Things That Go Bump in the Night 3/15/2026

By: Jennifer Richardson Holt

None of us made it last night.

One of us doing that is standard fare. Two of us is isn’t unusual. But all three of us? That’s distinctly rare.

My husband was first, as he pretty much always is. If more of us are going to join in, it’s usually me next. My daughter almost never participates, though last night she wholeheartedly did. To be fair, it had been a busy week—lots of travel and activity that was out of the ordinary for a variety of reasons. I suppose that explains why we were all a bit drained and ended up as a pretzel of familial snoozing humanity on the couch. Even the cat and dog were sprawled among us.

Bedtime crept up in ambush mode.

Going to bed can be a surprisingly complex production in a home—especially one that includes pets and children. Considering how many people I’ve heard complain about trouble falling or staying asleep, I suppose bedtime could be complicated in most homes.

There was a time when it was downright torturous in mine.

When my daughter was around two years old, we hadn’t lived in this house very long. She had just transitioned to a toddler bed, and her comfort with that idea was roughly comparable to how comfortable someone might feel lying on a bed of nails… inside a volcano… with a porcupine on one side and a rabid hyena on the other.

I feel like that paints a reasonably accurate picture.

Eventually, in an act of pure desperation, we moved her toddler bed into our bedroom. Mainly because at some point in my life I was going to require sleep, and the nightly marathon of crossing the house every twenty minutes to console her hysteria was making that increasingly unlikely.

Even with this drastic measure, my night would begin with me lying on the terribly uncomfortable floor beside her toddler bed until she finally settled.

Eventually—thanks to God after a great deal of agonizingly exhausted prayer—this phase passed. If I’m honest, whatever bedtime dilemma arises now will very likely (please Lord, do not test this theory) be minimal compared to the wearied anguish of that stretch of time.

In the last several months, however, it has been the non-human residents of my home who have introduced a bit more convolution to a good night’s rest.

Both the feline and canine are perfectly content with the process at first. The cat usually nestles against a throw pillow at one end of the couch, and the dog—spoiled rotten creature that she is—makes herself comfortable under the covers at the bend of my legs.

Everything starts off nicely.

It is later in the night when things go awry.

For the dog, there is occasionally the sound of a pack of coyotes outside. She then insists that she must go out (fear not—my yard is fenced and she cannot venture into the wilderness where her wild cousins are making their racket), and she must contribute to their noise factor.

So that’s lovely.

You scramble to shush her frantic barking and clawing at the door in hopes of not waking anyone. Then comes the pleasure of standing on the back porch in a state of angry semi-consciousness while she assures herself she has adequately voiced her sentiments.

Thankfully, this does not happen often. But when it does, I can think of no adjectives more accurate than obnoxious and ridiculous to describe the whole escapade.

There is also the faint, back-of-the-mind concern about why coyotes are that close to my house—but not quite enough concern to keep me from flopping back into bed afterward. Usually after moving a curled-up dog out of my spot.

She is a bold one.

And it isn’t just the dog. In fact, more frequently it’s the cat who has developed a rather nasty habit.

Around the witching hour of three a.m.—and we’re going to assume this is purely coincidence and not evidence of possession—he has decided it is a good time to sing the song of his people.

I do not mean simple meows.

No. These are long, haunting calls that very often sound unsettlingly like human wails. They are equally disconcerting and annoying.

The only conclusion we can reach is that he either wants me to get up, or he wants his canine sister to wake up and play with him. Why he has decided that the wee hours are the ideal time to introduce this activity plan is beyond me.

We won’t even get into the fact that occasionally the dog accepts his invitation and goes flying from under the covers at full, growling sprint to give chase.

Not the time, furry siblings. Not the time.

Mostly these days, though, it’s my husband dozing off while we watch television. Occasionally I join him, though mine is usually only in small spurts before I insist that my daughter and I go complete our nighttime routine before I become incapable of doing so.

Most nights, rest in my house eventually settles into a familiar pattern.

My daughter sleeps in her room with a stuffed unicorn perched on her head and a kaleidoscope of multicolored lights dancing across her ceiling. I’m in bed with the dog curled at my knees. And my husband eventually stumbles to bed whenever he finally stirs from the couch.

All in all, it’s a relatively peaceful scene.

Perhaps it isn’t exactly traditional in every sense of the word.

But for us, it feels like home.