Bittersweet memories...are all I'm taking with me...

This weekend is moving weekend and I'm no different than all the damned undergrads.  I too will be carting my life around in plastic totes from apartment to apartment with the only people in my life willing to help out on a hot as hell Sunday morning.  In this move I will be inheriting a bigger bed from a friend who is also moving.  While this sounds like such a boring lead in to a story...it IS going somewhere.  The fact of the matter is, I'm not only getting a bed but also giving up my bed.  Point being?  It's MY bed.  I paid for this bed with my own hard earned credit card.  To be honest, I probably still haven't paid for it completely yet. 

But I bought this mattress set brand new.  I brought my ex with me to go shopping.  I remember our drive out to the furniture store.  I was so excited that he actually was coming with me to look for a bed that I barely paid attention to my driving.  I changed lanes right on top of someone and almost caused an accident.  He was pissed at my driving skills (or lack thereof) but I didn't care because I was leaving my old twin mattress behind for a "big girl bed!"

We walked around the store together jumping on beds and laying down and trying them all on for size.  I really wanted to try a memory foam and bounce on it and see if he moved.  He didn't.  Too bad memory foam of the early 2000's was total crap and completely uncomfortable.  I was looking for a full-size because queens were way more money then I wanted to pay.  I figured I could get a really nice full-size or a cheap queen.  Since I'm short, I was okay with the smaller bed.  

The lady selling the mattresses asked what size mattress I was looking for and when I told her she suggested a queen would be more comfortable for us both to sleep in.  I quickly corrected her and explained how this was going to be MY bed...not OUR bed.  In fact, I can count on my right hand the number of times he actually spent the night at my house and two of those nights we were already broken up.  Later he and I would be shopping in IKEA and have a very similar experience.  That pretty much sums up our entire relationship...a bunch of situations that looked like we might be happy and normal...but always something there holding him back from actually wanting to be in that situation...but I digress...

So after all was said and done I chose a nice Serta and handed over my at-the-time-zero-balanced credit card and watched her swipe it.  This was my very first purchase on this card and I was very very excited!  Just like magic I owned a mattress set!  Unfortunately for my credit score, this would not be the last purchase my Visa made.

This story makes me happy because my brother Arnold makes an appearance.  He and his friend drove up with a truck to get my mattresses from the factory.  They helped me pick them up and get them in my apartment...then they helped put the bed frame together that my parents had given to me.  It was very nice of my bro to drive the almost 2 hours just to pick up my new bed.

There I was...brand new bed...new sheets...new down comforter...new life as far as I was concerned!  I have spent many many nights in this bed.  After I bought it...as I said...my ex never spent the night so I was always in it alone.  Once after a fight we had, he stayed.  It was weird to wake up with him next to me at my house.  Five years of spending nights together and that was the first time I remember him actually coming to my place.  Here I was with a full-size...but he was such a jackass that we were forced to share his twin bed if I wanted to sleep next to him at night...but again...this story is not about bashing him...it's about my bed memories!

My two biggest memories of him in my bed were after we had already broken up.  The first time he called me.  His roommates were having a party and he just wasn't in to it.  He came over and I layed in my bed and he sat in a chair.  He had just gotten an iPod (this was huge back then because no one I knew had one) and he was explaining it to me.  His arm was sprained from playing softball.  He never played sports the entire time I knew him that required running.  Ever.  But SHE was on the team.  He played with her.  I had to listen to his explanation of how it happened fully knowing he was only on that team because she was.  I hated myself for letting him share my bed that night.

This bed was also shared with my number 2 guy.  He will always be important because it was like losing my virginity all over again.  I'd lost it to my ex 3 years prior--and even though he strayed with some piece of garbage house party slut--I hadn't slept with anyone else.  Until that night.  I met him at Partner's which was a five minute walk from my apartment.  I sang a karaoke duet with his friend.  It was Picture by Sheryl Crow and Kid Rock.  His friend was hotter...but this guy was cooler.  I ended up talking to him all night and thanks to the copious amounts of booze I had consumed...I worked up the guts to invite him back to my place.  

Let's just say we enjoyed my not so new anymore bed.  When you've lost your virginity to someone and you stay with them for 3 years after that...when you finally get to guy number 2 the experience is completely surreal.  It was, in fact, totally awesome!  I had this incredible sense of accomplishment.  I had finally slept with someone else--who wasn't my ex---who had all these new tricks I'd never seen or done before. He was taller and had broader shoulders than I was used to.  He actually had hair on his chest.  His lips were thinner and his hair was long and curly.  He was everything my ex wasn't...and he was in my bed.  Before he left he did something most other guys do not do...he asked for my number and said he would "most definitely" be giving me a call to do it again sometime.

My bed had been the spot where I was re-empowered.  My ex had mentally beat me down in to a self-conscious, scared, untrusting, loser of a person and this one act on my bed changed everything.  This guy wanted me.  ME.  He asked for my number and he did call me again.  At least 5 more times.  

Without going in to all the dirty details and all the dirty men who have slept in my bed...let's just say it's gotten it's fair share of use.  When I sit on my bed I know I'm home.  It's my bed...it's my safe place...it's where I am most comfortable.  I own it (or may very well own it after a few more payments to my credit card) and it's been with me wherever I've gone.  

I've moved this bed to about 7 different apartments since I first bought it.  While that poor bed frame I had ended up breaking (I told you...good usage) I never got rid of the mattresses.  I've been sleeping on just my box frame and mattress for about 6 years now.  They're pretty high up off the floor...it's not as ghetto as some of the mattresses I've seen.  I've just been too cheap to spend the money to buy a new frame.  I always figured I would and just never did because my mattresses did me just fine.  

With the upcoming departure of my bed I just can't help but to look back on all the good times I've had with it and really appreciate my bed for what it was, still is, and could be.  Yes I know it's just a piece of furniture...but it has sentimental value to me.  I am only willing to give it up with the hopes that my new bed will bring just as many new chances for good memories...as well as just some more leg room!

But I suppose not every memory is a good one.  I've had many many more lonely nights in this bed than not.  Hell I've even had a very drunk "friend" of mine wet this bed.  That's a most unpleasant memory that takes place in my bed for sure!  But the time comes in every woman's life when she needs to say goodbye to the past and hello to the future.  Goodbye to all the men I bought this bed with, the men I've rediscovered myself in this bed with, the men who wet this bed, the men who left this bed, the men who've never been in this bed, tears I've shed in this bed, the phone calls I've made on this bed, the many fabulous dreams I've dreamed in this bed, all the good and bad movies I've watched on this bed, all the many memories I've made while owning this bed.  

It's time to move on to bigger and perhaps better things.  Bittersweet memories are all I'm taking with me...