Dear Evan:

Before you were born, before I met your mother, before so many things, I spent insomnia time playing computer games. One of those games featured a little wizard who, when danger approached, sometimes querulously asked, “What’s that NOISE?”

I write this because I think I subconsciously picked up his whispered, almost scared delivery. (I know I did for another character, an elf who chirped “Re-FRESH-ing!” when healed.) As you grew and became more aware of the world around you, we played games where I would try to get you to recognize the environment. Sometimes, I would do it by asking, “What’s that noise?”

At maybe the year and a half mark, you took up the practice for your own, peering around after an unfamiliar sound and asking, “Dat NOIZE? Dat NOIZE, Dada?”

And now, just in the past month, you’ve been answering your own question: “Dat NOIZE? Dat noize da WASHink machine.” “Dat noize is Mimi coffink.”

My favorite is when my laptop heats up, triggering the fan: “Dat noize is jus’… jus’ da COMPYOODER.”

(I can’t decide whether you sound more like Arnold Schwarzenegger or an old Jewish man.)
I love you,

Daddy