cama

I’m sleeping in my parent’s bed. I will soon be fucking in my parent’s bed. In 4 days an undetermined amount of people will be fucking on my parents bed- with and without me. Today my mom and dad drove their old mattress and the bed frame they’ve had since I can remember down to SF to give to me. I helped my dad assemble the frame and helped him screw in wood planks so that the mattress doesn’t fall through the frame like it used to when I was growing up.

I lit sage over the bed, I blew candle smoke from my altar on the bed, I burned lavender scented candles and wafted the lavender scent on the bed. I’m not sure if it’s the bed that needs cleansing for me or me who needs cleansing for the bed.

Laying in it I seem smaller. I take up about a quarter of the space I used in my old bed, which was the same size. Laying in it I remember crawling up on the footboard at 3am after one of my many nightmares to sleep in between my parents. The pickle in the middle.

I remember hiding under the bed and I wonder if I could still fit under the bed- if going underneath it would send me back into the small body of a child deathly afraid of her mother- hiding underneath the bed her father was sleeping in so that her mother wouldn’t hit her. The bed protected me. My father- asleep during the day cause he worked nights- would wake up as I slid underneath the bed frame with my mother charging after me. He would hold her off. Sometimes he wasn’t there and my mother would yank me out from under the bed by my long hair so she could beat me.

I wonder what it will be like to be beaten on this bed.

My housemate is convinced I’m gonna break this bed. I’m a little worried about that, since I broke my old bed twice in the past 3 months. Snapped the bolts. Forgive me Father, for I have sinned and my bed did the penance. The chains that stressed the bolts are gone because it’s too sacrilegious to put them on la cama de La Madre.

It seems so intimate, lying here. Comforting and scary, full of memories that I question. Was my mother really as bad as I remember her? Did I really run into bed with my mom after my sister knocked on my window at 4am trying to get in because my mom kicked her out for using and she had nowhere to go? Was that neighbor kid really touching me there, when I was 6, next to the wall that this bed sat against? Did I really go crazy that time I called my parents my junior year when they scooped me up, drove me back to their house and laid me in their bed asking me if I wanted to be there or placed in psychiatric care? Did I really try to kill myself when I was 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21? The memories are vague and sleeping on this bed, I worry that my dreams will be filled with my past.

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PS Does anyone know where the phrase "Pickle in the Middle" comes from?

Comments

[Carolina]

chamo, logan, gracias for sharing such intimate reflection... your relationship to your parents's bed brought up some memorias of my own...
abrazos fuertes,
carolina

[Storm Miguel]

my domestic partner is brilliant and beautiful!

[Maceo]

papi place a clear or white bowl filled with water underneath your bed. it will catch your bad dreams and try to give you good ones.
eres bello. plus my mami thinks your simpatico.

[Amy]

You continue to move me... with your words, stories, heart, and soul.
hugs, A.