My baby has been in quarantine his whole life, and I’m panicked he will be developmentally stunted. There are so many experiences and enriching activities he’s already missing out on.
He is missing out on going to the playground, where he should be tasting a dirty pile of sand while defecating in a diaper.
He is missing out on music class, where he should be drooling on a bunch of mats to the gentle strums of a ukulele Jason Mraz cover that is ever-so-slightly quieter than the cries of three other babies in the room.
He is missing out on baby yoga class, where he naps in his stroller near a bunch of babies who don’t even come remotely close to doing yoga, as babies simply cannot do yoga or follow directions as a group.
He is missing out on our cherished library’s story hour, where he should be contracting hand, foot, and mouth disease while chewing on the corners of Hippos Go Berserk.
He is missing out on exposure to culturally significant museum visits, where he should be throwing my car keys at a Bauhaus sculpture and spitting up into the crevices of his stroller while his screams for puffs echo through the Modernist wing.
He is missing out on experiencing new flavor profiles at interesting restaurants, where he should be squeezing his applesauce pouch all over himself while we wait another thirty minutes to hear if they can re-steam his plain carrots so they are mushier.
Most of all, my dear son is missing out on the excitement of air travel. I don’t know what kind of a person he will become without knowing the struggles of napping in a new time zone, diaper changes in a straightjacket-sized airplane lavatory, and the feeling of his ears popping on descent while a 26-year-old consultant stares at him as though he was the Antichrist.
Let’s hope there’s a brighter and more enriching future right around the corner for my poor, deprived quarantine baby.