title title title in Book Title.

I have been thinking about my kids a lot. I imagine them grown and what they'll be like. That leads me into some weirder side thoughts about my own parents projecting me into an adult personality but that's not the point. I worry about the relationships I keep around them. I'm happily married. But I don't have parents or extended family. I'm not much. I'm not enough for a kid. They need this whole world of extended families and cousins and grandparents to round out this perfect version of childhood with backyard barbecues and big birthday bashes. I'm just one person and I hate my fucking in-laws. We live twenty hours away from them. Since the move, I don't even have close friends. I've only known people for a couple of years. I'm busy, anyway.

I'm not sure what I'm trying to say. Or I'm not sure how any of that relates to it. The point is this- I saw my little son waking my husband this morning. My husband reacted instinctively by drawing the boy close to him in a snuggle hug. It was cute. I've been thinking about the vasectomy lately, about never being pregnant again, about the big, bright eyed infants I see around town, and it always reminds me of a line from the movie The Fly: It's the flesh. We crave the flesh.

I read a news story or something about elderly people craving touch. When you're older and you live alone, no one touches you anymore. And you begin to really appreciate a person who makes you feel good physically. I don't mean sexually, of course. I read a story about a young woman who gave her elderly grandmother shoulder massages.

I was thinking about myself, and my own craving for touch. I was thinking about David Byrne growling "Watch out, touch monkeys."

When you're an infant, if yer parents are worth a shit, you get a lot of flesh to flesh contact all the time. They teach you that in parenting books and classes. This is how we learn trust. This is how we bond. This is how we normalize to sensation. We start with the flesh. And if you're breastfed, this is especially true. You learn to trust the flesh. You crave the flesh. I sound like a cannibal but you know that's not what I mean. And as you age, you crave your own independence. Then puberty strikes and its back to the flesh. Your passion for flesh is reawakened.

I'm getting too busy to finish this thought proper but I was thinking about getting married. And having children. And how this continues to fulfill and perpetuate our craving for more flesh.

And my husband pulling our son in for a snuggle this morning got me thinking about it. Probably anybody who studies psychology or whatever has reached this conclusion more thoroughly than I can and I'd be interested if you know something about it, too.