When I was a kid I had the oldest parents in the class: My parents were in their 40’s when my younger brother and I were born. They had already had four kids spaced with military precision at 3-year intervals, and thought, and who wouldn’t? that their family was complete. Almost ten years later, to the surprise of everyone, they begat my brother and me within 18 months of each other.
By that time my parents were middle aged and exhausted, which worked out to our advantage. My folks were not about to get overwrought over minor details like bad report cards, missed curfews, broken bones or infectious diseases. They had also, in the span between raising what they came to call their “first family” and their “second family,” come to the realization that corporal punishment did not work, so, showing a level of enlightened child rearing that was ahead of their time, my parents never ever hit my brother or me.
The other rule they observed was that no one ever went to bed angry and no matter how wicked my brother and I were, after we said our prayers and were tucked in we still got our good night kiss. “Never go to bed angry,” my mother would say while my father nodded in the background; “If someone dies in their sleep you’ll feel awful for the rest of your life.” And she would close the door.
Looking back, that seems an odd thing to say to a 5-year old, but in my parents’ world, people fell asleep for good with alarming frequency. Grandparents, aunts, uncles, casual acquaintances in untold numbers all retired one night unaware that they would be waking up in a Better Place. I realize now, in middle age, that I will eventually need to make my exit anyway, so the idea of departing in my sleep seems like a great way to go. Not so when I was five.
Like all Catholic kids I did not “pray” so much as I recited syllables; This is why I thought God’s real name was Howard. (Our father who art in Heaven, Howard be thy name…..”) On one memorable night, I said my prayers, (“Now I lay me down to sleep,”) and was duly tucked in. As I was dozing off I suddenly remembered the line, “….if I should die before I wake …….” and it hit me that this prayer was some sort of an insurance policy against dying in my sleep.
I felt compelled to wake up my little brother to explain this to him. His main concern was that the Lord was lurking in our room ready to take our souls, which, understandably, alarmed him. Totally freaked out, we decided that, since death was apparently imminent , we would never sleep again and we determined to stay awake forever.
Of course we were both asleep by 9 PM but by 9:30 we were both wide-awake, in a state of panic that we had dozed off, and hysterical. My mystified parents rushed in and, gasping, we managed to explain our fears to them. My father gently explained that as long as we said our prayers each night we were guaranteed to wake up the next morning. My mother added that only bad little boys died in their sleep, so we had nothing to fear. Comforted, we both slept with impunity.
It took years before the twisted logic of these arguments dawned on me, but in the interim my brother and I slept easily, never realizing that we were the lucky products of enlightened child rearing.
