To understand the depth of my oppression, you should know that for the first 25 years of my life I read myself to sleep almost every night. It was just what I did. I grew up doing it, and I did it in college, in grad school, etc. You might say it was habitual. Almost necessary. Then I married Dan and between this, that, and the other, I can't do it anymore.

There are several reasons but perhaps the most significant reason is that there is no light by my side of the bed. Wait. There is a light. But it is a pretend light that is plugged into nothing. I believe that years ago it used to be plugged into something like, you know, an outlet with electricity running through it. In fact, I remember turning it on in order to change a diaper in the middle of the night when Sadie was still co-sleeping. However, once that necessity was removed, the light somehow magically got unplugged and all the outlet spaces in the area got magically used up with other things. Plus, the only outlet on that wall is behind the 40 ton bed and only Dan can bed-wrangle effectively enough to plug something into it.

Dan is disturbed by night-time reading. It keeps him awake. He doesn't like me doing it. This has been a minor point of contention between us for years.

So last night I was feeling restless and irritable and I'm in the middle of a book I'm interested in, and I whined, "See, I really wish I could read myself to sleep right now. Just six pages of Tom Wolfe and I know I would be able to sleep peacefully!"

And Dan responded, "Awww, honey, don't give up. If you keep working on your phonics with the kids, I'm sure you'll be able to read someday!"

And I said, "I'm telling the internet you said that mean hateful thing."

And he said, "Oh good. That'll play well on CNN."

So my question: Given his unabashed lack of sensitivity to my wishes on this point, do I need to

1. Climb under the bed and plug in my lamp. (I may never get back out.)
2. Get over it. Life with Dan has other compensations. (He is very good at video games.)
3. Read in the bathroom, crying softly, until he relents. (Could take forever.)

Everyone on TV has separate bed lamps! Therefore, it must be true!

Labels: husband