That’s not important here; what is important is that he is, in our house, viewed as the baby. 

Being the baby of the family means when his siblings, aunties and uncles come around, they all want to pick him up and such. And because he is the baby and everybody always wants his attention and to pick him up, he has developed a supremely shady response to, well, everybody. If you seem too eager to get his attention, he will not only shade you, he’ll shade you loudly so that everybody around you knows that he wants no parts of you. And then, because he is shady, he will toss his arms out towards another person and act like he absolutely couldn’t wait to hug them and smile at them. It’s quite a show he puts on, full of shade, petty and theater. I love it. 

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Here’s the funny part about it: Folks’ reactions to being rejected by babies are always so funny. Despite it being a clear song-and-dance on the part of a person whose command of the English language is marginal, at best, adults always feel a slight pang of hurt. Maybe hurt is too strong, but there’s at least a slight offense on the table. It’s as if being rejected by a baby says something about the person being rejected, like the baby is judging the adult, which is really funny if you think about it. Perhaps the baby IS judging the adult as being unworthy of their time and attention. Thing is, you’d never know because it isn’t like the baby says, “I don’t like the cut of his jib” as he reaches for another. They’re usually laughing and smirking as they move from arms to arms. 

I’ve seen this play out for years (I have four kids, if you’ll remember), and the reactions are always the same when my kids have been like “NO” when somebody tried to play with them and they didn’t want to play. Kids are hilarious, brutally honest, shady and self-interested humans. They want what they want when they want it and if they don’t want anything to do with you, they usually announce it. I’m sure it’s been that way since the dawn of time, even if it’s not mentioned specifically in the Bible. 

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Yet, we as adults who know kids mean nothing by it, always take it personally when a baby wants no part of us. I’ve done it. I’ve absolutely been like, “Well excuuuuuuuuuuuse me, newborn! Let me go back to this brown liquor, which always treats me right!” Maybe it’s the rudeness with which kids let you know their goals. Maybe it’s the choosing of others. Maybe it’s the way they do the things they do. I don’t know. It’s funny either way. 

As a point of note, “the baby” in my household does this same shady rejection to his other siblings. Every time he sees his big sister, he will immediately say he doesn’t want to see her. She swears he doesn’t like her even though he asks for her all the time. His big brothers? Same thing. He’s just a kid who enjoys a good practical joke, some shade and making others work for his love and affection. I’m sure if he were to do it to me, I’d feel a way, but he doesn’t so I don’t so I’m perfectly fine with the shade. And since I know he’s not unique in his shadiness, I will continue to get a kick out of how babies set their own boundaries and terms. I love it. 

Now let me go, my baby is requesting my presence to do something he seems to want that requires all of my time and attention. 

Panama Jackson is a columnist at theGrio. He writes very Black things, drinks very brown liquors, and is pretty fly for a light guy. His biggest accomplishment to date coincides with his Blackest accomplishment to date in that he received a phone call from Oprah Winfrey after she read one of his pieces (biggest), but he didn’t answer the phone because the caller ID said: “Unknown” (Blackest).

Make sure you check out the Dear Culture podcast every Thursday on theGrio’s Black Podcast Network, where I’ll be hosting some of the Blackest conversations known to humankind. You might not leave the convo with an afro, but you’ll definitely be looking for your Afro Sheen! Listen to Dear Culture on TheGrio’s app; download it here.