Nava and ArchiveGuy’s posts make me wonder how you baby-talk in Spanish. So, how do you do it?
My best friend and her boyfriend try to one up each other on horrible, sarcastic baby names. Your post made me think of the current winner “Mr. Snuggleupagous” gag
We’ll babytalk in jest, but we’ve never done it as a sincere expression of affection. Usually the babytalk comes out when we’re gently taunting one another for being a total wuss about something.
We both baby talk to the cat, sometimes together, but we’re not addressing each other. An example might be “Aww, poo widdle kitty didn’t get fed by his mean, neglectful, hawibble daddy!” “Well daddy knew that mommy was supposed to feed the poo widdle kitty and didn’t because mommy’s a mean, awful, forgetful wicked stepmother mommy!” “Awww, widdle kiddy knows who wuvs him better than that mean hawible man who makes up lies about his beautiful, puhfect mommy, doesn’t him?”
My husband and I occupied this strange, cute but bent world when we were alone together. Part of it was that we had an enormous number of stuffed animals (mostly bears, but by no means all), and there was an on-going White Bear plot to seize power so as to enslave all other creatures into manufacturing Doritos and Root Beer for their pleasure, so Adolph (one of the white bears) was always begging me for Cruise missiles and Sieg Heils. Bob, who had some puppeteering experience, would do the animals in pantomime, and I would talk what amounted to baby-talk back to them. Then there was Woodchuck (originally intended as a stuffed bear, but Bob took one look at her and said “that’s not a bear, it’s a woodchuck!”), who was a) very beautiful, b) very clever, and c) don’t you forget it, Jack! She was very good at getting her points across and getting her own way. And Jefferson and Abraham, who were white bears who didn’t support the takeover, and Goebbels and Hermann and Eva (she was pink, so she was a pinko) who were basically hangers-on and sucked up to Adolph (who was not really very bright, despite his aspirations for world domination), and Tyrone, a huge brown bear, and so on and so-forth. So there was a lot of baby-talk, but it was distinctly bent baby-talk, if you follow me.
Then, if we were watching TV together and any animal whatsoever would come on screen, I would point at the TV and proudly say “Puppy!” Bob would turn to me and very kindly say “No. Kitty!” if it were a lion or some such, or “No. Giraffe!” or whatever it happened to be. Of course, whenever a scene took place looking at some beautiful castle or mansion in Europe, I’d ask him if he’d please buy Europe for me, and he’d always assure me that he would. The lousy SOB never did though.
We also had a couple of dogs, and while we didn’t exactly use baby-talk, we did use “doggie talk” with them, which wasn’t all that far removed. And we had an on-going “argument” in which I would describe our actually rather small Newfoundland (about 100 lbs) as a “cute little puppy with round little puppy paws” and he’d insist that they were “great big dinner plate sized paws.” This “argument” occurred at least once a day on average.
Our friends were vaguely aware that we had this strange thing going on, but we didn’t foist it on to them. And besides, it never involved revolting endearments or anything like that. It was just a weird kind of fantasy world that involved a special way of talking.
This has also been the case in a couple of my other long term relationships, although never anything as bent as the White Bear Nazi movement. It’s depended very much on the man involved and the nature of the relationship - in some situations it was great, and in others it never occurred to me to do it. I DO talk baby talk to my dogs now - the same idiotic content mentioned above, such as “Who’s da cutest little puppy in the world? Oh, YOU’RE the cutest little puppy with the cutest little puppy face!” equally to my rather elderly 130 pound Great Dane and my adult 40 lb Eskimo mix. And it’s true every time I say it! Just as I’m Mummy to any dog I meet, and always refer to myself in the third person. Sorry, that’s just the way it is.
All I can say is that when I’ve had it, it’s worked for me very well. Some of the brightest and most sensible people I’ve ever known have indulged in this kind of thing too. When my husband and I split for reasons having nothing to do with our actual very deep love for one another, the thing I missed most painfully at first was this interaction, and I have no doubt that he missed it too - this was not something I foisted on him. It just grew of its own over time.
I think one of the keys to a happy relationship is that you often take turns being “the parent.” Sometimes you are the one who needs extra care and cuddling (both verbal and physical), sometimes it’s your partner. Whether or not that involves a special way of talking is entirely a matter of your mutual taste. As I said, in some relationships I’ve had, it never would have crossed my mind. In others, it played a HUGE role. Different people, different tastes.
Erhm… to a baby:
That’s a moderate version. I can’t bring myself to try and spell the worst ones.
Pío-pío: bird. Guau-guau: dog. Miau or miau-miau: cat. Popo, pos: shit. Pipi: somehow this word evolves with age, it’s pipi for babies, pipí for kids and pis for grown-ups.
This is actually incorrect. Way back, before time began, when Cervaise and I were falling in love, we watched a television program involving baby polar bears. I think watching it was originally a reason to sit on the sofa together and kind of cuddle up. But the baby polar bears were unbelievably cute. This resulted in several episodes of baby talk - fortunately they were never witnessed by anyone else.
There were also several cutsie nicknames that persisted for quite a while.
None of this has survived the divorce. Very little has survived the divorce.
So, it’s grad school?
Uh…
HubbyandIplayPeekaboo…
<d&r>
I have to say that that is one of the saddest lines I’ve ever read. I’m so sorry for both of you!