Overheard

Lately, Barak has been figuring out that a) he is Jewish, but not everyone is Jewish, and b) he eats kosher food, but not everyone eats kosher food. This has been a subject of some interest to him. There are two bakeries that we pass often; one is kosher, one not. The produce store we buy almost all our produce and dairy at also has a non-kosher deli counter. There is an ice cream man at the park who sells kosher ice cream sandwiches, but everything else in his freezer box is not kosher. Likewise, most of Barak's friends are Jewish, but not everyone he knows is: our neighbors are Hindu and Muslim, one of his babysitters is Christian, etc. A few months ago we were in the hamburger place (kosher, obviously) with a bunch of teenage boys in white shirts, black yarmulkes, black pants, tzitzis, and big payes. They were there with their rebbe, obviously having a siyyum. When it was time to bentch, Barak heard "rabosai n'vareich" and looked over--and then asked, in his carrying three-year-old voice, "Imma, are dey Jewish?" Just, you know, to be entirely clear.

Yesterday, Barak came down with a nasty sore throat and a little bit of a fever. I called the doctor, who said to bring him in for a strep test, which I did this morning. The nurse who took the swab is not my favorite and really hurt him--I've seen how she does things enough times and she just isn't gentle. (Yes, I've complained.) By the time we were done, Barak was crying and miserable and we decided that perhaps a trip to Baskin-Robbins on the way home was in order.

One cup of vanilla ice cream later, equilibrium was more or less restored, but Barak's sore throat was such that he didn't eat much of it. "I'm gonna put it in the freezer for later, when I poop potty," he informed me. And later, he did indeed reclaim the ice cream. I got it out for him and left him in the kitchen while I went to do something else. And that's when I heard this:

"My ice cream is kosher. I eat kosher because I'm Jewish. Jewish people eat kosher food and I'm Jewish and that's why I eat kosher food. I can eat the ice cream because it's kosher and I'm Jewish. People who aren't Jewish don't eat kosher. They don't eat ice cream. I'm Jewish so I can eat ice cream."

I'm going to let him think that for a while.

In other news, I took Iyyar and Avtalyon for their two-year and four-month checkups, respectively. Iyyar is, incredibly, average for weight and height--I say incredibly because of how much he still eats, even though he's slowed down quite a lot lately. And Avtalyon has rocketed from the third to the fifty-first percentile for weight. He charmed the socks off the nurse with his big chubby grins and dimples, then wailed most piteously when the lady he thought was his friend stabbed him with DTAP and Prevnar shots. But he forgave her quickly.