Ironically, recent comments on this blog have been oriented towards babies and their extreme cuteness AND this past Thursday, my aunt gave birth to a beautiful sweet little baby named Nikhil. Despite popular opinion that most babies appear slightly extraterrestrial after birth, he was simply adorable. I have no way of fully articulating how happy I am for her and how I can’t wait to see this little baby grow up, but it is overwhelmingly exciting.

As most of you know, I love babies/kiddos/little people for a few key reasons:

1) I am fascinated by embryology. I think it’s absolutely amazing how a couple cells dividing in synchrony can find their way into becoming a human being as we know it. For anyone that is interested in how things work or how they are formed, I think embryology is ultimately the most applicable and basic field of study.

2) The ‘blank slate’ that is a baby – I like how you can see what sort of personality the baby tends to have free of any influences. What their key tendencies are. What will make them smile, laugh and cry. How babies still exhibit eye saccades
(my professor tested this on his baby by holding him up and rotating him, but I restrained myself from doing this to little baby Nikhil. That’s willpower.) How cooling will stimulate a baby to breathe, an adaptive response resulting from the need to take a first breath at birth. Ah, it’s all so exciting.

3) They are just so CUTE! Cute, cute, cute. I met someone recently who told me that she volunteers at Sick Kids Hospital, and she basically just has to hold babies for a few hours each day. How cute would that be.

On another note, JUST to clarify, fish are not substitutes for babies, although my fishie (Blueberry) is pretty damn cute.