Category: A Bit Of Randomness

This category is full of randomness that really doesn’t fit nicely into any of the categories having to do with my road to walking.

“Birthday Month” Day 8

I have learned in the past 20 years that, “Birthday Month” or not, you can still feel like garbage on any given day once you have MS. Yesterday, was one of those days for me. I was tired of being tired. I told my Mom that and I cried just a little bit.

I decided to watch one of my FAVORITE movies to make myself feel better. 20 years ago, I always thought that Edward was my favorite and his proposal at the end was the absolute best! But, as I’ve gotten older, I love the Colonel Brandon and Marianne story. His actions and the reasons for them make me love him even more:

I could not share this video without sharing this song. I remember that, “11 year old Jenny” bought this single on tape from Musicland!:

The jury is still out on how I will feel today because I woke up late. I think I will watch The Quiet Man again today. I hope to feel better once I am up and running for the day. It’s “Cheese day” today so that’s something to look forward to!

Random Tune in my Facebook Feed #5 OR Gauges

I came across this song in my Facebook feed at 1:54 this morning! Sleep, as usual, was evading me at that point. I saw what song it was and I clicked on it and thought to myself, “That’s Kevin‘s favorite band.” I met Kevin my freshman year of college. I haven’t seen him in 20 years!:

As I watched the video, I noticed the gauges in his ears. I noticed that particularly because I actually helped Kevin change his gauges in his ears to the next larger size.

I remember during my freshman year of college that gauges in your ears for guys and girls was really cool! I never did it though because I saw myself as a professional teacher one day. I opted for a cartilage piercing instead.

So, Kevin asked me to change his gauges and I figured that was easy enough so I agreed. What I did not know is what it exactly entailed! Let me just cut the suspense and tell you that it is really gross!

So, Kevin had gauges in his ears and he had a slightly larger pair in a little baggie in his hand and told me that I just needed to put them in. Because they were in his ears, he couldn’t do it by himself. He explained to me what I was going to do and I was just going to push they bottom of the gauge into the hole and then pop the top of the gauge into the hole so it was snug. But, they were slightly larger than the holes that were already in his ears. This meant that I had to really force them into the hole with my fingers. I never thought I wouldn’t be able to control my hands but I was grateful I could do it back then. That is, until I actually did it!

I used my fingertips to force the top of the gauge into his ear but that slightly larger size was difficult to put into his ear! But, here’s the grossest part, the holes in his ears bled as a forced the larger gauge into them! I think we were sitting on the floor in my room as I pushed them into his ears because my wall mate, Marissa, had class.

His ears bled as I stretched out the holes! I was not prepared for that! His earlobes were bright red and I asked him if it hurt. He said it did a little but a few days later they looked like they did when I met him. That was absolutely disgusting and I will never put gauges into someone’s ears again!

This all happened 20 years ago but I still remember it! It was really gross!

This is Why!!!

I have never used bleach in either of my apartments or in my house. I wasn’t really sure why I didn’t at first but when I thought about it, I remember growing up with bleach stained clothes. My Mom would get bleach on things when they were in the basement to be washed. When I got my own place, that was NEVER going to be an option!

Sean played Dearborn Lions football and one of their uniforms was white! His practice pants were white! So, of course I HAD to get them as white as they could get but I would NOT allow myself to use bleach because of what it has done to clothes when I was growing up. I definitely should have bought stock in Shout! but it was my mission to get the white pants as close to white as I could!

Fast forward to my Mom sheltering in place with me and moving into my house. When this whole pandemic hit, and before she moved in, I got bleach on my GMFB shirt! That definitely hurt because I LOVE that shirt and I still wore it until it got too big for me, bleach and all!

But, today, it all came full circle! My Mom has been living with me for almost a year and she uses bleach (everyone does now) except for me and looking down at my arm just before my Mom transferred me back to my wheelchair, I was completely reminded of my reasons why I DO NOT!!! This is my Michigan hoodie and this is why!:

I love this sweatshirt and now there is bleach on it!

My, “Birthday Eve” Gift

Today is my, “Birthday Eve” and I received an excellent gift today!!! Today, my Mom washed my legs. This is an extremely long process because she takes off my compression sock which I wear all day every day and will hand wash it and then she will wash my leg. She dries my compression sock in my bedroom by blowing a fan on it. By the time she is finished washing my leg, the compression sock is dry. We do this because I only have one pair of compression socks. That is because they are pretty pricey!

