You Kiss Your Mother With That Mouth?

INT. JAKE'S LIVING ROOM - DAY (1950)

JAKE (to Joey)
What's that kissing on the mouth shit?

JOEY
What? I just said Hello. Since when can't I kiss my sister-in-law?

JAKE
Ain't a cheek ever good enough for you? I never even kissed Mama on the mouth.

JOEY
Well, you're not supposed to kiss your mother on the mouth.

JAKE
Well, that's what I mean.

This exchange, between Jake and Joey LaMotta, occurs around 3/4 of the way through the screenplay of 1980's Raging Bull. Afterward, LaMotta smacks around his wife and goes on to beat his brother into unconsciousness.

In 1980, this made perfect sense to me.

The kissing part, not the beating part.

I did not grow up in a family of mouth kissers. There were plenty of hugs and kisses, but the kisses were always on the cheek, which seemed right. A kiss on the lips seemed far too intimate for family.

And that's the way it was for many years. Until I had a baby of my own.

And everything changed.

After I saw that perfect little baby and held her in my arms, felt her warmth and life, heard the little squeaks and sighs she made as she squirmed around in her sleep, I just had to kiss her perfect little baby lips. Kissing her lips felt, in some way, more protective. Like it would keep her safer somehow. And she would know that Daddy was there to take care of her.

I figured when we got her home from the hospital and the new kid novelty wore off that I'd stop doing it. But I didn't. It felt perfectly natural, and come on, when it's your kids, they're irresistible. And those sloppy, slobbery, spitty kisses you get back are great. My wife also did it right from the beginning. My mother thought it was weird at first... now she kisses the kids on the mouth too.

Friends of ours have two boys, and their mother recently remarked to me that though she would miss it terribly, she was going to have to stop giving her boys the big smooches on the mouth she calls "movie star kisses".

So I know it's not just me.

Not every kiss is a lip kiss. There's plenty of cheek kisses too. Oedipus and Electra aside though, I know that just as our friend will kibosh the movie star busses, eventually I will have to stop kissing my kids on the lips. I've already pretty much stopped with my older one. But no matter how old my girls become, when I look at them part of me will always see them as those sweet, innocent bundles I carried home so gently and carefully from the hospital.

They will always be my baby girls.

So, did you kiss your mother on the mouth?

And do your kids kiss you on yours?