Mmm....Baby Smell.....Mmmm....

A couple of weeks ago Linda, Kai, and I went to our Kaiser pre-natal group reunion.  We all swapped birth stories, tales of figuring out parenting as we go along, and of course adored each other's children.  At one point Linda and I were chatting with one of the nurses and I mentioned how the entire house smells like baby.  "I mean everything!  And it's not just diaper smell, or breast milk, it's something else entirely that I just cannot describe."  The nurse enthusiastically agreed and seemed able to recall her own experience of the wonder of baby smell.  
Later, Linda mentioned to me how she never really noticed a baby smell, which left us both with an inconclusive "Huh."


I have continued to think about the phenomenon of baby smell, especially because I cannot escape it!  It's just so wonderful!  To try and describe it, it's sweet and musty and rich and when I hold Kai and press his soft and squishy chest to my face I get the nearly irresistible urge to devour him!
I've thought, "Perhaps it's pheromones or something," but every time I got on the computer I forgot about my baby smell wonderings (I think perhaps because the computer dulls my senses.  I am not kidding).  
Well, finally I remembered and lo and behold it has been researched!  A Swedish study headed by Professor Bill Hansson tested to see whether there in fact was a newborn smell and, if so, what its effect was on others.  Marina Green at TLC magazine summarizes, and their conclusions are fascinating!

The results of their experiments showed that men were better at distinguishing T-shirts that had been worn by newborns, and fathers were more likely than non- fathers to speculate correctly. The women had trouble distinguishing the scent of a newborn child from an older child but they all agreed that clean, unworn shirts smelt “most pleasant”.

Amazingly, none of the women could detect this baby smell--only the men, especially (but not exclusively) fathers.  This comes as a surprise for a few reasons: 1.  Women are generally found to have a stronger sense of smell.  2.  Our cultural assumptions around gender and bonding.  3.  A previous study by Karin Bengston at Hebrew University in Jerusalem had found that mothers could identify their babies by smell.
Here is Bengston's take on the research:

"Women have always had to be more concerned with the job of looking after their children than men and display protective motherly instincts in their presence. These feelings toward the child were never as natural coming from the father because he was primarily concerned with the hunt for food. A successful hunter was better off adopting an aggressive stance. Back at the homely campfire this peculiarity could prove dangerous for the youngest and most defenceless members of the clan, especially under less than ideal conditions."...According to this theory, men sniff out the information on baby aroma that is common to all small children but women focus more on the factors that distinguish their own child from other children.

I cannot say I have been aggressively hunting as of late.  Even when I am "bringing home the bacon" it has been from working with children--though children who apparently have largely lost their newborn smell (not until puberty will they produce their own "mature" smell--won't that be nice!).  Nevertheless, I must say that walking in that door after running errands or doing some work at school, I am immediately hit by a thick wall of baby's sweet sweet aroma, and most everything that was hanging onto me melts away.
To speak of the bond (whether assisted by pheromones or not) between Kai and I, one of my favorite moments is when I finish changing his diaper and he just lays there on the changing table, arms over his head, a serene look on his face, and his eyes on mine.  Right then, it is so clear just how much we are attached.  We both know that I am going to pick him up and love him until the end of time.  All his eyes seem to ask is, "Where to now daddy?"  And away we go.

Backyard Adventure!

