It is 10:30 PM and I just finally got Grandpa into bed. He doesn’t go to bed at a consistent time. On the very early end he is heading toward bed by 8:00 and might be in bed by 8:30. The normal is around 9:30. But sometimes . . . sometimes something happens.
Grandma went to bed at 10:00 and with no one else up (and me making myself scarce in the bedroom reading) I hoped he would become bored and decide to go to bed. He had been resisting my suggestions all evening, determinedly staying out in the living room. I don’t know if his unwillingness to go to bed was tied to the fact that he had been eating large quantities of chocolate cake all evening, or something else.
After Grandma went to bed I went out to check on him and he asked me to put a movie on for him to watch. (More precisely, he was trying to get the remote to work and, being unsuccessful was asking for another remote that worked. When honesty forced me to confess that the remote did work he asked me to put something on for him.) So I put on the old Turner Classic Movies channel and left him watching some black and white adaptation of a Sinclair Lewis novel.
I went back to my reading and stopped every once in a while to go out and check on him. I knew he was starting to reach his end when I came out once and he told me I could sit down with him. I told him no, I was going back to the bedroom. Maybe ten minutes later he opened the bedroom door wearing nothing on his upper body and carrying his T-shirt.
“Mind if I bother you?” he said.
“No, come on in,” I said.
“Then prepared to be bothered,” he said.
“You want that T-shirt on?” I said. “You ready to go to bed?”
“Yes, I want this on and this off, and I’m ready to go to bed.”
So I helped him get his T-shirt on, and prompted him on the rest of the steps for going to bed. Then he wanted to say goodnight to Grandma. She had already gone to bed, but I decided it had been a short enough time that I wasn’t going to deny him the opportunity of saying good-night. After guiding him through the process of saying goodnight to Grandma I got him back to his bedroom and into bed. Then I put on the Bible on CD for him to listen to.
10:30 PM. I’m going to give him twenty minutes or so to listen to his CD. Hopefully he will fall asleep in that amount of time. Then I can go to bed, turn of the CD player, and get some sleep. And some rest.
Two hours later, or there-abouts, he’ll be up for his first night trip to the bathroom. And about every two hours it continues, for the rest of the night. Back up for the next day after 7:00 AM.
Leave a Reply