At heart, I’m a night owl. Society has forced me to modify my natural disposition to conform to our morning culture, just as it has forced me to become more outgoing than my old, introverted bones would like. This cruel world can make me wake up early and talk more than I want to, but it will never make me drink coffee, so I’ve got that tea cup’s worth of identity to hold onto.
As a night owl, I like to stay up a little later on weekends. My wife, poster child of morning people, does not. She goes to bed without me, and that is where the trouble starts. Little boys see an empty spot in the parents’ bed as an invitation. There is hardly a little creature in all of nature who doesn’t love to snuggle up to Mommy for a nap.
The mommies of the animal world seem to love having their “babies” cuddled up around them. The daddies don’t. Just ask Mr. Lion if he likes to find a pride of cubs sprawled out on his patch of grass when he’s ready for a snooze.
I adore my children, but it’s hard to see them as anything more than annoying lumps when I find a bunch of annoying lumps on my side of the bed as I pull back the covers in the dark. Now I must extract and schlep a couple of 40-pound bags of potatoes to their own beds without waking them. This wouldn’t be so difficult except these sacks of potatoes have limbs that will be reliably tangled around each other, the blankets, and Mommy.
Getting them into their own beds is the fun part. The horror is yet to come. Little boys turn into blast furnaces when their minds wrestle with dreams. I could heat my house off one sleeping four-year-old if I could get him to lie still while I hooked up the ductwork. Children tend to be deep sleepers, so the heat they produce doesn’t wake them or inspire them to kick off the covers.
A fun shot of the other fellas I took at our last dads’ group meeting.
I am a light sleeper, and I am disturbed by those rare instances when I wake up in a sweat. Imagine my horror as I lie down on sheets already damp with sweat. There is disgust, and sometimes swearing. If there is a system of reincarnation wherein entities return as what they most deserve, I will live my next life as a fungus spore. I’ve found the perfect environment for that.
I usually end these nights by wrapping myself in towels and sleeping as close to the edge as possible.
I’ve discovered a new respect for WWI trench soldiers, made to always sleep on soggy ground. I’ve learned a greater regard for Mr. Lion. Fungi, on the other hand, probably have it pretty easy. The one thing I can say for fungi is they’re probably awesome dads who don’t complain at all about the “babies” funking up their beds.
Snoozing on the Sofa 
Laughing out loud. So sorry about your dilemma, Scott. But really what would you do without those little guys? Although I am with you on damp sheets. I would grab a bunch of towels too to stay dry. Boys and their energy. Please give some to the grownups!
What would I do without them? For one thing, I’d sleep more soundly. But it’d probably be a miserable, lonely, old man sleep.
And you wouldn’t want that for yourself would you?
Trying to put off the miserable old man stuff for another year or two.
At least …. I’m a lot older then you are and I still will not go “old”. NO WAY!
That’s the attitude, my young friend!
Trust me, Scott…grandpa lions are just as territorial, but the moist invaders into their lair are not as prevalent. Oh, and way before any of your three-some “cubs” procreate, you will long to tote those bags of potatoes again.
By the way, considering your papa lion analogy, your sons will never leave your “pride”.
You’re right. I will surely miss it all one day. But it’d be nice if they’d give me a good week to see how long it will take to miss it.
Your kids, or not – the bed is a sanctuary, and it seems like they are invading it with any chance they get.
My sanctuary is in ruins – soggy ruins.
Maybe you could put towels down when your wife goes to bed so the sweat mongers sleep on the towels. Then you can move them and the towels and have a nice fungi free stop to sleep in?
I’m just gonna keep them wound up int paper towels and bubble wrap 24/7. It’s the only way.
Sadly I must agree. Although..Bubble wrap can make one quite sweaty. Unless there is new absorbent kind that I haven’t heard of.
Space-age polymers.
Well it seems you have this well thought out. lol
They day is coming when sleeping with Mama won’t be quite as appealing to them. In the meantime, either go to bed earlier & claim your spot & crawl into one of their beds which may be dry from their departure!
I’m afraid of their beds.
Warm, moist, fungi-loving sheets… Thanks, Snoozin, now I can’t get that image out of my brain. Forget the long winter’s nap, there will be visions of toadstools dancing in my head tonight. I have no kids, but my sack-of-potatoes mutts are great portable heaters for my feet (if I can get them positioned right). There is a dude at our farm market that sells mushrooms, his business is called Fun Guy Farms. 🙂