Nature vs Nurture

Before I had a baby, I always thought that most of the reasons why girls were the way they were and boys were the way they were was because parents and society molded them to be that way, teaching them how they are supposed to be.  Now that I'm a parent, I'm constantly noticing this isn't so.  It is so apparent, even as a baby, that men are from Mars and women are from Venus.  For example:

I walked into daycare to pick Jude up a couple of weeks ago.  As I was filling out the sheet stating what time I picked him up, I heard the unmistakable sound of plastic banging loudly on plastic.  As I approached the door to the infant room, the noise grew louder.  I got to the doorway and saw four girls roughly around Jude's age all sitting quietly close to one another.  One was gazing at a book and turning the pages, two were softly cooing to each other, and the other was twiddling the ear of a stuffed animal.  I did a quick scan of the room searching for my son and saw him.  He was over in the corner next to a giant empty toybox, the contents of which were strewn about all around him.  He was standing up, trying to climb into it, while simultaneously banging a plastic cup against a toy piano with all the strength he could muster.  He was also screeching out something that I can only describe as a baby battle cry. 

I've been noticing little things before this:  he tackles me to plant big, wet, open mouth kisses on my cheek- there is nothing gentle about it.  He insists on crawling with a truck or a car at all times and has just now started to make a vrrrrroooom sound to it as well (I'm sure it's coincidental, but how is it that he inherently knows how a car sounds??).  He loves nothing more than to spill water or food onto his highchair tray and smear his goopy fingers all over anything within his reach with his toothy, devilish grin.  He loves catapulting himself off everything without so much as a warning (thank goodness my mommy adrenaline hasn't reached low levels yet as I'm always one step ahead of him- so far).  Oh yeah, and he's 10 1/2 months old!

Where did my son learn to be such a......boy? 

I know for a fact my husband isn't conducting classes on the benefits of rough play.  I'm pretty sure there aren't lesson plans being snuck in behind my back about how toy trucks give life meaning or speeches on the joys of smashing things together.  Therefore, I can only attribute this classic male behavior to one of those mysteries of human nature. 

I suppose it just gives some affirmation to the phrase "boys will be boys".  And I love having a boy. (Who is now a big boy and eating grilled cheese and pineapple chunks...when did this happen?!?)