seymoure

“Heather Jane & the 30 Acre Bed”

Whenever Heather Jane visited her grandmother Dorothy, there were lots of wonderful things to enjoy.
Apple Butter made from scratch.
Gooseberry pie!
And aaaaaaahhh!, the home-made vegetable soup!
Grandmother also knitted the warmest clothes than anyone could ever wear
while they were sipping hot chocolate and hearing warm stories.
But at the top of the stairs was the grandest glory of all.
In the guest room Heather Jane would adventure in the most mammoth piece of furniture anyone had ever seen.
The 30 acre bed!
The giant in “Jack in the Beanstalk” could have stretched out and had room
for Paul Bunyon to sleep over.
It was so huge that it took half an hour and a fireman's ladder just to climb into it.
And once you were in the bed the magic started. If you slept on the correct side, you could get an extra hour sleep, because the two sides were in different time zones.
At the head of the bed was the most tremendous pile of pillows in the known world.
You needed a Sherpa guide to get to the top of them,
and Heather Jane rarely got further than the base camp.
Somewhere near the top, someone was carving the faces of some former presidents
into the side of a pillow.
Between the pillows echoed songs that hadn't been sung since the first World War.
There was a magnificent goose down comforter that could keep you
warm and snuggly even on the coldest of nights.
Though it was enormous, it moved weightlessly.
One night Heather Jane found out why.
In the middle of the night, she thought she heard some distant honking and went to find the sound. Through a slight flaw in the comforter's fabric she saw where the sound came from.
The comforter wasn't filled with goose down, as you would think, but with thousands of live geese. When the edge of the comforter was pulled, they would all take flight and take the covers to where they were needed.
When they got there, they too would curl up and sleep.
On the bed's "hospital corners" were real hospitals (clinics, really).
In the center of the bed was a field of dimes that had been bouncing since the early 1940's.
The dust ruffle around the bottom of the bed was so great that it had once been the curtain in a theatre. Every now and then a Vaudeville act would emerge from behind it
and, appalled by the lack of audience, return backstage.
Heather Jane (being very polite) would always applaud, but she was so far away,
they never heard her.
Once a magician came out and produced a dust bunny from his hat!
All in all, that bed was the most magical of places.
Even years later, when Heather Jane was a grown-up, with children of her own,
and the 30 acre bed was just a bed, it was full of magic.
Her children would still know that this was the wonderland
that their mother had told them marvelous tales about.
So, as it always is, the magic was passed down to the children, because it belongs to them.
And the 30 acre bed would forever be a magic wonderland as well as a comforting place to sleep.