MEN IN MY BED

MEN IN MY BED – When I was single and living in an apartment by Hawk Mountain, I used to pick up hikers and bring them home and feed them. That is how I eventually met my dear husband. But before he hiked into my life, a lot of others passed through. I fed them, let them take a bath, and gave them a bed for the night, although it was not mine. My father, however, had an uncanny way of sensing that I had a male hiker at my place and would strangely select that particular evening to call me on the phone and see how I was.

“Anyone there?” he’d ask, as he was ready to hang up.

And I’d say, “I have a hiker here,” and being a devout Catholic and a fearful father, he would reply, “Oh dear God, please be safe.” I don’t know what he thought these men would try to do but none ever did.

Although I did not sleep with any male hikers I picked up, I did sleep with nearly all my male FRIENDS. My spare twin bed was in the farmhouse living room, serving as a day sofa. It was four rooms away and around a corner. It was not conducive for late night conversation, the kind that encouraged you to share secrets and fears and dreams and revealed who we really are as people. I loved to stay up late and talk and so I invited them to sleep in my double bed with me. I liked the company and I loved the conversation.

One particular friend, Les, whom I liked a lot, would come up on weekends from Harper’s Ferry. We had a lovely time doing all sorts of fun things together that we both loved: hiking, baking bread, playing recorder, and we’d sit beside mountain streams and play duets. Les slept in my bed with me and we held hands and sang songs and talked and laughed late into the night. That’s it. Les had a girlfriend. They did not share these mutual loves that he and I did but evidently they shared something very important, like indulging in wild sex all night long.

“All night long?” I questioned.

“All night long,” he answered.

I had multiple male friends like Les that truly were not attracted to me but loved me as a friend. They slept in my bed with me but we did not have sex. My father did not believe me. He thought it impossible. But it was true.

As I grew older (26), I grew a bit concerned. Why weren’t they attracted to me? I was never a sexy babe and had just a few extra pounds on me,  but was not fat as I was always an athlete. When would I find a man who would fall in love with me and become my beloved husband for the rest of my life? My wise mother told me that the longer you had to wait, the better they will be. Really?

A horoscope compatibility guide shed some light on my seemingly unique relationships with my male friends. It said that most saw me a buddy, as one of the guys, for I loved to do exciting, adventurous things and loved to move. But I remember whining that I wanted someone to not just move into my life but to stay.

My husband Todd finally did just that and we are going on 35 years of being happily married. I was cleaning out my office for the New Year, going through boxes of photos and things that I had not seen in decades and low and behold, I found photos of Les’s wedding. I remember it had been hard for me to attend, thinking, “Why couldn’t that be me?” He remained happily married for many decades too and sadly, just recently passed on, at too young of an age.

In my cleaning frenzy, I also found an incredibly sweet wooden postcard that my husband made for me when we were dating. It was three layers of different colors of veneer that he carved into with an “I Love You” message. On the back, he made up and wrote the sweetest poem of how I fill up all his senses, equating my presence with the most beautiful and wonderful things in nature and in life. I read it aloud to him and he said, “That is so corny.” I disagreed and said, “It is so incredibly sweet. But, I don’t think you feel that way about me anymore.”

He said, “That was puppy love. I was only twenty years old. But we’re still here, aren’t we?” and he gave me a peck. He is still in my bed every night, holding hands to fall asleep and every now and then having some wild sex! My mother was right. Be patient and wait for the best.