Bed Head

I just bought a bed on eBay after weeks—no, years—of dawdling.

It's harder than it look, you know. At least it is when you're renting and not entirely sure you should be renting and keep trying to buy property and being thwarted by oil tanks or misleading short sales or being terrified of not being quite sure where you'll be in a year or two. 

Though I always come home after my forays into the world. We know that already.

I had a really nice Gothic Cabinet Craft storage bed when I lived on Avenue B. But there was no way I was getting it out of the room it was in without figuring out how to dismantle it (they'd brought it in in pieces) and I wasn't nearly as handy back then as I am now. So I left it for the guy who bought my place off me in 2001. 

I didn't need a bed for a while as I roamed around for MariesWorldTour 2001 and 2002, and then when I bought and sublet my Jersey City place in late 2002, I needed a bed. I got the cheapest IKEA bed in the Elizabeth IKEA and my friend Polly helped me put it together. Problem solved. 

But later after a few moves and time in storage, that bed was a bit saggy in the middle post. And during my last round-the-world trip, the newlyweds who sublet from me managed to break a leg off the bed. I shouldn't blame them. The bed frame was cheap and almost ten years old. But the fact that a floorboard under the leg also broke seems significant. Perhaps it is. I try not to give it too much thought, but I threw away the cheap particle-board bed frame when I got back from MariesWorldTour 2011. I could have made cutting boards from the slats, but this was before I'd bought wood glue and clamps and learned about IKEA hacking. 

I just put the mattress on the floor at that point, which was fine. And there it's been since January of 2012. Every morning I'd think for a second "Maybe I should get a bed." But then I'd wonder if I was going to stay renting where I am, where two sides of the bed are exposed, or if I'd buy a place and the bed would have to stay against a wall. I'd look at the Gothic Cabinet Craft beds and wonder if I should get drawers on two sides or one, and I'd go to IKEA and look at all the particle-board beds and add up the costs of the bed plus the slats and then get annoyed that the cheap beds really weren't all that cheap once you got into the minutiae of price-to-value. 

Finally, I looked on Amazon, eBay, and Economy Foam. The conclusion: You can get a simple wooden frame and drawers to go under it. 

Then I waffled over which one to get. There's the one everyone on Amazon likes, but you have to buy plywood too.

That seemed reasonable. But once I started digging, I found other similar ones, and there was even one on eBay that looked like it was made by a guy, and if I could have found a little proof that it was just some carpenter making beds, I'd have bought it, but I couldn't find out anything about the guy after a bit of digging, so I just went with the cheapest one with lots of feedback instead. 

I will probably build a few legs along the center post, just because it seems prudent. And I might shellac the bed, or maybe just put linseed oil on it. I might even add plywood to the mix. 

Next I get to think about the mattress. The one I have now seems fine to me, but given that I bought it in 1992, maybe I should try out new ones.

That might take a few more years.