Reasons to be cheerful

The one who got away came back My daughter Cornwall My sister My nonbiological sisters Tequila Dancing My home

We'll always have Paris......

Looking forward to celebrating my birthday in Paris with some of my best friends! Antique market in the morning followed by lunch on the left bank. Am hoping to find the elusive art deco clock which will make my life complete....until I want the next thing.

Things can only get worse

I think it has been over a year since I blogged. Am going to try to devote more time and energy to my writing in the next few months, and this seems as good a place to start as anywhere. It was intended to be a way of expressing my feelings about my MS and its progress (wrong word because it has connotations of things getting better, and MS can only get worse). My hairy neurologist tells me I am officially in remission. Of course that should make me happy, but there is always the ying and yang of MS - remission and RELAPSE. So being the glass half empty kind of girl that I am, the word remission only reminds me that I have a degenerative illness and that slowly but surely my body is attacking itself. Typical bloody competitive me, can't even let some virus or bacteria get the better of me, it has to be my own body!
Apart from the mental stuff, I feel a bit of a fraud when I go to the MS clinic. Crutches and wheelchairs are a very visual indicator of the disease, but the exhaustion aspect, which along with my vision problems is my main symptom, gets little sympathy. The only way I can describe it is that you simply feel like if you have to move an arm, your head, or your little toe, the effort it will take will kill you on the spot. You literally feel like life is draining out of you body through your legs. The memory of this haunts my remission and the ghost of MS past and MS future is always present.

Signing off for now

Was tempted to call this entry 'Blog Off' but it doesn't seem quite right as I am the one withdrawing temporarily. I am facing some medical stuff next week which I am finding hard to cope with, as well as lots of mental stuff which is even harder. When there are people suffering real disaster in this world, I am going to withdraw for a little while and just get on with my life, rather than trying to make sense of it through writing, because there is no sense to any of it anyway.

Cursed

Another friend at work hit with a cancer scare. Thinking of her xxx

Tabi

I don't know if you are reading this, but please know I love you.

Barcelona.......

Just booked our salsa trip for April! Very excited, a group of 7 of us going to dance the nights away at Mojitos. Seville in 5 weeks too, Cornwall in the summer (and I even found a salsa bar in Gwithian last year!).

Life according to Michael part II

I'm not superstitious. I'm a little stitious.

Life according to Michael

Do I want to be feared or loved? Easy - both. I want people to be afraid of how much they love me.

Heavy heart

The painkillers are fairly useless today, and I am feeling like crap.

I have so many amazing people in my life, which is lucky because I certainly have a vacancy in family.

I am back to thinking of my family as 4. Which is more than some people, I suppose.

Lo siento tan que le lastimo. Perdóneme.

New Year

It was never my intention to use this blog as a public forum. It is an attempt to make some sense of what is going on with me physically. I apologise to those people who seem to believe that I am using it to attack them. I am not going to close the blog because I actually value it as a way of communicating with my friends without boring them shitless about my worries. They can read it when they feel like it, and choose not to if they are having a bad day.

Out of action yesterday and most of today because I have had my wisdom teeth ripped out of my gums.

Regrets, I've Had a Few....

....but then again, too many to mention. I don't understand how people can't have regrets. Does that mean that they would lead their lives in the exact same way if given the opportunity? I certainly wouldn't. I have tonnes of regrets.....whole years of regrets!

Saying unkind or spiteful things to a whole host of people.
Not always being true to what I believe.
Being weak and unassertive when people said or did unkind or spiteful things to me.
Being hungry for my entire 20s and early 30s - I am now an enormous two sizes bigger, and the hell difference does it make?
Edward Bigden. Every frigging year of our relationship (see all of above).
Babies lost.
Not studying more languages when I was younger - it's such an enormous effort of concentration now.
Not respecting my body, but hating it instead.
Not talking to people in lifts. Who knows what I might have learned?

Having regrets is not the same as denying that those experiences made me what I am right here, right now. I just wish I knew then what I know now......I guess that is the real regret! As they say, youth is wasted on the young.

Christmas, interrupted.

