Honest. My son totally said my name.

I’ve officially experienced the happiest moment in any new father’s life. Everett said my name, “da da.”
Now, Emily is going to argue that this isn’t true. She seems to be clouded by the erroneous belief that Everett is just making noises. It is all a matter of having the proper perspective and understanding the context of the situation.

Everett first said my name when I was feeding him lunch. Emily would argue he was actually saying, “ba ba,” which essentially means nothing since he hasn’t used a bottle in months and he isn’t a lamb. She, of course, is forgetting that I declared that specific noon to be the “replace ‘d’s with ‘b’s” hour. Besides, it was common knowledge growing up in my household that it is polite to say “ba ba” to your father when eating turkey. I’m a little shocked and slightly appalled my wife never adopted that practice in her own family.

Despite my hard evidence, there is a miniscule chance you’re siding with my wife. You may believe my son was trying to impersonate a cute farm animal. I have another major moment that is much harder to argue.

He called me “da da” while I was bathing him. This was the more traditional “da da,” where you don’t use the “b.”

So, how does my wife ague against this hard and irrefutable proof?

Well, she uses the weak and incredibly flawed argument that he wasn’t even looking at me. She is right. He wasn’t looking at or even facing towards me. But he was looking at his toy dolphin.

My solid and impeccable argument is that he is my son. What? You don’t like that defense? The fact is that I had a massive imagination as a kid and I often liked to pretend my toys were real (yep, Pixar totally ripped off my childhood). Everett was just following his dad and having a perfectly reasonable conversation with his toy dolphin.
The dolphin obviously asked who was bathing him, and Everett then let him know it was “da da.” Is there absolutely any way to dispute this verifiable fact?

Emily’s final argument would be that Everett hasn’t called me “da da” since the bath. She would be correct.
But does she call me “my stunningly handsome husband” every time she talks to me? No. Is she thinking it? Of course.

Everett just doesn’t want the name “da da” to lose its meaning. So, he is saving it for special times like when he has his mouth full of food or is talking to his toys. It makes complete sense to me.