“I’ve been thinking, Dad,” Gideon broke the silence in the car.

It was just the two of us and he had been quiet for some time now. He didn’t have to tell me he was thinking, it was obvious ever since we left the driveway. I was just patiently waiting for the moment when he was ready to share. It had been a long day and we were on our way to pick up Thai food take-out too late in the evening because no one was in the mood to cook and I could barely break away from the report I had been working on to even drive to the restaurant with him before diving back into it. So, silence and the outside world were a gift. Silence, the outside world, and whatever thoughts were bubbling through my son’s curly little head.

“What have you been thinking?” I asked casually, encouraging him to continue.

“Well, okay, I was thinking about what you told me once about hiccups, and about how no one really knows for sure why we get hiccups.”

“Right, kinda,” I glanced at him and then back at the road.

“I saw the other day at church that Lydia’s friend Sadie gets hiccups when she laughs, and she really really likes to laugh a lot. And it made me think about when I get hiccups, which is when I eat candy and play video games.”

I watched him out the corner of my eye as he touched his fingers absently and drew his conclusion.

“So, I think maybe people get hiccups when they do things that they really really love to do.”

“Wow, that’s a really interesting theory, Gideon. I really like that idea.”

“Yeah,” he said, almost dismissively, he clearly had more to share about his hypothesis. “Anyway, I also noticed that I have hardly ever seen YOU have hiccups. And I think that makes sense because you work all the time.”

The car was quiet again.

“And I don’t like working?”

He looked at me sideways as if to make sure I wasn’t angry. “No,” he cleared his narrow throat. “And so you never get hiccups.”

The road whispered something up at us.

“That’s a very well-thought-out conclusion,” I told him finally. “I like how you pieced that all together.”

He smiled but tried to hide it by looking out the window and acting very serious.

“But, I’m afraid I found a flaw in your theory, little man.”

He frowned slightly. “What?”

I reached over and took his hand. “If we get hiccups when we are doing things that we really really love to do, then why don’t I have hiccups right now?”

He grinned and bobbed his head in thought. “Yeah… Hmm…” the little scientist turned again to look out the window. “I’ll have to think about that,” and he silently squeezed my hand.