The Scariest Part Of The Holidays: Casual Insults From Toddlers

There is a ticking time bomb that awaits millions of us this Thanksgiving. It’s not the turkey food coma, and it’s not that one brother-in-law who always makes inappropriate jokes and then says, “What? Oh, c’mon, you know I’m kidding.” It’s not even all the driving in holiday traffic. No, the threat we all need to be bracing ourselves for is subtler than all of that: It’s the toddlers we’ll be seeing, and the particularly cutting insults they will dole out at us. I’m talking about the kind of insults that you think about before you fall asleep at night, the kind that stay with you for years and years. We all need to prepare ourselves, because they’re coming.

The toddlers don’t mean anything by it, which might be the hardest part. This is what we all tell ourselves, as though it makes it easier to swallow. Like when I popped by to visit my aunt, who runs a home day care center, and the little girl there asked me if I was pregnant. She was happy for me, I could see it. Except I’m not. And it’s not like I can say to her “Hey, that was rude” because it wasn’t. Or this summer, when I was chasing my friend’s little boy around the backyard in a fun game of tag until he screamed, “Help! An ugly zombie is chasing me!” Or that time a friend was buying a copy of my book and she showed it to her little boy. “Look, Jen wrote this book!” she told him, and he walked over with his soccer ball under his arm, sweaty from playing and ready to pass judgment. He held up my book, looked at the author photo on the back, and said, “Is this really you?” I told him yes. “Wow… You’ve really changed.” He said this two years ago. I don’t think I’ve ever forgiven him.

Of course, I smiled through gritted teeth while his mom said nervously “Hey, that’s not very nice!” He shrugged and walked away, his work done.

I didn’t say anything. But I wanted to say “Look, I was drinking a little too much pinot grigio during lockdown and eating toast constantly, and I ran out of the good moisturizer; give me a break.” I wanted to say “Everyone ages, kid; don’t blame me.” I should be accustomed to the targeted, honest, and totally devastating insults from toddlers by now. My own kids certainly came up with some zingers. “Can you take that ponytail out? Because I can’t tell if you’re mad at me or if that’s just your face,” my youngest said when I was, indeed, very mad at him over his messy room. His comment did not help matters.

They are simply honest observations from small children who mean you no harm and can’t help noticing that you, like me, have a “comfy, squishy stomach.”

“Mommy, I bet you don’t get cold in winter because you are like a polar bear,” another son sweetly said, happy as a clam for me, when we were out on a winter walk together.

Waking my toddler in his booster seat to carry him in the house, he wakes up, screams, and tells me, “Don’t touch me! The holes in your nose! They’re! Too! Big!” He meant my nostrils. So specific. He is a grown man now, kind and thoughtful, and yet here I am still looking in the mirror with my head tilted back, wondering how to make my nostrils look smaller.

The problem is, of course, that these insults are not insults. They are simply honest observations from small children who mean you no harm and can’t help noticing that you, like me, have a “comfy, squishy stomach.” The bigger problem for me is that toddlers are the best and the only people I want to be around, and I desperately want them to like me. When we gather for a holiday like Thanksgiving, if there is a toddler in the room, that’s where I want to be. They just know who they are in a way I find compelling. Plus they are usually cuter than anyone in the room and dressed in more interesting outfits. So their version of observational humor really hits me where it hurts. When my toddler niece told me as we were packing up to go to the beach, “Aunt Jen, I think you’re more of a one-piece bathing suit girl, right?” I meekly changed out of the (very modest) two-piece I was about to wear. Because she was right. I’m a one-piecer all the way.

Despite their cut-glass wit, despite their assessing eyes and life-altering one-liners delivered sotto voce at the table, they are the most fun. Ask my uncle, who calmly tried to tell a toddler in his care that it hurt his feelings when she called him stupid and was struck silent by her retort: “I guess now you’re stupid and a cry baby.” Ask a friend of mine whose husband, two years younger than her, was told by a toddler that he must be her dad. Ask anyone who has dined with a toddler ever. They’ll cut you to the quick and calmly just sit there eating their mashed potatoes like they didn’t just end you.

I would love to tell you that there is a way to safeguard against these cherubic character assassins, but I don’t think there is one. It’s not like you’re going to wear your best dress, do your makeup, sit mutely at the table smiling and hoping that you’ll avoid their censure by being the best version of yourself possible. Don’t bother; I’ve tried it. It didn’t stop the French toddler at the table from asking me “Etes-vous un imbécile?” And being called an imbecile hurts so much more in French, I’ll tell you.

The only thing to do is laugh it off. Remember they don’t mean anything by it. Like when my niece told me I reminded her of Ursula the Sea-Witch from The Little Mermaid (the original), she really loves Ursula. And she really loves me.

It’s not her fault that she’s sort of right.

Happy Thanksgiving. And good luck to you all out there.