Thursday, February 01, 2007

Kissing the kids

These pictures remind me of this post about a year and a half ago. My, how the kids have grown! This post is a draft from a full two years ago. At the time, I had a terrible illness that lasted two months and took two rounds of antibiotics to overcome. It was a combination of 3 days of high fever followed by 3 days of intense coughing followed by 3 days of high fever, etc. I made it into work only 5 days in the month of January (which made no difference since I was already laid off at that point and was only coming in 3 days a week anyway). I was paranoid about getting the kids sick so I was careful to kiss them only on the back of their heads and washed or sanitized my hands every time I blew my nose. I really missed being able to kiss them on their face and letting them be close to me.

I remember seeing another couple being extremely affectionate with their baby girl, kissing her all over, biting her nose, and letting her explore the insides of their mouths with her tiny fingers. I remember thinking, wow, they must not be concerned about germs. But then again, they are really physically close to their baby, really enjoying and loving her, and allowing her to express herself, so maybe I'm missing out on something. After I got better, I made it a point to be more physically close to the kids. I still get antsy if they poke around my nose or mouth, but it's nice to be close in that way. I'm certainly not physically distant like some parents who stick their newborn in a big crib in a separate bedroom the night they come home from the hospital. But I want to hold on to these days when they always want to be close to us, as we all know, those days are numbered.

1 comment :

Anonymous said...

Reminds me of the grim days of spring 2003 here in Hong Kong. Given that the doctor had you on antibiotics, a surgical facial mask should have stopped the spread of airborne droplets. Still have a few boxes of masks laying around the place now as leftovers.

As for the debate over cleanliness with kids, some folks suggest that a lack of cleanliness might be a good thing due to building up a resistance all of those possible contagions early. At least that was a theory floated at me during my "immunological transition" after moving here.