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Imagine the following as a photograph.

Baby J and I are in a beautiful, immaculate house before a party. We are the first to arrive. We are sitting on the floor while Baby J plays with a plastic truck belonging to the party's host, D. All is calm, all is bright -- as it were. In the photograph, you can't hear the peaceful Christmas music playing over the speakers, but it is there in the background. I think its inclusion adds ambiance. Behind us, it is possible to see the fog still wavering over the pool beyond the steps.

We are having fun.

Imagine the next as a video, maybe shot in the style of that police drama from when I was in high school (NYPD Blue? The one that was famous for the choppy camera work.)

Suddenly, there are nine children under two, in addition to seven mothers, counting me. There's noise and laughter and color. Suddenly, there seem to be seventeen thousand toys, all of them in motion. We're all talking and greeting and discussing. The lights on the Christmas tree seem to be blinking in acknowledgement of the picked-up pace. I'm having fun -- I like these people and their children, and the party is fantastic with good people, good food, and lots of excitement.

But now Baby J doesn't know what to do. Other children are moving all around him. He can't focus on the truck, and when he does, other children want to play with it too. Eventually, he sits on the floor and starts to cry, so I pick up him and hold him -- we do our baby-as-outfit-accessory routine -- and all is fine.

Except for the lingering thoughts that creep in as the fog creeps out on the drive back home.

I've improved a lot over the years, but I've never really been a life-of-the-party type person. Which is not to say that I don't want to be; it's just that it's not in my nature. I have difficulty making small talk (even though I like having conversations with people) and sometimes I sort of space out and just watch people and listen to what they're saying, which, of course, is completely fun for them. And then, other times, I talk too much, too... I guess there are no absolutes in this description.

But this isn't really about me -- it's about Baby J. And, watching him at the party, I began to wonder whether my personality flaws are, in fact, actually genetic. Is he going to be the one who stands around awkwardly waiting to talk to people but unable to open sets, a la The Pick-Up Artist? (That's a bad example -- one thing I wish for my son is a complete dissimilarity with the contestants on reality television, no matter how often I watch it.)

Is he going to be able to socialize with the other children as he grows up?

It might just be that he needs to warm up a bit -- nine small children is daunting even to the most seasoned baby socialite. And, as SC suggested, it might be that he's an only child as of yet. He's not used to the constant noise, motion, and sharing implicit in a life that began and continues in the company of siblings.

Both Freckles and I were pretty shy as children. I probably still secretly am, to a certain extent, but I read somewhere that shyness is a form of being conceited, so I try not to advertise it anymore. (Narcissism is more attractive when partially hidden, after all.)

I just want Baby J to be able to enjoy being around other children. I don't want him to grow up with any problems or issues whatsoever and I don't want other children to make fun of him.

Actually, sometimes I sit and look at him sleeping peacefully and am physically frightened to send him out into the world on his own -- even though I know that I have to someday, even though I know that the greater cruelty would be to shield him completely from the outside world, even though I knew this all going in.

Sometimes I think that's the problem, that we would all be happier just bumbling around oblivious to our own existence.

I concede that this would also be ridiculously boring.