Late last week Kai and I made an exciting discovery.  For our morning walk one day, I decided to walk to the Barnum Recreation Center and time how long it took us to get there.  We had not gone this way yet because it involves crossing very noisy, polluted Federal Ave.  Nevertheless, the intrigue of nearby attractions compelled me to make the journey.  And wow what is it worth it!
After crossing Federal we went north onto Grove and in a few blocks found ourselves overlooking a creek feeding a marshy pond all nestled right behind the Barnum Rec Center!  My imagination began to run wild.  The creek comes from the west at a nice trickling pace and I immediately began to imagine boat races with Kai from first, boats as represented by leaves, sticks, or blades of grass, and then growing up to build our own boats to take down to the waters to race.
After my mind settled back into the present and I looked once again toward the pond, I could see three large white birds resting in the middle of the pond.  "Swans?" I thought.  But after watching them further, they did not have the grace of a swan in movement or in build.  Kai and I hurried closer and when I was close enough to recognize them my jaw dropped in awe: "Pelicans!"  Three American White Pelicans!  As Kai and I circled the pond it turned out there was another group of 5 on the other side of two small grassy islands on the north side of the pond.  I was and still am completely stunned.  Though I knew that Pelicans came through Colorado, I had no idea that some would actually roost in Denver.  After all, migration season is over so what other reason do they have to be here?  Furthermore, I was astonished to see them chowing down on what seemed like loads of fish.  My pessimistic view of Denver ecology was beginning to take a brighter turn.  
This being my first time seeing American White Pelicans, I was fascinated by their behavior.  Never did the pelicans stray from their respective group.  The threesome and the fivesome would swim altogether, nearly shoulder to shoulder and then would dive their great long necks with massive triangular heads down into the water near simultaneously.  Then as each of them caught their fish they would raise back up with beaks open, shaking the fish down from their beaks' flopping jowls (throat sacs I guess is what they are called) down into their throats.  Apparently, as I confirmed with my Sibley Field Guide to Birds, they hunt cooperatively, chasing fish to one another.  
As exciting as the pelicans were, they were not the only exciting presence at the pond.  Aside from the usual suspects of Red-winged Blackbirds, Canada Geese, Green-Winged Teals,  crows, cowbirds, and swallows, were Snowy Egrets, sandpipers, Double crested Cormorants, and one little fellow I could not identify.  It had a similar body structure to a sandpiper, but considerably bigger with a white underbelly, black chevron-like markings on its back and wings, and a gorgeous cinnamon neck and head.  Lastly, both its legs and bill were incredibly long with the bill being slightly upturned.  This little guy liked to wander through the mud poking in its bill here and there in search of something to eat.  This little mystery was the American Avocet.  
Since that first exciting morning, I've been back a few times with Kai or Linda or both and all our new favorite characters (and yesterday we even saw a couple Killdeer) are always there, except the pelicans seem to be a bit more particular about when they come out.  This morning Kai and went again and I actually had my camera this time to snap some shots.  Here are a few of the best we got.

Our little friend the American Avocet

Here you can the egrets, teals, and pelicans.

Can you make out the two cormorants amidst the geese?  You can see the avocet and egrets too.

Pelicans!

How to Make Your Kid a Writer

I found this post linked from Ta-Nehisi Coates' blog, and I absolutely love it.  You can click on the link too see the whole thing, but I've pasted an excerpt below.  When reading it, I had the same reaction that Coates apparently had: this is not just great advice on becoming a writer, but great advice in parenting.  

First of all, let her be bored. Let her have long afternoons with absolutely nothing to do. Limit her TV-watching time and her internet-playing time and take away her cell phone. Give her a whole summer of lazy mornings and dreamy afternoons. Make sure she has a library card and a comfy corner where she can curl up with a book. Give her a notebook and five bucks so she can pick out a great pen. Insist she spend time with the family. It’s even better if this time is spent in another state, a cabin in the woods, a cottage on the lake, far from her friends and people her own age. Give her some tedious chores to do. Make her mow the lawn, do the dishes by hand, paint the garage. Make her go on long walks with you and tell her you just want to listen to the sounds of the neighborhood.

Let her be lonely. Let her believe that no one in the world truly understands her. Give her the freedom to fall in love with the wrong person, to lose her heart, to have it smashed and abused and broken. Occasionally be too busy to listen, be distracted by other things, have your nose in a great book, be gone with your own friends.

