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This bed isn’t big enough for the both of us.
Toad and I started out on a double bed. We were young, just married, and we
enjoyed the closeness of a double bed.
No more.
After eighteen years of marriage, there is not enough room in a king-size deluxe
bed-for-nine, complete with moat in the middle and optional alligators.
I believe small beds are a leading cause of divorce. Couples travel through the
years together buying larger and larger beds until they reach the end of the
mattress-factory display-rack and are still sleeping too close together.
Toad and I have a bed so big we no longer buy blankets for it. We buy fitted
tarmac covers. Our comforter is two old baseball field tarps sewn together with
grass rope.
Still, we can see each other over the horizon. We are no longer in spitting
distance, but Toad has a good arm and beaned me with the alarm clock
yesterday morning.
Toad: Did the alarm clock wake you this morning dear?
My Wife’s concern is both fake and sarcastic.
She moans constantly that no bed is large enough for the two of us.
Toad: I can still hear you snoring over there you big noisy lump.
Me: What’s that perfume you have on? Did you grind the juice out of old Dr.
Shoal’s Odor Eaters and rub it behind your ears?
We need a bigger bed. After eighteen years of marriage, when we go to bed,
we don’t want to snuggle up in the same hemisphere.
We keep our cell phones handy in bed, just in case we think of something
mean to say to one another during the night that can’t wait until morning.
Toad called me last night—as she does most nights.
Toad: You awake Lump?
Me: You sleep like an out of balance washing machine running on three legs;
of course, I’m awake.
I’ve been awake for ten years.
Toad: Good! I don’t sleep either. How could I, with you over there performing
Chinese snore-torture? I like to listen to the dogs barking next to the window,
but I can’t hear them. Are your tonsils made of high frequency, aluminum ball
bearings?
Me: I don’t snore. I don’t even sleep.
Toad: Your snoring isn’t really like sawing logs; it’s more like wrenching them
apart with bare adenoids. Can we get a bigger bed?
We fight on. True love knows no boundaries, except the edge of the bed.
Our next bed is going to be BIG.