Sweet Dreams - in my Texas Farm Bed

Grief is just a darn strange thing to live with.
I never know what will set it off or when I will have an unexpected reaction to something most people think is a simple and reasonable decision.

Take what happened several weeks ago.

After I spent four nights in my sister's guest room in Athens, Ga sleeping on a firm mattress it was quite clear that the familiar, too-old and soft mattress on our King size bed was a crippler. I was walking more comfortably than I had in months. I knew that old mattress had to go. I told my sister I was ready to get rid of it.

Filled with good sense and determination, when I got home I moved into the guest room where the newer mattress on my grandmother's bed (willed to me when I was a baby) was firm and easier on my back. Culprit confirmed.  I swallowed hard and called 1-800-YOUGOTJUNK. I arranged for a pick-up. They shocked me by saying they would pick it up in 36 hours.

36 hours was too soon. I knew that when I hung up the phone. I stewed about it for 28 hours. Cried over it too. I still have a very difficult time parting with anything that I have shared with Jim or that was important to him. I called and cancelled the pick-up. They said "no problem. schedule when you want us to come."

My stewing began again. What to do? I did not want to buy a new King size mattress which I did not need and could not use if I decided to move to a smaller place.

I probably should cut myself some slack and say that all the angst over getting rid of the old bed comes just two weeks from the 2 year anniversary of Jim's death on March 6. My skin is thin. All my emotions are on my sleeve especially where they have anything to do with getting rid of things. To continue -
 
More stewing until I focused on a treasure I had held on to that was stored in our basement - a Texas farm bed that Jim and I bought at a Friday evening auction at a place on the old San Antonio Loop 13 in 1958 when we were living there when Jim was in the USAF.

We had little to no furniture when we were moved to San Antonio. First we lived in a furnished apartment. When he finished his courses at the School of Aero-space Medicine he was assigned to stay on at the school. We set up house keeping in a rented house and began to gather furnishings. We began by sleeping on a mattress and box springs set on a metal frame. Then one night we saw the farm bed and we fell in love with it. We bought it for maybe $50 and drove it home in our Apple Green Ford Station wagon. We shared that bed in Texas, North Carolina and Maryland for the next ten years until we splurged for a queen size bed. When we moved into our current home we up-graded to a King size.

For a while our daughter Robin used the farm bed in her bedroom. In the mid-1980s it was retired to the basement. Even though it was heavy to move and took up lots of space, I could not bring myself to get rid of it.  Jim agreed we should keep it "for awhile."

That was 28 years ago. A while is now. My son and a young helper brought it up this evening to see how it had fared all these years in exile. I am happy to say - it is in FINE shape.

I had forgotten how pretty it is to me. How much I liked it. The bed is solid cherry - dark with a touch of red glow in the hue. The details are hand cut lines - sometimes wavering - not exquisite - just a bit of decoration. There is no water damage, no warping and it is steady as a rock.

This is my new-old bed. When it is outfitted with a good mattress and boxsprings and the white King coverlet I recently bought is on it - I am sure I will crawl in and wonder, as I used to, about the people who had it before Jim and I bought it 56 years ago.  I am guessing this bed is at least 100 years old and would have a peck of stories to tell. The first I would like to know it how it came to be at that auction place in San Antonio the night Jim and I showed up.

You can be sure I will also be remembering the days when Jim and I awoke in it every morning and went to sleep holding each other every night.

This bed will be fine - because it has connections - it has been part of Jim and me.

In a few days I will call 1-800-yougotjunk to come back and get the King Size bed. We will move the farm bed upstairs to the bedroom.

It is home with me.