Let her have secrets. Let her have her own folder on the family computer. Avoid the temptation to read through her notebooks. Writing should be her safe haven, her place to experiment, her place to work through her confusion and feelings and thoughts. If she does share her writing with you, be supportive of her hard work and the journey she’s on. Ask her questions about her craft and her process. Ask her what was hardest about this piece and what she’s most proud of. Don’t mention publication unless she mentions it first. Remember that writing itself is the reward.

Let her get a job. Let her work long hours for crappy pay with a mean employer and rude customers. If she wants to be a writer, she’ll have to be comfortable with hard work and low pay. Let her spend her own money on books and lattes – they’ll be even sweeter when she’s worked hard for them.

Let her fail. Let her write pages and pages of painful poetry and terrible prose. Let her write painfully bad fan fiction. Don’t freak out when she shows you stories about Bella Swan making out with Draco Malfoy. Never take her writing personally or assume it has anything to do with you, even if she only writes stories about dead mothers and orphans.

Let her go without writing if she wants to. Never nag her about writing, even if she’s cheerful when writing and completely unbearable when she’s not. Let her quit writing altogether if she wants to.

Let her make mistakes.

It comes, as usual, with good timing after taking a very long walk with Kai yesterday.  We walked all the way to the Platte River, which took us about 30 minutes each way.  To get there we pass through our little neighborhood with houses and families like ours: barking dogs, giggling children, sparrows chirping in the hedges, and the smell of hot summer pavement, the dairy factory to the north, and flowers in bloom.  Afterwards we pass through some Section 8 housing projects leading to Bar-Val-Wood park with adults playing baseball, kids playing basketball, older siblings watching baby siblings, warm pine pitch wafting in the breeze, cottonwoods letting go their fluffy flowers, and the subtle scent of car exhaust and industrial production.  
After passing through the park, there remains a kind of five block dead zone between it and the Platte River: nothing to shade us, no providers of fresh air, just lot after lot of this or that industry.  Yesterday, we passed by mechanic's shops smelling of engine oil, grease, gasoline, rust, and cement.  We saw sparks flying from a metalworking shop soon to close its doors and move elsewhere -- a warehouse cutting and polishing granite.


All of these sights, sounds, and smells made me wonder what will be the sensory triggers for Kai's memories?  Will the slight hint of cinnamon and cream remind him, not of a cinnamon roll, but of the Robinson Dairy factory at 7th Avenue next to the Platte?  When I hear fireworks and think of the Dewey cabin in Idaho, will he be thinking about this neighborhood and their zeal for explosives?  What will be the lasting sensations in his own personal life story?

"Favorite Things To Do With Kai" List

As Kai gets bigger and bigger, my list of things to do with him gradually grows.  Nevertheless, just because it is on the list does not mean he will not object.  Kai’s likes do not extend far beyond mom’s breasts, being held, having a clean diaper, and sleeping.  Our favorite things list are really just things I like to do with him that he will at least tolerate.  Now that he is smiling more I am getting a better gauge over the preferences of my little audience.

1.    Read poems and nursery rhymes.  Favorites include Night and Cradle Song  by William Blake, My Bed is a Boat by Robert Louis Stevenson, Lullaby by Tennyson, and Wynken, Blynken, and Nod by Eugene Field.  Sometimes I make up a tune for the lullabies, other times they are just read.

2.    Play guitar with Kai in sling.  After imagining for years having a son to sing it to or with, I sang “Father and Song” by Cat Stevens for the first time to Kai.  It was really magical.  Linda was in the bedroom falling asleep with a smile.

3.    Looking into each other’s eyes.  He has these moments throughout the day when he is just taking in the world.  And his eyes are so clear, so free of judgment, unclouded, and open--wondrously open.  So open his mouth is open—in the shape of an “O”—and he longs to take the world in so much that sometimes he sticks out his tongue like he is trying to taste it!

4.    Me burping him, him on top of the world!  Sometimes I am not really burping him anymore as much as patting him—a rhythmic reminder of me while he is up there, craning his neck to see what normally his tall daddy sees.  I can’t see what he sees when he’s looking over my shoulder behind me, but I like to think that he’s got my back.   

