A BED-time Story

As I was trying to fall asleep last night, I got to thinking about, well my bed(s). From the length of this story you will see it took several hours for sleep to actually come.

I guess you can say I have a love/hate relationship with my bed(s). I must have really loved my crib, because I actually remember getting my first bed (that puts me at minimum 4-5 years old??) I recall being in the back of my parents van, laying with my two brothers under the mattress that was propped up on top of us – like the coolest fort ever. My first bed was a double. Yep, that’s kind of how I do things in life – from crib too long to double bed. No in-between stages for me.

I proceeded to fall out of that bed for several years. I can remember my Dad running in to pick me up, sometimes still asleep – but just awake enough to remember him gently placing me back into the MIDDLE of the bed.

I have always been the kind of person who makes their bed the minute they get out of it and can’t leave the house with an un-made bed. Of course I am also the person who doesn’t really move in their sleep, making it extremely easy to make the bed. It all starts with this double bed of mine. I decked that bed out too – pillows, cabbage patch dolls (yep, had a whole collection on display!) my pj’s hidden under my pillow, stuffed animals, you name it. My bed looked …… well it looked like a child’s dream.
The only problem with this bed is that I found myself trapped under it, blocked in on both sides from my brothers, more times than I care to remember. To this day, tight spaces freak me out. (I think they were jealous I had a room all to myself and a big ole bed in it, while they shared a bunk bed until they were over 18.)

In high school, I wanted more room and got every teenager’s dream – a daybed. With a cot-bed underneath. I can remember lying in my bed at night imagining my knight in shining armor saving me from any type of natural disaster. Sometimes my day bed was a boat stranded in the ocean and of course my current heart throb at the time was with me. I am pretty sure Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe and that guy from Sixteen Candles played a role or two.

This would be me and we are floating in the ocean on my day bed. Stranded. ALL. ALONE.

The cot under the daybed followed me to college and believe it or not, the hubby and I had that as our bed until I was pregnant with our first child. YES, you read that right, a COT BED. (we were skinny and in love) Thankfully he worked nights. One night though, he came home to find me half on the floor with my feet in the air because the cot had finally broken and I could not fix it. Having only one other piece of furniture (a mini couch from my parent’s boat) I had nowhere else to go.

So the bed I have now is the bed we bought with wedding money. You’ve seen this bed before – it’s the Queen size Broyhill bed. Can be seen in most romantic comedies near you. Imagine my embarrassment when I went to my bosses’ house to find their child had my same bed. Thankfully I am the non-mover and we have somehow made it work over the years.

Yep it’s a love hate relationship, my bed and I.

The foot of the bed has very pointy edges and I have had a permanent black and blue mark on my upper thigh for years now. We had a kid in the bed with us for at least 3 years each, by time we got them all out and in their own beds. our bed made too much noise for anything interesting to happen in it with kids in earshot. This even AFTER that same boss helped us move and tightened every nut and bolt so hard he announced that no noise would ever be heard – ( yes, that was embarrassing…) and lately this bed does me absolutely no favors in the getting to sleep department.

But this same bed kept me company while I was on bed rest, played never ending games of Mario Party with the kids on a snowy day, while I hand bathed my brand new babies, when the hubby was in the hospital, working the night shift, or delivering newspapers at 3am and I swore I heard a noise just on the other side of it…..

Trust me, the fact that I can write about my bed is simply because the new house has been decorated in my mind more times than I can count and now I am dreaming of inanimate objects, just because.

Don’t let the bed bugs bite……………….