His name is Seven.

Today I drove out to the middle of Missouri to have our new car serviced at the dealership. While there, I waited for about 2 hours for the brakes to be inspected and the transmission fluid flushed. I sat quietly in the customer waiting area reading the last book in the "Girl with the.." series and trying desperately to ignore Dr. Oz talking about the consistency of a human pancreas.

About five minutes in, a girl about my age and her toddler son entered the room. He was carrying two balloons, stomping, grinning...and screeching.

Screaming. I could no longer hear Dr. Oz talking about pancreatic links to diabetes if I wanted to.

The girl was completely unfazed. She sat down on the tacky leather couch and pulled out her phone. Little Monster scrambled into the adjacent showroom where he continued yelling at the top of his lungs. Let me also say that this child was not yelling words. At least not any from the english language. His mother never looked up. Moments later, a salesman led the wailing boy back to his mother (sans one balloon). When she saw that other humans had taken notice of her outstanding parenting skills, she simply grabbed the child by the arm, plopped him down on the couch next to her and went back to texting. There was no "thank you." No "please behave." Nothing spoken to her child or anyone else.

He sat semi-quietly, fingering his balloon string and alternating between attempting to strangle himself with it and shoving it fist first into his mouth. Still no words. Just humming, blubbing, glopping.

I began to think, paranoid, that perhaps this child was an deliberate experiment in lack of communication and socialization. The salesman wandered back into the room, making light conversation with the girl.

"How old is he?"

"He'll be two in May."

"Does he talk?"

"Not really."

"...He'll get it."

"Yeah."

"What's his name?"

"Seven"

"What made you want to name him Seven?"

"Oh, there's a bunch of symbolism in the number. Biblically and stuff. And he's the seventh grandchild."

"Well, all right."

He walked out and screecher went back to his screeching. I did not read any more of my book. Instead, I spent the remainder of my wait time talking to Seven. Using words. Like balloon. His mom didn't seem to mind. Her apathy further enraged me.

If you make the decision to have a child, raise your child. Don't let your parents raise your child just because they are willing to help you and feel bad for you and love you. Don't leave your child with them every weekend while you go out and get your party fix because you feel you're missing out on something. Teach them everything you know. Words, letters, numbers, colors, manners (in the hopes that you also possess some).

Do not ignore your children. Do not let the television raise your child; it won't turn out well. Help them develop, mentally and physically. This means not feeding them McDonald's three times a week because it's easy. This also means removing the words "baby fat" from your vocabulary and introducing them to the outdoors, sports and sweat.

I don't have any children; I'm not ready. I'm just basing my unsolicited advice on the young parents and children I've come into contact with, and it pains me to know that these children will no doubt have trouble expressing themselves in adulthood. If they can't speak or create or express while in their freedom of their youth, they'll never have the courage or resources to do it when they're older.

If you make the decision to have a child, devote yourself to him or her. Stop thinking about yourself and your hair and your nails and your jeans. Buy your kid health insurance. And please don't name him something that will make it absolutely effortless to gain relative popularity for being a shitty rapper.