Touchy

The cast of my play contains one of the world's nicest man. Like most of the world's nicest men, he is happily partnered; his wife is also lovely. Most enchanting by far, however, is their 18 week old son, whom I have been longing to meet and finally did today after the afternoon run. I know it is asking a lot to encourage all my friends to come and sit through a 200 minute-long incomprehensible play in which I do little more than walk on and walk off again. It was beyond the call of duty for them not only to do so, but to patiently wait in the foyer afterwards while I spent twenty minutes scraping panstick out of the ravaged remains of my facial skin. It was therefore indefensible that when at last I emerged I all but dived past them in my eagerness to meet Oscar, who had not bought a ticket, not sat through the play and not hung around to offer me kind, ill-deserved and dearly welcome congratulations on my nugatory performance.
But oh, this baby. He is delightful. You may refer to my previous post about my chum's puppy if you doubt my capacity for infant-induced hysteria, which is considerable. However, the paticular effect of meeting Oscar and stroking his downy baby face was to make me reflect on the compelling thing that is the human need for touching. I have always had a very tactile life: half my family is Welsh, and there is no stopping them from hugging one another constantly. I have for many years lived close to numerous dear friends with whom sharing physical affection is as regular as breathing, and I am not normally short of a chap or two. I suppose moving to a foreign country has various dislocating effects, but none of them has affected me with anything like the power exerted by the sudden radical diminution of physical contact. It's simply not natural to go untouched. On Friday I was shattered and needed a nap, and realised after an hour's procrastination that my reluctance to go home to bed was anticipation of the desolate feeling induced by having no one - not parent, spouse, sibling, friend, lover or child - to cuddle up to. Quite apart from the noted panacaea that is the Babycuddle, what is the point in general of a warm bed without a warm body in it?
Luckily I am blessed over here with the kind of first-rate friends who not only sympathise with this tragedy and compensate me with great big full-body hugs, but also sit through my boring play, listen with patience to my endless nonsense, keep my secrets, calm my worries, and ring to check I'm okay when I sleep though classes. I do not deserve them, and charming as Oscar is, I was secretly far, far more touched and pleased to see them in the foyer after the play than I could ever have been by even the sweetest and peachiest of baby boys.