2:44 a.m.

Sam woke up late, early this morning. Sometimes he's been sleeping through the night lately, but not usually. Not yet. He usually wakes up around 1:30 a.m. and demands a little food to help him back to sleep. Tonight he woke up an hour later than that. I grabbed a bottle, went into his room, and switched on the dim closet lamp, like usual. He was up on all fours in his crib, as he sometimes is these days, looking like he might crawl but not quite doing it. He looked at me with some confusion, his eyes not yet used to the light. I said, "Hi, Sam," like I always do, day or night. He said nothing.

I picked him up and brought him over to our chair, positioned him on the boppy and started to feed him. Before very long, he was dozing off again, using my left bicep as his pillow. He does this all the time. Tonight, though, he started grinning, as his eyes darted into REM sleep behind his eyelids. Little grins, brief grins, then slightly longer. Then a big, wide smile — not quite his huge, gigantic, explosive smile, but a very big one with his mouth open. Once that subsided, more grins.

What do you dream about, Sam? Are you chattering away with your baby friends? Eating your Stage 2 carrots while Mama cheers you on? Dancing away while Papa sings to you? Horsing around with your grandparents? Are you, in fact, back in the womb? Or do you, like Fezzik, dream of large women?