The Sullivan Rainbabies

There are few more cherished memories in my heart than those of my mother reading to my siblings and me early every evening before bed. In the security of our modest but bright bedrooms on one of our twin beds, our freshly scrubbed and jammied bodies tightly framed my mother as she read with perfect accents and sound effects to our squeals of delight. Our hands and fingers draped around Mommy, as if simply touching her made the stories more real. It was a scene of affection, closeness and imagination that served as the threshold of my whimsical childhood dreams every night. 

Reflecting on this scene, one children’s book stands out in my mind as accurately encompassing the tender closeness, warmth, and love that I felt as a child: The Rainbabies by Laura Krauss Melmed. In the story, an aged man and wife long together for a child of their own. One night, in the middle of a beautiful moon shower, the couple finds twelve tiny babies, each the size of a finger, hidden in the grass. They rejoice and care for the little babies in the midst of many terrible dangers until a stranger arrives and offers to buy the dozen babies for immeasurable riches. When the couple refuses the offer, the stranger turns into a fairy of sorts and reveals herself as the true mother of the Rainbabies. In return for their integrity and love, she rewards the old couple with a child of their own. 

I distinctly remember staring intently at the beautiful paintings that accompany the tale while listening to my mother’s voice. I physically felt, saw, and heard the principles that provided so much security in my youth and continue to do so today: parents should want their children and parents should love their children. The Rainbabies endures as a symbol of pure, authentic love in my own life, and the little babes themselves in the care of their beloved adoptive parents, clinging to the their hands and safely nuzzled in their arms, linger in my thoughts as the image of my own dear childhood.