stuff put away, I began to relax and looked forward to peace and quiet. Husband proposes, but wife disposes. Tired of our king mattress on a metal frame, Rani wanted a solid king bed with a proper headboard. So, off we went bed-hunting. For such a small town it was surprising that there were so many furniture stores. The mandate was to avoid furniture stores selling cheap stuff, where the lack of quality was papered over by the endorsements of tall and slim supermodels or big-bosomed stars of trashy TV shows.
In due course, a ridiculously expensive mahogany king bed was set up in the master bedroom. I decided to use the relatively new king mattress and box spring, the relic of our previous adventure with the wobbly king bed in Upstate NY. Before the mattress was placed on to the bed frame, I personally made sure all the screws were tight, and the frame rock-solid and unshakable.
And then began the sequel to the saga of our sleep, or the lack of it. The king size mattress which behaved so well on a simple metal frame now started to act up. When Rani moved in her sleep, I felt the bed wobble and had some difficulty falling off to sleep again.
In addition to the restless leg syndrome, I developed nocturia—a medical term for night time urination. When I got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, Rani, a very light sleeper, would also wake up even though I did my best to get out of the bed quietly. More visits to the doctor, more tests, and more medicines followed. Alas, the medicines weren’t effective, and I had to live with this new malady for the foreseeable future.
We tried to ignore the problems and tried our best to sleep. But one morning, after a particularly restless night, Rani complained bitterly about her ability to function without proper sleep, night after night.
I felt very bad for depriving her of her beauty sleep. It was bad enough I had a medical condition and had to get up a couple of times at night. I was helpless about my disturbed sleep, and had to live with it. Prostate surgery offered a glimmer of hope, but not a foolproof solution. But, there was a way to help Rani. So, I purchased a twin bed, and called our handyman to help me to bring it home. We quickly dismantled the king bed in the master bedroom and moved it to the guest bedroom. Now, in the master bedroom, we placed the old queen bed (I still have fond memories of those deliriously decadent times) and my new twin bed side by side, close enough so Rani and I could touch hands, but far enough so as not to disturb her sleep.
When Rani came home she was surprised, and berated me for the aso bedroom. The thought of two matching twin beds did cross my feeble brain,