Baby Feet

Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy.

—Psalm 126:2

One snowy Monday after a busy weekend, when he was almost three months old, Henry and I stayed home and wore our pajamas all day. When he was awake, we played together. I’d stick my tongue out, and he’d stick his tongue out, and then he’d smile and laugh, a gurgly drooling laugh, where his blue eyes flashed and I was convinced that he knew a lot more than he let on. He looked up at me with a face that seemed to say, “I hear you. I get what you’re saying, Mom.” We stuck our tongues out for hours.

When I changed him, I talked with him. Before I put his sleeper back on, I tickled his legs and belly, and I kissed the bottoms of his feet, because they’re so soft and perfect and chubby, and before I knew it, there were tears running down my face, and I cried so hard I couldn’t keep talking to him.

All alone with my son, in the midst of a frantic holiday season, that moment on a dark Monday afternoon was the merriest Christmas moment for me. The sweetest moment of gratitude and hope happened right then, in our quiet house, with my son, kissing his little baby feet.