Being that I am the only adult in the house at the moment makes me hyper-sensitive to noises in the night. Sleep does not come easily when everything is magnified because of the fear factor. I'm amazed at all the things I don't hear when Chuck is home. I don't hear them because I'm sleeping peacefully because my protector is here to hear them for me (and the kids).
As you know, I have little visitors sleeping in my bed with me. When one visitor is with me, the other two sleep in the same room together as well. It's the whole safety in numbers thing. Somewhere around 12:02 last night I heard a loud crashing sound. I bolted upright in bed and looked around my dark room. Bennett was still sound asleep, so evidently he didn't hear the mystery noise. My next instinct is to 'secure the premises'. This entails walking blindly (that would be without glasses) through the darkness of the hallway all the way downstairs to Gavin's room to check on him and Chloe.
Before I leave my bedroom, I decide to 'hide' a screw driver left out in the open that I was using earlier in the evening. My mind decides that the best way to hide it would be to cover it with something on the floor. I wouldn't want someone to use it against anyone in the house if someone is indeed perusing through my house at the moment. My mind also thought that it wouldn't be 'safe' to bring the screwdriver with me since it could potentially be used as a weapon against me. I'm so glad my mind thinks with such clarity at midnight. Therefore, my mind decided I would be safer going down stairs to scout out the origin of the crash unarmed, especially without a scary screwdriver.
As I peek in Gavin's room, I notice that he's lying there with his eyes open. I therefore assume he's awake and ask him like we just spoke 5 minutes ago, "Hey Bud, did you just hear a crashing sound?" He looks at me like we always have these little midnight conversations and says, "Nope." He then rolls over and falls back to sleep.
Not once did it occur to me to ask him why he was laying there wide awake. I was more concerned about whether or not my 11 year old was going to concur that I had in fact heard this heart stopping sound in the middle of the night. "Okay then Honey, goodnight, sleep tight" was how I ended our little rendezvous. I decided to continue scouring the dark house, without so much as a bat or even a hanger to throw at someone or something had I actually found anything.
Gavin didn't hear anything and he was awake and I thought I heard something and I was asleep. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary anywhere in the house. So I figured it must have been in my dream or I was in some whacked out mental state and thinking I heard something just because of my new found responsibility as 'protector of the house'. I crawled back in bed, heart beating out of my chest and tried to fall back asleep. I told myself it must have been something in the attic that fell (I should have been VERY AFRAID if that was the cause cuz the only thing in the attic is the HVAC unit, the hot water heater and some very heavy boxes), or that I was just having a very over active imagination.
Simple. Just take deep, calming breaths and go back to sleep.
Ya...like in 2 hours.
Anyways...morning finally came and with it, a lot of light which makes all those little bumps in the night seem silly. I had decided that it was all in my imagination once I woke up and saw the sun streaming in the windows and the house all peaceful.
But to my surprise, when I walked into the kitchen, I found a frame that fell off the wall and was laying all caddy-wompus on my counter. I felt justified. I'm not going crazy afterall. I did hear something. Looks like I could have used that screwdriver after all!
