I went to see my good friend Caroline last week. This is not Caroline, this is her daughter Gracie. Gracie is around 9 weeks old. Caroline told Gracie that I was Uncle Joel and I felt myself instantly age.
I wasn't there for very long, but Caroline did let me hold Gracie temporarily, perching her over my shoulder. I experienced fear. Now you might attribute this to the standard not-a-father male instinct (baby? what do I do with this? are there switches or buttons? where the hell is the manual?), but the truth was that I was weighing up the fact that babies do a lot of vomiting.
"You're a good baby, aren't you? You won't vomit on my sweater from Next will you?"
When Caroline took Gracie back to feed her, there was a palpable sense of relief.