Cliff and I are separating

Now that I have your attention... 

My husband and I both get up several times a night, me more so than him.  I noticed recently that we were often awake at the same times, and wondered if maybe when one of us got out of the bed, it woke the other; I asked him whether he thought we'd sleep better in separate bedrooms.  He said, "Try it and see."  

There was a time my snoring bothered Cliff, but he's too deaf to hear it now.

I should mention that because of my trouble sleeping (and maybe my snoring, too), he once wanted to go sleep in the guest room himself;  I just didn't feel like that was right.  A married couple should sleep together!  Besides, I told him, I'd be washing twice as much bedding.  And that was that.

Well, this time it was my idea, and I do believe it's going to work.  The guest bedroom, now MY bedroom, is tiny, though.  We've always had a queen-sized bed in there because that's what we had when we first moved over here.  Yesterday I looked on Craigslist for a twin bed and found one twenty-five miles away: a brand new, never-used mattress, box springs (or whatever they call them now, with no springs in them), and a bed frame for a very reasonable price.  We bought them.  

I made do with the twin bed last night by using big sheets folded in half, but I ordered twin-bed flannel sheets from Amazon yesterday evening and they have already arrived.  Tomorrow the mattress pad will be here.

I had slept in the queen bed in that room for two nights and slept pretty well.  Gabe has always slept in a big-dog kennel near my side of the bed before, but that kennel would take up too much room in my new quarters.  I let him sleep on top of the covers with me; part of the time, though, he got down and went under the bed to sleep, then he'd get back on the bed.  Now that I have the twin bed, there really isn't room for him, so I got the small pet taxi out of the garage today.  He can sleep in that beside my bed.  It's not so big, and I can put it in the closet during the day.  He thinks he's walking in tall cotton, sleeping with me.

I told Cliff not to be surprised if he wakes up one cold winter night and finds me beside him, though.  I may need the benefits of his body heat.  And I still crawl in beside him when I'm waking him up every morning, screaming in his good ear to make conversation... because, you know, he can't wear hearing aids in bed.

The only person who has used the spare bedroom in the last few years is our son when he makes his annual visit, and I'm not sure he will like the twin bed.  However, his son lives next door in the old house and has three bedrooms upstairs, so it isn't like he'll be forced to use my little bed if he doesn't want to.

The grandson doesn't think this experiment will last.  If it doesn't, it's no big deal, but so far, so good.