This is a pretty long process and while this is taking place, we will pray or sometimes listen to music as we talk and laugh. We finished praying today and she put on a playlist I made for her for a surprise birthday party that we never ended up having. She smiles and looks surprised as she says, “Oh, I like this song!”

I would have to tell her when she first started saying that that she is going to like ALL of the songs because the playlist was made for her!

I really like being able to see her get lost in a song with a faraway look in her eyes. Well, I saw that today! As this song started, she smiled broadly and I saw her dimple. My Mom has very deep dimples which I wished that I had for all of my life. Sean has one though! This is the song we heard:

She recalled a story of my Dad calling her over to the living room to hear this song. She was in the kitchen making dinner or something. I vividly remember that day! I was sitting in the living room as well as my Dad sat in his recliner and listened to the song. My Mom shook her head and waved her hand at my Dad and went back to the kitchen.

I also clearly remember this day with fondness! As she got the broad smile on her face, I looked at her and saw her dimple dimple deepen and she said, “I was talking to my sister” and then she abruptly stopped. Based on that look in her eye and the song that was playing I told her that I am not old enough to hear whatever she was talking about with my aunt!

We just let this song finish and I was so happy to be reminded of that memory and to see my Mom’s smile and tomorrow is my birthday! I think that was an excellent, “Birthday Eve” gift!!!

Great Friends AND Great Music!

A Facebook friend of mine and former colleague posted a picture of a song she heard while she was driving and it made me laugh! But before I share that song I have to go back about 11 days to a friend I’ve had since I was a little girl.

She was my neighbor, actually, she lived across the street 15 houses down, an empty lot, and a big backyard away! Our older brothers were in Boy Scouts together. We went to school together and she was one year older than me. We played basketball and softball together, we’re in plays together, and before that, we were Girl Scouts together! She texted me a song that she heard that reminded her of being in high school with me!:

I’ve shared this song before on my blog but remember jammin’ to it with her as well! We had so many great times together growing up and living so close to each other!

But then, yesterday, a friend and former colleague posted a song that also reminded her of me. We were hired in the same year and we were members of the same, “Freshman class“ (how I referred to people hired in at the same time to teach at the school). We had a pretty strong, “Freshman class!” There were five of us hired in that year and sadly, none of us are still at the school.

We were hired in at the same time I had just moved in to my first apartment. I recently reminded her that she gave me a set of extra cups that she had. I was just thinking about her driving with me to our first school kick off luncheon for the staff that was downtown at Cobo Hall. They had really big balloon arrangements that looked really cool and the last speaker told us that it was okay to take the balloon arrangement home if we wanted to.

Sean was three years old then and he really liked balloons, helium balloons. So she helped me to make cram the big balloon cluster into my car. It was crazy and I remember laughing but when my Mom brought Sean to our apartment, they opened the door and when Sean saw the balloons in our living room and his eyes got really big and he said, “Ba-woons!” And that made it completely worth the struggle to cram them into my car! She posted this picture on Facebook:

This song came out the first year we taught and we both got to work at about 6 o’clock in the morning back then.

So, both of these songs I have shared on my blog before and the memories of these friends are decades apart but they remind me that I have great friends and great music that reminds me of them!!!

3’s a Charm

Last week, my Mom told me that she would watch Laws of Attraction with me and I was totally cool with it! We watched it and she got tired and took a nap halfway through. So the next day, she asked if we could watch it so she could see the rest of it. Of course I didn’t mind at all! I love that movie! We watched that movie three days in a row and each day she missed part of it but I got to hear this song all three times it was a win for me! Makes me think of Marilyn’s wedding! 😍😍😍

Poser

So, I have always wanted to be Irish! I love the accents and I’ve wanted red hair since I was a little girl. Over the years, I would tell people that in my past life I was an Irish dancer and my name was Bridgette. I wanted to say that I am a, “Wanna-be” but I cannot say that without posting a Spice Girls video and that’s not the point of this blog post.

Instead, dI will say that I am a poser because my son’s name is Sean. He was asked if he was Irish and he said that I was just weird. Well, I am but I really wish I could dance like that or speak like that or have gown up around all of that greenery!

