Baby Feet

Tonight after bath, I sat my towel-swaddled son my lap like in the old days and he stuck his thumb in his mouth and snuggled in to my chest.  He's done this since he was a baby.  My little baby.  I smelled the top of his head, the way I did when he was my little baby.  Little.  Baby.  No.  More.

His feet are suddenly big kid feet.  I remember being so scared of cutting his nails for fear of catching his tender skin.  Now his feet are gnarly almost-kindergarten feet with black dirt under the nails.  I see his feet every day, but for some reason tonight, I was shocked by the size his toes, the length of his foot, how it now takes two snips of the clipper to get each nail.  

One of my clearest childhood memories was when my mom would sometimes come sit on the bottom bunk next to me and hug me or rub my back in the dark as my sister and I were falling asleep.  She'd whisper something about how I'd always be her baby (I was the younger sister).  I do this now to Abe.  I can't help myself.  No matter how gnarly those feet get, they're still the baby's feet.