Sweet Talker

A couple of weeks ago, we had a particularly interesting experience out to lunch with Sean and Ella. We needed to drop off Sean's glasses to be repaired, so I suggested we grab some Chinese for lunch while we waited on the optical shop.

I sat down with the kids while Doug got our order. Sean noticed a man sitting at the table near us, wearing a cowboy hat. Sean has his great love of Woody, so he has a bit of a soft spot for guys in cowboy hats. He started talking to me and pointing to the man, telling me "Mama! Mama! Yeehaw! Yeehaw! Hat!" He was signing hat and taking his hand to his forehead, then raising it up like a cowboy tossing his hat off.

The man saw Sean "waving" at him and smiled and waved back. This made Sean even more excited as he repeated, "Yeehaw! Yeehaw!" to the man. I smiled back to the man and said, "He really likes your cowboy hat. He had a lot of fun seeing the cowboys on horses at the fair last week, too."

The man came over to our table and said hi to Sean, kneeling down to his eye level. He asked me, "Is he deaf?" Since he saw us signing, I suppose. I said, "No, he can hear, we use sign to help communicate." He said, "I swear I'm not some weirdo and I don't have lice or anything. I was wondering if he'd like to try on my hat?"

I said sure, that'd be fine. He put his hat on Sean and Sean's face lite up like a Christmas tree. Sean looked back and forth between me and the man and signed/said, "Mama! Hat! Me? Yeehaw!"

By now, Doug approached the table and said hello. The man said, "He's just adorable! I buy these hats by the dozen and have given them to client's kids. Would it be alright if he kept it?" We said, "oh, you don't have to, he'll give it back."

He again knelt down to Sean and asked him directly, "Would you like to keep it? Would like to take that hat home?" Sean said, "Yes! Hat! Me!"


So Sean went home with a big cowboy hat and a happy face, while a cowboy went home with hat hair and a big happy face.