Seeking Comfort on Earth

This ad in the latest Better Homes and Gardens magazine looks like comfort to me!

The older I get the more obsessed I become with comfort--not so much "what is your only comfort," or comfort food, or not even so much, warm and comfy. What I dream of realizing more of is the soft side of comfy. My goal is to not only wear comfort, but to sleep and walk as if on pillowy clouds or downy pillows of comfort.

This would be heaven on earth: sleeping on a cloud like a Care Bear.

Cotton and fabric softener have been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. In my youth, April-fresh softness was only achieved when my clothes were hung on a line to blow in the Spring wind. But since the invention of dryer sheets, I have been known to occasionally triple downy (if I may invent a verb) my clothes--with detergent, fabric softener rinse and dryer sheets!

But probably more important for comfort--and health--is to find a proper mattress and the right shoes--the very foundations of our lives. I have previously admitted to "princess and the pea" standards. I have not yet (and probably never will) achieve those ultimate dream levels of comfort, in either bedding or footwear.

I have been wearing authentic Birkenstock sandals for the last two years and they have grooved-in quite nicely to my feet. The arch support is probably the best thing about them for me, since I have very high arches. But they still feel stiff and hard to me.

 I still occasionally wear heels of various heights and have not invested in a great walking shoe. I have discussed practicing "grounding" in a natural leather moccasin with no support at all. Sometimes vanity and frugality and stupidity trump comfort.

I hope that in heaven I am issued a pair of perfect sandals, which will wear well for at least the 40 years that the Israelite's sandals reportedly lasted (sermon today!) in the book of Deuteronomy. Alternatively, it might be cool if clouds would magically form under my feet as I run barefoot on the golden streets.

Coming down out of the clouds to very earthly comfort concerns, last week we purchased ($499 plus tax) a new queen size gel memory foam mattress in a box--you guessed it, at Costco! Does this mattress provide the billowy pillowy level of softness I crave? The jury is still out on this new mattress but it feels much too stiff for me. An additional layer of cushier foam could still be added on top, I suppose, if it pleases the cloud-princess.

A bed in a box that fit easily into the back of my SUV was certainly a new concept for me. It was heavy, but two 60-somethings barely managed to carry it from the car to our front door through the banked snow and slippery ice on our sidewalk. There was an ice dam on our porch that I somehow navigated, walking backwards.

(A video of our conversation and struggle would have been really funny I think--funny enough to be played at our funeral or something, if a little levity was needed.)

Once inside the front door, we opened the sealed bag in the box and the vac-sucked mattress began to vigorously and noisily grow in a way we were not quite prepared for in our limited entry space. We carried it down the hall to the bedroom and opened a second bag. With a loud sucking noise (I don't remember this--this was the husband's version) it quickly achieved full expansion.

A new dust mite-free mattress is always a good thing. But will it ever feel comfortable enough for Princess Rose?