So, how do you get into bed?
Your first reaction to this question might be: ‘what do you mean?’ followed by: ‘does it matter?’
Let me put your mind at rest. I don’t think it matters at all; I am not aware of any scientific study, which attaches any importance to this question. Come to think of it, if there were studies in some obscure university, they would be for academic purposes only and none of us should lose any sleep over them, pun intended.
My question is just an idle thought that has troubled me for the last; oh let me see…two months or so! I am not obsessive about it, or at least I don’t think I am however, once I downloaded the subject on to your consciousness, I will forget the matter and move on to another non-issue to worry about.
A while ago, I became aware of the way I approach my bed when attempting to get into it. After throwing the covers to the side, I tend to crawl-in and once completely off the ground; I twist and lie on my back for a while before settling on the final preferred position for sleeping.
All of a sudden, this technique caused me a little problem. I will return to that later. So, to resolve this problem, I decided to change my approach thus: I still throw the covers to one side, I then turn and sit on the bed, lift and swing my legs into the bed, etc. This method is unnatural to me and as a result, I often revert to type and do the ‘crawl-in’ routine. I think, but not sure, that most people would find the ‘sit and swing’ method unnatural and somewhat staged. In fact, when you think of any movie where the characters act going to bed, they all (men or women) tend to adopt the ‘sit and swing’ method because it is more cinematic than the ‘crawl-in’ one, which is why I think it is affected.
However, I am sure there are many people out there who prefer, and consistently apply the ‘sit and swing’ method and might be deeply offended by my claim of affectation on their part. Affected or not, it does not make them bad or pretentious people. I am sure some of my best friends are ‘sit-swingers’ and I still like them! To my way of thinking, you can be fired through a cannon into bed, if that’s what jiggles your bell.
‘Are there more ways of getting to bed?’ I hear you thinking. Not really. Okay, there is the euphoric ‘run and leap’ into a sumptuous bed when you find yourself in the fortunate situation of booking a really posh hotel bedroom. There is also the dramatic standing at the foot of the bed and either falling forwards, or backwards out of exhaustion but, that’s as occasional as trying the wine in a restaurant before it is served to your fellow diners; we hardly ever do that when we open a bottle of plonk at home.
Anyhow, I promised to explain why I have been fruitlessly attempting to change my method of getting into my bed. I finally cracked it! It started out when on one occasion I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. I got up and attempted to feel with my bare feet for my slippers. I found them but, they were all disarranged and confused. It took forever to align them so I can slip my feet into them; a manoeuvre that required engaging my brains; something you do not want to do in the middle of the night as it makes it harder to get back to sleep after the bathroom visit.
After a few similar incidents with my slippers, I began to wonder: why don’t my slippers ever align correctly at night? Statistically, it should happen every now and again, surely! But it never seemed to for me. Then it dawned on me. My slippers were never going to align up correctly, ever! This was due to my ‘crawl in’ method of entry earlier that night, which guaranteed a misalignment of the slippers, every time! For scientific purposes, I deconstructed my entry method carefully. Here is how it goes:
I approach my side of the bed; I slip out of my left slipper, lift my leg and rest the knee on the edge of the bed; I then rest both my hands on the bed further in; lift the right foot, letting the right slipper fall randomly on the ground somewhere near its twin. Note that the left slipper is now pointing towards the edge of the bed, not away from it. The right slipper could be in any state at all since it was allowed to drop haphazardly to the ground but, very often ends up pointing towards the bed like its twin.
Now, when one gets up at night, or indeed in the morning, one does not reverse out, in the same manner, one went in. Unless! This is where my analysis gets very interesting. I hope you are by now breathlessly excited by all of this! Almost all of us (there are exceptions I am sure) get out of bed in the same manner, irrespective of how we went in! We sit up, swing our legs round and when they reach the ground we stand up and get on with our lives. Getting out of bed is almost the reverse action of the ‘sit and swing’ method of getting into bed!!! Isn’t this the weirdest, wonderful thing?
Weird, wonderful, boring, or whatever you think of this conclusion, it was brought about as a result of my nocturnal visits to the bathroom. As my feet land on the ground, they discover that the slippers are not arranged nicely ready to receive them with open mouths, so to speak. No, they are at best both facing the wrong way; one could be turned upside down, and in the wrong order of left and right. This is why the ‘sit and swing’ method, affected or natural, is the only way of making sure your slippers are left in a situation that allows you to gain access to them in the right orientation when you are ready to leave your bed.
Happily, we don’t let such trivialities affect our lives and we go through the minor inconvenience of sorting out our slippers before we get into them. There are bigger issues to worry about in this life. But someone has to care! On this occasion, this someone is me; but only as far as telling you about it and now I intend to go and find out why I always have an odd sock in my sock drawer. When I find out, I will be sure to let you know.
