We were recently at a multi-day wedding that was attended by many kids. On the third day of the wedding, a 4 year old boy arrives and immediately starts running and jumping everywhere as young boys tend to do. About five minutes later, he spots our baby Uma playing less rambunctiously in a different area of the property and runs over to her. At first, he stands by and watches her from a few feet away. Then he decides to stand within one foot of her, following her wherever she went. Meanwhile, his mother is frantically trying to simultaneously manage him and his even more wild 2 year old brother who is running all over the place. She yells out, "Give her space!" to her 4 year old son, who by now is like Uma's shadow. While trying to corral the younger brother, she yells out to us that he loves babies as an explanation for his fixation on Uma. The boy then leans down and whispers something in Uma's year, to which she responds with an emphatic, "NO!" The boy is visibly dejected and walks away deflated.

About ten minutes later, he's back. This time Uma is sitting on a step next to her mom. The boy again leans down and whispers something in Uma's ear, except this time Asha heard what he said.

"Can I have a hug?" he whispered.

Before she can respond, Asha translates into Gujarati and replaces the word hug, with 'huggy' which is the word we use with Uma for 'hug'. Uma replies with an, "Mmm-hmmm," and then stands up to give the boy a hug. Immediately afterwards, he says, "Yessss!" followed by a triumphant little arm gesture, and then runs off satisfied, never to return for the rest of the wedding :-)

We speak to our daughter in Gujarati so she learns the language of her biological family. Her nanny talks to her exclusively in Spanish. And she frequently hears us speaking to each other and guests in English. While she basically understands all three languages, it took us a minute to realize that she didn't understand the word 'hug' was the same thing as 'huggy'. And what power a hug from a baby can have! My experience is that hugs from my daughter me give me a visceral memory that lasts for hours. Our friends have also mentioned similar responses to hugs from Uma, with the visceral memory effect lasting for much longer in some cases.

My suspicion is that hugs from babies are powerful because they are so pure, free from anything but the feeling of affection and the intention to connect.

May we all give and receive hugs like babies!