A mattress made of horse hair—historical, flammable. A grandmother’s hand-me-down but she was not my grandmother. There was no sentiment to keep this ancient artifact when it began to deteriorate.
I tossed it out for a Sears mattress, three times as thick as grandma’s with a pillow top and an equally high box spring to match. It proofed to be somewhat a mistake. The old bed frame was a tad too narrow for the new boxy-box so four planks were lain widthwise to keep the whole thing from tipping.
Compare this delicate balance to James Broughton’s short film, The Bed, upon which various vigorous activities were performed: Broughton’s bed rolled down a hill, was used as a trampoline, a celebratory altar of love, sex and its progeny. The bed is a place for birth and death, the womb we go back to every night, a magic carpet that takes the sleeper into the dream world. I think of Broughton’s bed when I go to bed. Sometimes when the planks are out of alignment and the mattress tilts it might well be that it is taking off.