Well, hopefully in the next couple of days we will resume plans to travel to the far North! We actually had an absolutely lovely few days and it was a real joy to see Josh on his birthday for the first time in 15 years. I can't believe my little nephew is 29.
Being at home has meant loads of extra TV viewing which I have relished. Lots of films, the glorious David Tennant in Hamlet, catching up with DVDs.....from the ridiculous (Bruno) to the sublime (In the Loop).
I went to dad's flat today and for the first time since he died felt a real sense of peace there. I was trying to explain the idea of purgatory to my little one (rather a tricky one) when we were watching Hamlet. It is almost like dad has moved to another, more contented place, but is still here at the same time. Maybe he has moved on from purgatory.
A very hopeful link on the family tree with the Schoenlanker branch, with excited emails to and from the States. Lots of very careful work needs to be done - I need Claire or Melissa! My own rather romantic approach is not good enough, I fear.
Anyway, Cranford calls......

You spin me right round baby right round

In an effort to avoid alcohol and trans-fat overdose, I am thinking about the year almost past/passed. It has been less of a roller-coaster, more of a ride on the tea-cups. But I am going to focus on the great things and try to kid myself I'm a glass-half-full kinda girl.
Dallas
Napa
Meeting Melissa
Latin Fever
Cornwall beach house
Salsa lessons with Hannah
Getting a near-telepathic TA
It's a Wonderful Life in Ipswich - the best production I've seen in years
Riga hotel, spa architecture and synagogue
Teaching Year 6 again
Bar Salsa
Dishy doctors
Spanish lessons with Angel
Watching Molly grow more feisty everyday
Reading ellaminnowpea
Elbow concert
Lille
Snow
Looking forward to Seville and Barcelona!

Northern Soul

Up now to the even-more-frozen North for Xmas. Looking forward to seeing the moors covered in snow, and almost certain for a white Christmas. Wimped out of the James Bond party last night due to the snow, and also partly due to the fact that my eye has been bad and I didn't think that excessive salsa was the answer (for once). Also my Miss Moneypenny outfit didn't quite hit the mark and was worried that people would think I'd just drifted in from work without bothering to change! There is a fine line between sexy secretary and sad city employee on the verge of redundancy.

Elaborate plans have taken place with late night shuttles of prezzies to the car so that my little one doesn't realise that Santa is a big fat lie - whoops - a magical miracle.

So, with Christmas cheer hopefully powering us up to Lancashire, adieu to yer and yer and yer.

Lost love

Every waking day
My head is filled
With the presence of my father
His voice telling me
Over and over how he loved me
As if I must learn it

That was the Decade that Was

All the Sunday papers are full of reviews of the decade which has started me thinking about some of the things that have happened to me....
got married to Rob
moved house
had a baby
changed jobs twice
lost a parent
found a brother
met my paternal cousins after a gap of 40 years
travelled to the Czech Republic, USA, Holland, France, Spain, Israel, Poland, Latvia
lost my vision in one eye
made some great new friends who will be friends for life
carried on dancing
started playing tennis again
found out that I have an abnormal brain
continued my on-off relationship with prozac
got a new car (new to me, not new)

Wow!

Keeeeep dancing!

Strictly Finals night - OK maybe the disco ball and light box were a bit over the top but we had a fabulous time, and it didn't matter who won. Darrrrrling!

Eurostar

If I had taken the train two hours later, I would have got stuck! Those poor people.

Frozen

Oh My Goodness......the cold!

Had a lovely two days in Lille, looking in art galleries and taking many stops in cafes. Lovely Christmas market where I had the most amazing hot pear cider. Great toy shops and lots of clothes shops - basically heaven. Even the waiters didn't scoff when I asked for something vegetarian.....roll on Spain! Was a bit of an anti-Atkins carb fest, but vegetarains can't be choosers in Europe.

Strictly Finals party tomorrow night, and am wondering how I'm going to juggle the children and adults so that everyone is happy. Hang on, maybe if I juggle the children, the adults will be happy. Or knowing my friends if I keep them supplied with sufficient tequila that will keep them happy. The adults, naturally.

Missing my family in America.

Twitchy hand, which I am trying not to think about. New round of neuro appointments came through for the first week of the new year. And, joy of joys, I am having my top wisdom teeth out that week too. Wow, how much am I looking forward to 2010.