Wednesday's Words for November 20, 2019

I promised y’all a report on our new bed. I didn’t forget, but I did want to give it more than a week before I reported in. We’ve had our new bed now for 13 nights. It arrived on the Thursday, just three days after we traveled to the really big city (population over 5 million) and tested the Casper mattresses out.

We knew it was coming that morning. So my husband had already pulled the old mattress and box spring out of the bedroom and taken down the old bed frame—a frame meant for a boxed spring. Our new frame doesn’t need a boxed spring, which made it perfect for our new mattress. We did discover in this dismantling process that our headboard, consisting of gold colored metal made to resemble a brass-style headboard, could not, as I’d hoped, be used with the new frame. It was, in fact, and like the rest of the old bed set, done. Some of the vertical bars were broken, and so it, too, went the way of the mattress and boxed spring, to the town dump.

We did salvage our latest memory-foam bed topper which was under a year old. I washed the bamboo cover, and then asked our second daughter if she would like it. She not only was happy to take it, she loves it.

No sooner had the bedroom been cleared, and the new frame assembled than the UPS driver arrived. The mattress came, as advertised, in a box. Our daughter was on hand to help David unpack that box. They’d never done this before, but they had a plan going in. Now folks, just because I am not physically able to do the things I used to do, that doesn’t mean I wasn’t involved in the process.

I, dear friends, was the peanut gallery. And it was the most fun I’d had in a while.

They opened the box, and I reminded them not to use the box cutter on the plastic binding the rolled up tighter-than-a-spring mattress - in case they damaged the mattress. Oh, did I forget to mention to them that it was likely rolled up tighter than a spring? I didn’t forget, that was a test. We received the last bed topper via UPS, it came tightly rolled, and that was kind of fun to open. David opened it, so therefore, I just assumed he knew what to expect. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. He should have known what was coming. Queen sized mattress in a box that is much, much smaller looking than a queen-sized mattress—well, you do the math.

After considerable grunting and a little cussing, the wrapped mattress was out of the box, looking like an over-sized, cylindrical marshmallow. I helped by taking the box out of our bedroom (where this exercise was taking place).

They decided—my husband and my daughter—that they would begin to take the plastic off the mattress on top of the bed frame. They began to carefully cut the white plastic, and then realized it could be unrolled. With each tug, the mattress rolled away from them. And so, they tugged, then re-positioned the mattress, and they tugged and re-positioned. Several times. I, being clever, stood back. As far back as I could without leaving the room.

Husband: “There sure is a lot of plastic on this.”
Daughter: “Don’t they know about the global plastic pollution crisis?”
Me: I didn’t say a word, I just waited.

It didn’t take long. There always has to be a point of no return. They reached it. Yes, before the plastic was completely removed, it had been reduced enough that what remained of it could not hold that mattress from trying to free itself from its earthly bonds.

Drama was called for, so I said, “Oh my! Look out! There it goes!”

The tugging became decidedly more energetic, and slightly frantic, but of course it’s hard for people to work with alacrity when they’re laughing hard. The last of the plastic had to be tugged from around the completely unbound, almost at full thirteen-inch height mattress. At that point David remembered there were adhesive strips on the bed frame. That was worth a chuckle, too, because they had to lift the mattress and tug the protective plastic off those strips one-by-one. With the mattress still on the bed.

It took only minutes for the mattress to be ready for linens. There had been a lot of plastic, and it did go out into the trash. The box has made a wonderful dog-den for one of my daughter’s chihuahuas who loves boxes. And I have a comedic encore to look forward to. I look forward to that time, six months in the future when it is time to rotate the mattress—they recommend every six months re-positioning it, so that where your head was is where your feet will be. We’ll see how good those adhesive strips are then, won’t we?

As for our new bed? What a joy it was for me to wake up the next morning without a sore and aching back. David also loves it. He, too, is sleeping better, and waking up much less sore. With the level of arthritis that I have, no bed is going to let me wake up completely pain free. When one joint flares up, well, that’s that for however long it lasts. At the moment my left hip isn’t playing nice, but that will ease off. In the meantime, this bed is proving to be all that we’d hoped it would be.

It’s low enough that I don’t have to “climb in” and high enough that I can transition from sitting to standing with no effort at all. And when I do get into it, I can move, up or down, side to side, without feeling as if I need a handle to hang on to, for support.

So far, each night has been a bit better than the last as we grow accustomed to what soon will be our new normal. Sleeping is better, deeper, and far and away more comfortable than it’s been in years.

And that, my friends, is a wonderful thing.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.morganashbury.com
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury