So you think making your bed every morning is key to the start of a successful day? Maybe you’re right. But have you considered the ramifications this may have on the lives and future relationships of children, especially as they develop mechanisms to cope with this parental mandate?
I’ve long heard that making the bed each morning is quite important to our men and women in uniform. I’ve always heard that the discipline aspect was the primary reason for the hospital corners and wrinkle-free mandate. I suppose if a fellow soldier can’t follow a demand as simple as creating order out of the chaos of the previous night, you can’t have confidence in his attention to detail later in the day when your life may depend on it. There’s also the idea that no matter what the rest of the day brings, at least you’ve accomplished one thing successfully. One small action that you can 100% control. A couple minutes each morning to start you out on the right foot.
I would never have cut it in the military. Not because of the whole “making the bed” thing, which I detest. But not not because of that, either. Before my wife and I got married, there were two major stipulations I had—potential deal-breakers, as it were: 1) we would not be having kids; 2) I would not be making the bed.
I guess I can understand why parents force their children to make their bed every morning. Starting the day off on the right foot and learning discipline are understandable concepts. No arguments here. But kids are smart enough to realize it’s a pointless task, since they’ll just be returning their tired asses to the soft rectangular confines in 16 hours. Every kid’s heard some version of “I brought you into this world, I can take you out of it.” It’s an empty threat, but kids understand they don’t hold any bargaining power in the relationship, so they submit to parental demands. Over time, loathing of the morning task cools to a mere apathy, those feelings further repressed day after day, year after year, until they bubble to the surface decades later in psychotherapy. Other long-term physical and emotional drawbacks, though, may far outweigh even $200/hour therapy sessions.
Allow me to posit a fictional, explanatory scenario in which I use first-person pronouns merely for simplicity sake. My mother requested I make my bed every morning before school. I presented the argument that the bed was just going to get messed up again tonight. An unpersuasive argument if ever there was one. So after some time—perhaps as my foray into passive-aggressiveness—I began sleeping on top of the covers with only a thick blanket to cover me. Wake up, smooth a hand over the top sheet, fold a single quilt, plump up a pillow, and the morning chore was done.
What began as a child’s antiauthoritarianism against bed-making, gradually progressed into activities proving detrimental to my health. In undergrad, I made my bed only on the rare occasion when I completely changed the sheets. Living alone in a one-bedroom apartment during pharmacy school (remember: fictional scenario), I placed my bed in the living room as the lone seating option. Why bother walking the 20 paces from the living room over to the bedroom? Teeth already brushed, pillow and blankets at the ready, I simplified the ritual and preamble of bedtime prep to a single step: transition from sitting to lying. After graduation I began sleeping wherever I was when drowsiness struck, usually skipping the bed altogether, often waking to find myself still in the previous day’s work attire.
Knowing that I could be asleep at a moment’s notice, ultimately nullified the need for a set bedtime. The time saved not needing to change into special pajamas—and whatever else it is people do to prepare for sleep—prolonged the time I could stay up by a few minutes. A few minutes became 5 minutes, 5 morphed into 10, then to 15, and so on. Eventually my mantra became, “I’ll sleep when I’m tired.” The only thing more annoying than forcing myself to try and go to sleep when not tired, is struggling to stay awake when I am.
My lack of a sleep schedule stresses out my wife, who I will call “Pheobe” in this example. Pheobe complains about me staying up too late, sleeping in past noon, not coming to bed at all, and occasionally even lapses back to the marital deal-breaker of me not making the bed on rare days I do seek the bed’s confines. Each complaint is like an ounce of marital strife, gravitating closer to a black hole of divorce.
Certainly you wouldn’t want to jeopardize your child’s future relationships with an aversion deeply ingrained by a childhood filled with years of daily, mindless labor. An aversion so absolute that he’d rather push a boulder up a hill for all eternity than have to toil even once with stretching a fitted sheet all by his lonesome. Nor would you, dear mother, want to risk setting a boy on a path to an early grave, just so his childhood bedroom can appear well maintained for 16 hours a day. Yet studies show that maintaining a consistent circadian rhythm is essential for general health, and decreasing the risk of developing a number of diseases, thus delaying the inevitable shaking of hands with the Grim Reaper. My circadian rhythm, though, has long been in chaos. A shortened life. The threat of divorce looming on the horizon. All for what? A freshly made bed.
So, you still think a bed should be crisply remade as soon as the last occupant rises from its cozy confines? I’m intrigued to hear from active and retired members of the military regarding how their feelings on this topic change over time. 2020 has certainly been a year of changes. A year when even a mild success each day is much needed. If nothing else, the minor daily annoyance of making your bed will remind you to tear yesterday off the page-a-day calendar on your nightstand. Otherwise, you might not remember that today is March 232. So, I guess, yeah, come to think of it . . . You’re Probably Right.
[016] October 28, 2020