A Game of Musical Beds (to be completed by YOU!)

Currently, my entire family is coughing. ALL. NIGHT. LONG.

My wife has a strange cough mechanism that seems to only be triggered when she lies (lays?) down. It seems our children may have inherited this baffling oddity. Alli, our youngest daughter, has it the worst. She has been coughing for several nights now. She shares a room with her twin sister, Abby, and Abby has been moody this week for obvious reasons. So we decided that Abby could sleep with Mommy for a night, and I would take the couch if Alli continued coughing. She did, so about 11:00 or so, I pulled Abby from the top bunk, carried her to my room, and laid her down in my spot on the bed. I then headed to the couch.

About thirty minutes later, Kristi came out of the bedroom. “Now I’m coughing too. You’re going to have to sleep with Abby.” So, we traded spots, and I went back to the bed, this time on the WRONG side, since Abby was already in my spot.

I can’t sleep without hearing something (preferably television). If the room is silent, my brain runs wild, and thoughts of anything and everything, without rhyme or reason, run through my head. I think of the dog we don’t have, the unpaid bills (or did I pay that one?), the stain in the carpet, the unfinished work laying (lying? I DON’T KNOW!) on my desk, the duck-billed platypus (they’re just SO cute!), etc, etc, etc, (why do we abbreviate that word all the time?). It goes nuts. That is to say, I need the TV on, so I pulled out my tablet and stuck headphones in my ears, using Netflix as my sleep aid.

But, lo and behold, thirty minutes later, ABBY WAS COUGHING! AHHHHHHHHH. My evening of musical beds was getting quite aggravating, because it seemed like I was the only one playing, and despite my lack of competition, I still couldn’t seem to win.

I went back to the living room and took my spot on our loveseat. (I love to say “loveseat” in my best Barry Manilow voice…wait, no…Barry WHITE voice. Or is it Betty White? I DON’T KNOW! The lack of sleep is now affecting my writing skills, and my attention span.) I was hoping Kristi had stopped coughing, but she hadn’t. So I got up again, dug out some old, grungy, purple ear plugs, squeezed them into my ears until they were pushing on my eardrums, and squished myself back onto the looooveseeat (Barry White) in a fetal position, hoping to sleep at least a little before the sun started popping through the shades. The ear plugs worked, thank God. I got a couple hours of sleep. Then, the evil, wicked, unrelenting, morning sun came shouting at me from the slots between the shades. It was a night to remember.

So, what’s the point, Darren? You always bring these things around to some spiritual ending, right? Yeah, I do. But not today. I’m going to let you make the spiritual conclusion. So, whatcha got? Leave your ideas in the comments. If one is good enough, I will complete the story and update everyone when it’s finished (crediting you with the epic conclusion). So, let’s have it. How should we conclude?

5 Replies to “A Game of Musical Beds (to be completed by YOU!)”

  1. Spiritual summation: “You have not because you ask not.” The dog. The one you think about that you do not have. They have them at the pound. All you have to do is ask. Ta. Da.

  2. The moral of this story? Obviously God wants to talk to me. I am told that if you are awakened in the night, go to prayer. It’s God. Answer. I am imagining at this point He is asking why I keep hanging up on Him, (headphones?) God has a sense of humor. He kept hitting redial. I still didn’t answer so he called a friend to pass on the message. He said have them take benedryl before going to bed to clear up those awful allergies

  3. I think we use the etc abbreviation so much cuz at this point nobody actually remembers how to spell the full word

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