The Face

Our lovely Alice is five months old it is a delight to be with her and I'm only too aware of this precious year of getting to know each other before returning to employment. Blogging for me is just as much about reading and commenting on your blogs as it is posting here. I look at my 'phone all too much anyway and I really don't want Alice thinking I've a black oblong of a nose, so I'm ready to make the decision to stop blogging. If I read an amazing quote that I want to save for posterity then I will post it here, more so it's stored somewhere and I'm going to start tweeting short favourite quotes as I read them but apart from that this is the last one.

Mother sent me this just after Alice was born and it seems a fitting way to close.

'The swaddled infant lies on her rug. She is the centre of the adults' care, of their comings and goings. Above her a shaft of light dazzles. The blurry brightness sharpens around tinkling objects swinging back and forth, back and forth. These tinkling shapes are tethered to the familiar voice, the familiar hand, the familiar smell. She has no words for these marvels. They are magnificent - but they are not enough. Her legs kick in unison. She cries out; there is a rustling sound. Events happen to her and around her in an unbroken stream. Her arms reach out to touch the firmness of the murmuring shadow above her. She struggles for this shadow to come closer. The fragrance now envelops. She wonders: Am I part of this warm shadow, so that I am lifted up, it really is me doing the lifting?Will this flow of movement, sound and smell transform into the familiar face - the beloved Face - that makes sense of me?
....
We emerge after nine months with very few welll-formed instincts. Fresh from the womb, we have no chance of finding our own legs and going off in search of food. We are helpless. We are equipped mainly with a desire for the human face. Babies are primed to search for any human face, though in time they seek out the familiar special Face they recognise. The beloved Face is sought with more energy and vigour than anything else.
...
Watch a mother and baby greet each other as the baby is waking... 'Hello. There you are. It's wonderful to see you.' And the baby mirrors this delight back, as she learns. 'Yes, I am here. And I am very wonderful.' This Face is our building block.' Sarah Savage Joseph

xxx

Rachel & Alice