The Bed

The Bed is Won

My mother entered contests obsessively. Her prizes ranged from the grand—an emerald and diamond ring by Cartier (Benson & Hedges) to measly—aprons, spatulas, paper towels. She won a $1000 energy savings certificate in 1979 (Portland General Electric), with which she purchased gigantic tank-like Amana Radarange microwaves for herself, me, and my sister. And, right around 1977, she won an enormous oak four poster/canopy bed (Meier & Frank), which she immediately gifted to my older brother.

I wish I had a photo. The contemporary design utilized the grain in a large V on the headboard, framed out by smooth, thick, incredibly heavy 8-inch planks of wood. The posts were triangular in shape, with smoothed edges, and probably ten inches in diameter at their thickest points. Canopy rails were also substantial eight-inch by one inch boards. It was planed and smooth and very modern, and massive. Each piece of it was so heavy that it took at least two people to set it up properly. The headboard was heavy enough to be a danger. I have no doubt that if it had dropped on a sleeper, it would have crushed a skull.

It looked like the most sophisticated waterbed imaginable, but it held a Queen mattress.

The Dangerous Bed Comes Home

Like anything heavy, unwanted, and perceived to be of value, this bed eventually made its way to me. But first, my brother used it, then my parents. I don’t think any one had an issue with the appearance of the bed, but my family tended to move constantly (unlike me).  I think the actual physical labor of disassembly and reassembly wore them down, so it came to my house.

My ex-husband loved it because it was so manly and modern. I didn’t, my taste ran to antique teddy bears and vintage brooches, 1940s handbags and patchwork quilts with dust ruffles. But what the heck. I found a knock off of that Aztec-looking Ralph Lauren bedding set that was so popular in the nineties, and settled into my hyper masculine bedroom.

Bedventures

The bed was cozy, I will give it that. I always liked the idea of a Swedish sleeping cabinet, and there was something about sleeping in this big canopy four poster that reminded me of a cabinet, even though, as I said, it was styled more like high-end waterbed furniture. We tossed and turned on this bed, slept with our backs to one another, conceived a child. In this bed, I had migraines, the flu, and a seriously herniated disc.

This is the bed that danced in the early morning earthquake of 1993. I woke to the sound of a distant freight train that turned out to be an earthquake. Those four massive bed posts lifted and danced a jig while I lay there, paralyzed. My then-husband jumped up, stood in the bedroom doorway and demanded, “Go get the kids.” I replied through gritted teeth, “I can’t move, you do it.” But he was too frightened.

When he moved out, I changed up the bedding and made my bedroom hyper feminine. It was all floral, all the time, with many sweet gilt-framed items of a romantic nature, and majolica, and scented candles. But I didn’t get rid of the bed. I would regard it from my prone position, imagining how I could somehow decrease the ultra-sleek, ultra-masculine nature of it.

I would (mentally) shabby chic it by painting it, and perhaps add some trailing sprays of flowers to the headboard. I would leave it wood, but wrap the canopy frame with tulle and fairy lights. I also imagined long muslin curtains gathered with ties around the end posts. It was fun to envision those things, but the hyper-femininity was a post-divorce reaction that lasted only a few years. A lot of that post-divorce stuff went back to the thrift store from whence it came. The bed remained.

Bed Travels

My house has three bedrooms, and I had three growing daughters. We all needed our own space, so I moved into the family room. The bed came with me. It suited that room better. I was very tough in that room, finding my way back to myself. I had a big oak desk, at which I was working hard at finally earning my college degree and writing the Great American Novel. All my bookshelves were down there, and my oak blanket chest, so it was a very woodsy room, and that huge bed fit right in. I was glad I hadn’t painted the oak after all. This is the same point in time when I gave away all my clothes and lived in a pair of overalls, a pair of jeans, five plain shirts, and a selection of gigantic black shoes.

One weekend, my friend Sue came to visit for the weekend. She helped me do a huge bookshelf cull (I made $300 at Powells and used the money for a brake job). Together, we disassembled the gigantic bed and took it to the garage in an attempt to invest my room with a little more Aphrodite (I can explain this at another time, but things had gotten a bit lumberjack and I was trying to usher in the Goddess of Love). We worked hard to arrange the room in a welcoming way that was finally free of that massive oak bed. When we were finished, I looked around, thanked her, and said, “I miss my bed.” She burst out laughing.

She helped me move it back up from the garage and set it up again.

Bed Tidings

I slept in this bed for several more years. It seemed a fixture, dominating one half of the huge TV room that had become the fourth bedroom. And then came the house fire. The bed didn’t burn, but it was disassembled, cleaned, and stored in the garage by the contractors who restored my personal goods. It sat in the garage for a long, long time.

One girl was at college, so it seemed like we could occupy the three bedrooms again, and the TV room could once again be a TV room. I moved back into the main bedroom after the fire. I had a new king-sized set. The girls had new double sets because those bedrooms are tiny, and nothing more than a double would fit. What was I supposed to do with this huge oak queen bed frame?

It took up a lot of space. My dad was sure that if I put it together, photographed it, and put it on Craigslist, it would sell. But to who? It was huge, heavy, completely outdated. Now, in 2023, it might have a buyer, because the standards of “vintage” are always expanding.

I’ll tell you what I did with it. I left it in the garage.

Bed Terminus

In 2013, [Redacted] (a former boyfriend) and I were cleaning out my garage after finally evicting my sister’s belongings (another story, another time). I looked at the massive bed leaning against a garage wall and considered posting it. But I doubted there would have been any takers. I had to confront this massive monster of a bed.

He lived in Salem, and was loading his truck with wood to take to Salem’s wood recycling facility. Things like old plywood, some vintage shutters I’d bought in 1990 and never found a use for, a bookcase that collapsed when we tried to lift it, a bunch of scraps saved in case I needed a piece of wood (I never did).

I probably said it quietly. “Let’s load up that bed.” And we did. All nine pieces of massive, modern oak went into his truck bed, weighing that rig down like you would not believe. He drove it off and I never saw that bed again.

You know, sometimes, I still miss it.

(if you’re ready to read more of my musings)

The most-visited post on my blog: Bachelor Beds

Another bed-oriented post that people have enjoyed: Hideabeds and me

Where to read about the end of my relationship with [Redacted]: Shopping at the Used Man Store and other writings (it’s in the other writings part)