A Double Wide Sleeping Bag

It's entirely possible I've told this story before. It's a classic in our home, and we have friends who request it from time to time. It's up there with "The Canoe Story" which, in truth, "The Canoe Story" needs to be told on video, by Jeremy, to truly appreciate it in its entirety. I searched my blog for this story, and having not found it, I must make the assumption, I've posted it before in threads, but never actually wrote it down for posterity. After awhile, it becomes difficult to remember who heard this story, and who heard that one, when it comes to the classics.

I know there are some who long for their early days of marriage when love was an explosion. When everything felt fresh and exciting and new. Not me. Jeremy and I are complete opposites in so many ways, it took a long time before we began to mesh. His polar opposite personality is what attracted me to him in the first place. I craved that calm, solid, disposition he has always had, because I'm a bit, er, emotional. And then we had some fairly large cultural differences to overcome as well. Blending a little bit of his family with a little bit of mine, and then adding our own twist to the mix was a challenge, and it's taken years for us to become our own unique family outside of the ones we both grew up in. He wanted what he knew. And so did I.

Looking back, it should not have been a surprise to me that we would disagree over something as simple as a bed, with a mattress, sheets, pillows, and a comforter. After all, I believed, incorrectly, that most normal people in the whole of the United States slept in beds. An ignorant assumption to be sure, but I was young, fairly sheltered and thereby naive to much beyond what I knew in my sleepy little world.

I won't go into our wedding story, but just know it was a rather unusual arrangement, thanks to Uncle Sam and the US Army, causing us to be separated for the first month and a half of marriage. It would have been longer, but we were granted a reprieve, thanks to the Russian Government who didn't wish any U.S. Government passports to cross their borders. As a result, we were left without a place to live. We had made arrangements to be housed upon his return from Russia, and so our future place was still occupied. We lived in "Guest Housing" for longer than I care to admit (yet another story) and so I had not really had the opportunity to see Jeremy in his natural habitat. He had always been at home in his parent's guest room, in the barracks where ever he was stationed, in a hotel, or guest housing.

We finally moved into our little mobile home that we were renting. I stood inside the empty space and declared we needed furniture, but first, and foremost we needed a bed.
"A bed? Why do we need a bed?" Jeremy asked.
I just looked at him for a moment before I said, "To sleep on?"
"I thought we'd get a piece of foam. I always slept on a piece of foam growing up. It's great!"
"I'm not sleeping on a piece of foam. What's wrong with you?"
"You just have to try it. I know you'll like it."
"I know I won't."

Being that he was newly wed, and male, and he wanted to ensure good things would continue coming his way, he caved into the whole bed v. piece of foam argument and we went mattress/box spring shopping. It was delivered and set up the same day. Standing over the bed I then declared we needed to go buy some sheets and a blanket.

"Why?" Jeremy asked.
"Why???" I said. "Because i"m not just sleeping on an uncovered mattress."
"I just thought we'd get a sleeping bag. I always slept in a sleeping bag. It's great."
"A sleeping bag?"
"YEAH! I know...we could get a double wide sleeping bag!"
I just looked at him, incredulously. "A double wide sleeping bag," I said flatly. "Really. You want me to sleep in a double wide sleeping bag? That's kind of gross. You can't wash a sleeping bag that often."
"But they are sooooooo comfortable," he argued. As if this was really going to sell me on the virtues of a DWSB.
"No they aren't, " I pointed out. "They're hot. And stuffy. And the liner gets picky, and gives me the chills. No way."

And because he was young, and male, and newly wed, and wanted to ensure good things would keep coming his way, we went shopping for sheets and a blanket that very same day.

Jeremy still hasn't given up hopes for the Double Wide Sleeping Bag. When I'm cold and complain the response is, "You know if we had a DWSB..." So, I avoid the "Camping" section of the department store as if it were the quarantined quarters of a hospital, knowing all it would take is one sight of a DWSB, and I'd be owning it, though I very much doubt I'd get talked into sleeping in it. Because he's while he's not newly married anymore, nor as young, he's still very male and always wanting to ensure good things keep coming his way.