Behind the Curtain

Do you remember the character of Gladys Kravitz on “Bewitched?” She was the lady who lived across the street from Samantha Stephens—she was always lurking in her curtains, watching the strange happenings at the Stephens’s house. I am very much like Gladys Kravitz. I’m a watcher, an observer—I have an insatiable curiosity about other people and the way they live. My dad, who has an affinity for acronyms, calls me a POTC—a Person Of The Curtains. If you’re a fellow POTC, this post is for you. I’m giving you full permission to lurk in your virtual curtains and look straight into my house—right into our bedroom window at night. This is what you’ll see.

When Monty and I are ready for bed, I tell the boys, “Come on! It’s time for bed!” and all three of them run in and jump on the bed before we even get in the bedroom. Each of them has their own place on the bed. Seamus Territory is my half of the bed—Seamus has his own blanket and far more room than I do. Carrick Land is the bottom half of Monty’s side of the bed. It’s not unlike Candy Land, if Candy Land was inhabited by a naughty leprechaun who occasionally dared to invade enemy territory, prompting swift retaliation from its occupant. And then there’s Mt. Mackin—Mackin’s area, which is any place he can find to perch on Monty. When Mackin falls asleep on his perch, he rolls off Mt. Mackin and into Seamus Territory. Seamus responds by pushing Mackin out of his territory and down into Carrick Land, where Mackin settles next to Carrick. Once Mackin and Carrick go to sleep, Seamus bites my arm to let me know he wants me to lift up his blanket so he can sleep underneath it.

While the boys are settling in, Monty and I watch TV. This isn’t a peaceful activity. Monty’s an engineer who loves gadgets, and over the years I’ve given him gadgets and gizmos galore. Two of these are in our bedroom. One is a voice-activated alarm clock named Ivy. When Monty wants to set it, he says, “Hello, Ivy.” And Ivy the clock responds, “How may I help you?” To turn her off, you say “Cancel.” If you don’t say it fast enough, Ivy will start listing all the ways she can help you. The other gadget is a Star Wars themed version of the Clapper—one of those “Clap on, clap off” devices that turns a lamp on or off when you clap. This Star Wars one doesn’t just turn Monty’s lamp off or on. It does it with a James Earl Jones’ voiced Darth Vader proclamation—either “You underestimate the power of the dark side” or “The force is strong with this one.”

Sometimes the TV sounds trigger Darth Vader to turn Monty’s lamp off while saying, “You underestimate the power of the dark side.” Ivy the clock responds with, “How may I help you?” Monty or I say “Cancel” to stop Ivy, and Darth Vader’s response is to turn the lamp back on with “The force is strong with this one.” Ivy listens to Vader, not to us, and starts asking if we’d like to set the time. Settings? Alarm greetings? Timer noises? Vader answers each question while turning the lamp off and on. This happens a few times while we’re watching TV, and we’ve both gotten so used to it that we just keep watching while hollering “Cancel.”

The problem is when the train rolls through town sometime between ten and midnight. The sound of the train makes Seamus angry. If he hears it before we do, he’ll pop out from under his blanket and start growling. This wakes up Carrick, who thinks it would be an excellent time to make a foray into Seamus Territory. If we don’t stop him, Seamus will. And I’ll just say that trains put Seamus in a fighting mood. So when we hear the train, we immediately switch our TV input to the Fire TV Stick and tell Amazon music to play “Candy Shop” by 50 Cent. This might seem like an odd choice, but it’s a deliberate one—it’s the only song we’ve found that covers up the sound of the train. If we act fast and time it right, Seamus stirs but doesn’t get up, so Carrick doesn’t either. Meanwhile, Monty and I are listening to 50 Cent singing “Candy Shop” at full volume, which triggers Darth Vader, which wakes up Ivy. So our bedroom is vibrating with bass while the light rhythmically turns on and off. And this ensues:

“The force is strong with this one.”

“How may I help you?”

“I’ll take you to the candy shop. . .”

“Would you like to set the alarm?”

“Cancel!”

“You underestimate the power of the dark side.”

“One taste of what I got. . .”

“The timer has been set for seventeen minutes.”

And so on and so forth until the seemingly interminable train finally rolls out of town. The other night, after “Candy Shop” stopped, and the light stayed off, Monty said, “You realize this is crazy, right?”

I said, “You realized when you married me that this would be your life, right?”

He smiled and agreed. Then he kissed me good night, rolled over, and said, “Hello, Ivy.” Ivy asked how she could help him. He responded, “Set alarm.”

And with that, I’ll close the curtains.