Sitting in the hallway

As a kid I can remember sneaking in and out of my brother's bedroom after we'd been put to bed, as if I was on a secret mission to stay up just a little bit longer. Our rooms were in the attic of a Cape so it wasn't far to get from room to room. Sometimes we'd hide under the sheet on his bed like it was a tent and pretend we were camping. Or, we'd just whisper about what we did that day, or planned to do the next day...but I also remember that shout up from the bottom of the stairs "Get back to your room" and if I pushed it too far on any given night, Dad would be sitting at the top of the stairs waiting for me to cross over from my brother's room back into mine...and getting caught was never good!

Payback is a bitch. My son is incapable of staying in his room after our nightly routine of pajamas, teeth brushing, glass of water, pee and hugs and kisses. He insists on sneaking out to the bathroom to lather himself in lotion, or cover himself in baby powder. He'll move swiftly into his sister's room to open her purple nail polish on her rug or steal her toys or her jewelry. He scared the crap out of me last night as I was plucking my eyebrows in the bathroom to declare, "I had a bad dream", when I know for a fact he wasn't asleep long enough to have even a good dream.

So, there I sit. At the top of the stairs. Listening to him cluck like a chicken, run his feet up and down the wall, flip from one end of the bed to other, mumble a word or two, before finally drifting off to sleep. It's true what comes around goes around - sorry Dad. I should have stayed in my room. Sitting in the hallway in the dark is boring!