This last New Year’s Eve, Cody and I decided that, in addition to our own individual New Year’s resolutions, we’d also create “Couple Goals.” In that Goals list were things like cooking healthier meals with fresher ingredients, creating and maintaining budgets, and even setting a regular bed time that we’d follow.
It’s this regular bed time that I want to reflect on this week.
I would not be the relatively high-functioning, usually kind and happy-go-lucky person if I did not receive at least 7 hours and 15 minutes of sleep every night (yes, I’ve noticed the pattern and no, it does not make me lame). Waking up with enough dream-juice in the tank helps me do everything I need to do with hundreds of different personalities every day (yay, teaching!). Without it, I am simply a lesser version of myself, and that’s not cool for anybody. I become shorter-tempered and eat way more than I need to. And I am way too much of a control-freak to be ruled by the monster that is Lack of Sleep.
So at 8:30pm, an alarm goes off on Cody’s phone reminding us to clean-up around the house (any clothes on the floor or dishes that need to be washed are ideally tended to at this time). This alarm is boring.
At 9:05, however, another alarm sings, heralding my absolute favorite time of the day. Bed Time.*
*Hilarious, because I remember never falling asleep at my parents-requested 9pm bedtime. I realize now this was their bed-time, not mine. Sorry, Dad.
Sometime around 9:30, I make a big show of diving into all the covers and smile up at Cod as he closes the door for the night. “Bed time is the best time!” I always sing. And he laughs every time and joins me in the sea of blankets.
“Bed time is the best time!”
It’s either the over-tiredness or complete comfort we feel in each other’s presence, but I swear we’re at our funniest right before bed. We crank out the punniest jokes and find ways to make lighter those rougher days. We literally find a way to laugh out the bad stuff.
It’s crazy to point out, though, that I never would have realized how important our bed-time ritual is to our marriage if we had not spent this weekend away from home. I would have continued to take it completely for granted. Instead, my in-laws (parents and grands) commented the next morning on what they heard before we fell asleep after our 2:30am arrival:
We couldn’t stop giggling.
And this is a regular thing – but because I hadn’t had a chance to stop to appreciate it, I kept taking it for granted.
Bed time is the best time because my bed-time is full of security and snuggles and so so so so so much laughter. I believe it’s a testament to how vulnerable and open we have become with each other, and I couldn’t feel more blessed to have it this way.
So if you ever invite us over to your home to spend the night, apparently you will have noises keeping you up for a little while. But don’t worry – I hear laughter is contagious.