Sean was 10 when that movie Brave came out in the movies and he agreed to go with me just because I was so excited to hear even the Scottish accents and I decided that I must have looked like Merida in my past life!


I stopped drinking alcohol about a decade ago because MS and alcohol do not mix but I definitely would like to someday have a Guinness and get a mustache when I drink it to take a picture of myself! But that really won’t happen I think but I can always enjoy Irish music! These songs are in my head today:

I saw U2 perform once and Bono started singing this song but no one was joining in even though I was screaming at the top of my lungs because it’s one of my faves! They didn’t perform this song:

I think of Fairlane mall when I was like 12 when I hear this song:

I saw The Script perform this one; it was their opening song:

I am going to watch Laws of Attraction because it has all of those great things! Dancers with curls, accents, and beautiful scenery!

Learn Something New Everyday

A common theme in all of these Irish themed movies but I didn’t pay attention until I heard Darby O’Gill mentioned it that I started to think about it and I like Pierce Brosnan’s explanation in Laws of Attraction but I found this explanation on Wikipedia:

Still not a drinker anymore but I wonder what it tastes like. Julianne Moore says it taste like, “Poo.” Learn something new every day!

The 5th Friday of Lent

I am extremely mindful of my Lenten promise because I can’t go to church for Stations now. I really like that I have kept my Lenten promise so far! Today, I focused on Pontius Pilate when I watched Jesus Christ Superstar.

His sunglasses in the beginning and the end are totally 1979 but I would prefer something more like Bono’s sunglasses. I still cried during the lepers song and Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. When Pilate washes his hands, the red water really gets to me! I see so many of my religion teachers in grade and high school while watching this movie! The story is so familiar to me but it STILL gets me!

Conflicted

My first semester at U of M Dearborn, I was four months pregnant. After a huge mishap regarding my transcripts from my high school NOT being delivered to U of M, I think the new chancellor took pity on me and told me that I could drive to my high school which was probably about 10 minutes away, get my transcripts, bring them in a sealed envelope, and then I could be registered at U of M in time for the new semester that started the following Monday. It was Friday so time was of the essence!

Because I had only gone to Western for one year, U of M wanted my high school transcripts. I have so many memories of that day returning to my high school to get my transcripts and that was the first day I started wearing maternity clothes. I was such a strong student in high school that when I returned to the registration office, the chancellor unsealed the envelope and pulled my transcripts out. I think the paper was only about halfway out of the envelope when he looked at me and said, “Well, you’re in. Go make a, “Dummy” schedule and we will register you later.

I sat in a chair just outside of the window for the registrar’s desk and made my schedule. I already knew how to do that because my cousin helped me make my winter semester schedule at Western. One of the classes I chose was closed because it was already full so I just chose another class that fit in the same timeslot. I enrolled in a Women’s Studies class.

I chose that one because of the time slot but also because it filled one of my requirements for my degree. I have often told Sean that he did NOT like the class at all! That’s because of every class I sat in while I was pregnant, it was only in this class where Sean decided to kick, wildly I might add. He continued to do that throughout that semester and especially when I barely fit into the desk!

I really liked my prof and she asked us all once toward the end of the semester if after everything we had talked about in class if there was anything in our lives that made us feel conflicted with everything we have learned in the class.

I thought of this memory specifically because this morning, my Mom told me that she had just gotten avocados and asked me if I wanted it with dinner. Dinner is the only meal I eat these days because I drink both my breakfast and lunch because swallowing is still an issue! I thought for a moment and told my Mom that eggs and avocados sounded delicious! Both of those things are easy to chew! My Mom offered to make tortillas and how can I turn that away?!

The fact that I am eating eggs for dinner tonight made me think of the instance I shared with my Women’s Studies class that made me feel conflicted.

It was late morning and I still lived with my Parents. Two of my brothers came over and were sitting at the dining room table and were talking with my Dad. My Mom was making tortillas and she asked me to make the eggs for us all to eat. I had just awakened and I was still barefoot. I remember that I felt very strange because here I was, barefoot, pregnant, and making food for us to eat. Both me and my Mom we’re cooking as my brothers and my Dad sat at the table.

I remember laughing as I made the eggs because it was a strange situation to be in with me barefoot and pregnant and cooking with my Mom making tortillas! I’ve been thinking about that a lot today because I’m having eggs for dinner! I think it’s crazy how clear that memory still is to me almost 20 years later!