Care to Cuddle?

     Someone forgot to teach Joshua how to cuddle.  Don't get me wrong, he loves to give hugs and he likes to be held.  But cuddling is something he just doesn't do.  Liam will melt into you while watching TV.  He's like a stringbean growing up a fence, wrapping his skinny arms and legs around yours.  Not so much for Joshua.  Instead of nuzzling his cheek against ours, he prefers to headbutt our chins.  Really, he pushes his skull up into my chin as I read him a story, so much that it is sometimes hard to open my mouth to read the story. 
     Rocking Joshua isn't so cuddly either.  He insists on facing out, perhaps because it gives him better leverage as he pushes up that head of his.  I remember Liam used to lie on my chest, with his head on my shoulder.  True, I may be idealizing Liam's cuddling and surely I'm forgetting that I used to spend hours in his room rocking and rocking and rocking him just to get him to sleep (that was back when I had time to rock a baby to sleep).  Thinking back, Liam has always been more of a cuddler.  So many mornings we woke up with him sleeping between us.  We just fell asleep that way after the 2 am feeding.  Again, I'm sure to be idealizing and forgetting the fact that he was kicking us and stealing our pillows.  But Joshua just never caught on to sleeping in the bed- whether we wanted him to or not.  On nights that Joshua ended up falling asleep in our bed, we would wake up to find him perpendicular to us- with his toes sticking into Bill's nose and that head pushing into my back.
     Joshua always has plenty of excuses why not to cuddle.  He wants that book read, to see the ducks at the park and to keep an eye out for an incoming brother.  He can't be bothered to sit down when there's jumping to do back and forth across the room or running from one end of the hallway to the other.  His hands are too full with cars or plastic farm animals (or this time of year, Easter eggs).  Or, his favorite excuse, he would much rather run away from you than cuddle.
     No, Joshua doesn't cuddle... but he does give hugs.  He will hug friends, family and sometimes even strangers and he always does so with a big smile.  You get that smile right before he dives in for his hug.  It's like his way of saying, "No, I won't cuddle with you but for this one short minute you can keep me all to yourself.... until I squirm away."