Sleeping Around

Inspired by the writings of my wicked smart funny friends Jesse Seret (Perfect Calm), Trish Deitch (Distant Dock), Jessica Schickel (Chagrin and Bear It), Jen Sincero (Hey Little Bad Ass), and Janine Schulz (Oiling of a Rusty Mind), and encouraged by people I’ve met here and there, I will now commence the blog. Maybe just about beds. Maybe about other things too. But the beds are a constant. I’ve been keeping record of every mattress, hammock, waterbed, and couch I’ve spent the night on for some time, as many of you know.

Not every bed makes it into the bed collection. Sometimes I forget to take a picture. Once my computer was stolen on a night train in deepest India and I lost an important year of photos. Sometimes the beds in which I’ve slept would cause too much of a stir if made public, so. But there are lots beds in the bed collection. And stories behind each one.

If beds bore you then there is still some hope for us having a blogger/reader relationship. Let’s see how it goes. I’m only about 80% comfortable with this set up and welcome your input.

Love and kusheln from my red velvet bed in Berlin,

Noa
June, 2010
~ Monday, September 19 ~
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Over the Atlantic (September 2, 2011) —Virgin flight 10 took off from JFK at 10:40 p.m.. My mom drove me to the airport which was really nice of her. Sometimes these drives to and from the airport constitute the most meaningful moments of my whole visit. The flight was full. My seat would not stay reclined. I forgot to take a picture of it which is just as well because I couldn’t sleep all night. Instead I watched a very good Danish/Swedish film, In A Better World, and then some documentaries. A beautiful girl, maybe a model, was seated next to me and neither of us accepted any of the odious plastecine food products offered from the carts and for this I was happy. We quietly drew our white line in the sky over the Atlantic, blinds drawn. I arrived in London at 10:40 in the morning and took the tube to Earls Court, then switched to the Wimbledon train for two stops to Fulham/Broadway. Lucinda met me at the station and it was so good to see her face in the crowd. We took a double decker bus to her house, a stinking drunk middle aged man slid around in his seat wasting this gorgeous fall day. She has a sweet home and I was relieved to take a quick shower. Then we met a rare constellation of friends—Emily and Tangthong Tulku—and walked to Bishop’s Park where we were joined by Claire. We bought a delicious picnic lunch at an Italian deli and sought out some tea and cookies at the park cafe. There was a wedding in the Bishop’s home, a big one with men in top hats and tails, women in extremely uncomfortable shoes. I counted about $30,000 worth of baby carriages parked in the grass under a big blue comfortable sky.

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After a few hours, Claire drove me back to Heathrow, which was really nice of her. All these kind ladies. The whole beautiful day cost about $30. Virgin flight 300 to New Delhi was nearly empty. The air hostesses wouldn’t let us spread out and take the empty seats, a ridiculous bit of red tape. But I told them a story and for my fiction, I was rewarded one of the empty rows. I had two seats to myself with a window and room to curl up sideways. I watched a thrilling documentary on the race car driver Artyon Senna and a documentary about the history of time. When I looked out the window, it was daybreak over Afghanistan. This world we live in.

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My carry on was overweight so they’d made me check it and only here, above Kabul, did I remember that all of my money for the next year, in cash, was in pouch in the bag, which was unlocked. I had a moment of panic, then decided that’s simply not a story that’s going to be told. I am keeping things together.