5.    Taking walks!  As a family we went on our first walk about a week ago and our first hike just a few days ago.  Kai and I have been have some father-son walks together as well.  It’s a nice way to bond and give mom a little bit of her own space for a short while.  The other day we took an all family walk with Kai in the sling, and as we passed a young teenager he had a double take, stopped, wheeled around and said "Is that a kid in there?", to which we affirmed.  His reaction was excellent: "Whoa!  That's trippy!"


Here's a video of us taking our first hike:

Deja Vu?

The other day Linda and I were sitting on the couch with Kai laying on Linda's chest, his head on her heart, facing the window, facing away from me.  He was sleeping, deep sleeping with his torso rising and falling with each big little breath wearing a red onesie.  I put my hand on his warm back and gently began to rub it up and down with long (as long as a tiny baby's torso can be) strokes.  Suddenly my eyes dashed back into my head with the entire world expanding beyond my normal vision.  A certain taste found itself in the back of my mouth and my mouth soon began to water.  
Reading Swann's Way right now I cannot help but think of the famous scene of Proust and the petites madeleines, which upon tasting it, he is overcome by an onslaught of feelings: 

"[it] had immediately rendered the vicissitudes of life unimportant to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory, acting in the same way that love acts, by filling me with a precious essence: or rather this essence was not merely inside me, it was me.  I had ceased to feel mediocre, contingent, mortal.  Where could it have come to me from--this powerful joy?"  

Unfortunately, unlike Proust, I could not trace this feeling back to a source.  Was I remembering myself as a child, seeing me in my baby boy?  Or was it a visceral feeling of fatherhood?  Either way, two feelings predominated above the rest: Love and Truth.  Love for my son, for all that he is, has been, and will be--a love that, as Proust relates, transcends mortality.  And truth for the unmistakable reality of this moment and the conviction of my own feelings.

Party Time

If we celebrate the 4th of July every year like we did this year, Kai might start to think he has two birthdays.  Yesterday my parents threw a party for everyone to come and see Kai and party.  Minutes, indeed hours passed of Kai being passed round and round from one person to the next.  Friends and family hovered intently around him to ensure that there would be no Bogarting the baby.  In the month since Kai was born I have never been around him so long without holding him (save for when a diaper needed to be changed.  No one seemed interested in that duty).  A couple of times I would panic with the thought of "Where is Kai?!" feeling the strangeness of his absence from my arms.  My wide eyes would then settle on a friend with Kai sweetly resting his head in the crook of their arm.

Judging by the cake, you might think our son is Uncle Sam, but I guess that's the kind of cake they're expecting you want on the 4th of July.

Scary huh?  You can't see it but we (my dad and I) are both wearing khaki shorts too!  It is one of those moments where find out just how strong heredity can be.  We'll see how far from the tree Kai will fall.

Kai Liang...

Kai Liang.  Just the sound of his name sends a jolt of love through my chest as if something gently tugged at my ribs from without, like a child yanking at the strings of a kite before the wind sends it soaring into the air—dancing. 

Welcome!

The birth of my first child, Kai Liang, has brought upon an irresistible desire for me to share him--and a bit of myself as it relates to him--with the world.  I could not bring myself to join Facebook, so a blog it is!  He is the inspiration though not necessarily always the subject.

The title of the blog comes from a dream I had the night Linda (my wife) and I found out she was pregnant.  I awoke the next morning, turned to Linda and said "I dreamed its name was Crimson Light!"  Unfortunately, a blog (which made one post in 2002 and that is it!) already had the name, so I looked at the etymology of "crimson" for other ideas and found "kermes."  Interestingly, both crimson and vermillion derive from a genus of insects (kermes) whose dried bodies were used to make red dye.  Anyway, a bit of a tangent.

Welcome!