I went to bed with a bit of a knot in my stomach last night after watching a particularly frightening episode of one of my favorite television shows. In the last two minutes of the episode, someone who was killed in the last season SHOT OUT OF THE WATER and grabbed the hand of someone on a boat, which turned me into a nervous wreck who may or may not have stabbed a pile of laundry with a pair of scissors because it was dark and the laundry looked suspicious.

Anyway, I was expecting to have terrible dreams involving murder or stabbing or giant piles of dirty laundry. Instead, in my nightmare, my mother replaced my toothbrush with one of those free ones from the dentist, and she didn't care that the bristles were hurting my gums.

The chocolate syrup furrowed its brows with great determination and hurled itself out of the refrigerator as I reached for the milk. My free hand automatically shot out to protect this nectar of the gods from falling to the floor. "Gandalf! Noooo!" I cradled the bottle in my arm and looked at the familiar Hershey's label with fondness. "Okay, then, little buddy," I said. "Chocolate milk it is."

Somehow, my family came to own a giant chest filled with dress-up clothes. The chest sat in the basement, where my brother and I would play during the summers when it was too hot to go outside. One dress in particular reminded me of the country and the prairie, so I'd often put it on and imagine myself as Laura Ingalls Wilder or someone from that era. Occasionally, I would place a white, silk dress shirt on the punching bag that hung from the basement ceiling, pulling on the sleeves to create a makeshift dance partner.

The chest smelled unlike anything else in the house. It smelled of adventure and mystery and, once in a great while, like Grandma's house.