What I Wear To Bed

Right. That is a headlamp. That I’m wearing. In bed.

I am not sure how we came to own a headlamp seeing as we are not given to spelunking. It’s possible that I picked it up on one of my “survival shopping trips” which sometimes occur when I get myself all worked up in a frenzy about different scenarios like “what would happen if a tornado hit our house and we were trapped in the basement” and also “what would happen if a tornado hit our house and we were trapped in the basement.”

I’m very worried about tornados.

Anyhow, Jeff likes to go to bed earlier than I do because he has to get up before dawn. Don’t even feel sorry for him because I also have to get up before dawn, mostly because Scarlette thinks that is when playtime begins. Scarlette might be a vampire, that is what I’m saying.

I, however, am a night owl and I like to read in bed. And I used to have one of those nice little book lights that softly illuminated the page, indulging my need to find out if The Bishop was going to put Katie Lapp under the Bann or not while allowing my husband to peacefully slumber by my side.

But the batteries burnt out and so then I relied on a tiny hand held flashlight for my nighttime reads. But somehow I misplaced that and the only other thing I had in my nightstand was this headlamp.

I stowed it there in case a tornado ever hits our house and we need to light the way to the basement. Given the number of flashlights I’ve dropped on the way to said basement in a neurotic panic when the sirens go off, I figured strapping one to my head was the safest bet.

So I keep it in my nightstand next to my Bible because, you know, “Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path” and all that.

Before I got married I was all “No t-shirts and sweats for me! I’m only going to wear flimsy pieces of lace to bed! AND ALSO I WILL MAKE FRESH COOKED BREAKFAST EVERY MORNING!” I won’t tell you what I actually wear to bed because you don’t need to know about my night time attire. That would be called “oversharing on the internet” and I am against that. No I’m not. But I will tell you I’m pretty sure that when your husband comes to bed and finds you wearing a caving headlamp, that is not what they call “lighting his fire.”

I know this because he didn’t even laugh at me. He just shook his head and said “Headlamp.” I suppose his exposure to me coming to bed looking like a Teletubby on the nights that I put my hair up for sock bun curls has paved the way for moments like this.

A few minutes later he sat up, grumbling that he had forgotten something in the kitchen. To which I held out my hand and said “Wait. I got this.” And then I pointed between my eyes

“HEADLAMP”

While walking back from the kitchen I noticed the reflection of the headlamp bobbing around in the dark and I wondered what our neighbors were thinking. Did they think someone had snuck into our house under the guise of darkness and was rifling through our belongs, flashlight in hand? Probably they did, I decided. Probably I’d end up explaining to some policeman that no one had broken in and I just needed some reading light because my kindle isn’t backlit.

But when no one called to check on us I figured that my neighbors just chalked it up to another one of my Tornado Safety Drills. Which is actually pretty disconcerting because what if someone DID break in our house and no one alerted anybody? Then my neighbors would feel terrible, that’s what.

And that is the story of why I need a new book light.