Tag: babies

Lessons From a Sleeping Baby

Jae-Ha Kim

I feel a surge of gratitude when I look in on my children fast asleep. Penny, with her arms splayed, as if to embrace the universe … William, curled on his side and cuddling his giraffes … Marilee, swaddled tight with only her round face in view … And yet learning how to care for them comes when they are not nearly so adorable. It comes when I am willing to offer myself as a calming presence, willing to sing one more lullaby or change one more diaper or kiss a forehead one more time. Love is not an emotion so much as it is a series of actions.

Our author goes all Bahama Mama when traveling to Atlantis with her son

Jae-Ha Kim

As it turns out, having a cute toddler with a penchant for high-fiving strangers is like toting around catnip. Apparently, my son saves his worst for when it’s just us, in private. In public, he was like a well-behaved movie star. He went straight to work at the airport, charming the sort of shop girls I had always assumed were beyond human emotion. Put him on a plane, I learned, and suddenly he’s the flight attendants’ favorite passenger. I’m not ashamed to say that we used him as a means to reel in extra snacks.