My baby likes to cuddle. She will crawl up to me, pull herself up to my knees, and when I scoop her up into one arm she will snuggle in beautifully against my side. It feels good. She is warm and clingy and she smells nice.

Oh, and she likes to stay there for really long periods of time.

If I have a computer or a book handy, I can read or even peck out brief responses to people – occasional emails or blog comments. But sometimes she demands more – she wriggles, or is distracted, and the cuddling takes over. The laptop gets ignored, the book gets laid down. My job, as she sees it, is entirely to be cuddled. Who can argue with that? Cuddles are nice. It’s not a hardship.

Today, the book that did not get read because of the firm and polite (and snuggly) demands of the baby was “How to Suppress Women’s Writing,” by Joanna Russ.

There’s a metaphor in that somewhere.

Tags: jem, joanna russ