Due to one reason or another, the kids took overly long naps the other day. This seems like a good thing, but it’s not. It always leads to a very difficult bedtime.

This time was no exception.

C simply wasn’t sleepy. After being put to bed, he kept re-emerging with new reasons why he had to stay up. On his fourth such attempt, he finally got creative.

He poked his head out of the door of his bedroom. “Daddy?”

I’m afraid I responded with my “daddy’s about to snap” voice: “GO BACK TO BED!”

“No, no, no. I just wanted to tell you that N wants to talk to you.”

This caught me by surprise. “Huh? Okay.”

I got up and walked over to their room. On the way, I could hear whispering over the monitor. Naturally, I stopped to do some eavesdropping. Here’s what I heard, all in strained whispers. Recall that C (who is 4) shares a room with his little brother (who is 2)

“Quick, wake up. Wake up! Quick!”
“Huh, what? What?”
“Daddy wants to talk to you?”
“Huh?”
“About your mean dream. Daddy wants to talk to you.”

At this point, I figured out what was going on and ran to the room, hoping to catch the little miscreant in the act. Unfortunately, he was in bed when I got there.

His little brother was standing up in his bed, “Daddy? I had a mean dream.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. It was about a ghost.” He held his hands out dramatically.

I was trapped. I sat down and listened to his dramatic telling of his dream about a ghost – and tried to ignore the muffled giggling coming from C’s bed.