The Wedding Shower

Today was the first day without rain in a week. Sunny and beautiful and a perfect day to spend outside, under a nice shade-tree with a book. Well, that fantasy just had to remain a fantasy because I had to go to a bridal shower.

I can't even tell you the last time I went to one of those, my god! Remember - unfortunately I can't forget - I'm in my late forties. My bridal shower days were probably between ages 25-25 I guess. I might be wrong, and I'm not going to put much effort at all into proving this, but I'm quite sure that if a friend of mine was not married by the time she was 35, she is either still (blissfully) single, or she eloped.

Anyway, the bride-to-be (I'll call her A) is 32, gorgeous, successful and has wanted to be married for as long as I've known her. Of course, like so many other young women she went through a period of dating the wrong men who were handome but with no character; and they liked having a girlfriend who had money to "loan". She's marrying a terrific guy: handsome, stable, ex-Army, City of Atlanta police officer. She's Italian, he's Cuban and they both can cook their ASSES off. Nice, nice kids and I'm very happy for them.

So this was a lingerie shower, which was much fun. There were about 20 of us, with a spread of food like nothing I've ever seen (and some I've never heard of). Ziti with meat sauce, empanadas, risotto balls, artichoke spread, mozzarella balls and basil and some other spices in olive oil, croquetas, cuban chicken spread. I probably missed some things and I probably misspelled some things, but you get the idea. And I haven't even mentioned the dessert table (holy cow)!

When it was time to go, I was standing outside with A and a couple of other girls chatting it up for maybe 10 minutes when I started to topple. Other MSers who read this can back me up here when I say that when the legs decide to stop working there is not a damn thing you can do about it. I gotta tell say, and excuse my language, I Fucking Hate When That Happens.

I was blessed to be in the presence of lovely women who did not freak out; they asked me what I needed and took care of me. They helped me to my car where I sat and cranked the a/c as low and as hard as it would go, talked to me for five minutes while I cooled off, and then I went on my merry way.

Interestingly, I'm smiling. These girls were so compassionate and curious! They all knew what MS was (as much as anyone who doesn't actually have it knows) but had no idea how it can manifest itself sometimes. They were interested in what was happening to me, after all we'd spent 90 minutes with one another at the shower and the drastic change in my ability to walk really shocked them. Poor A was upset and I felt the worst about that. We hadn't seen each other in probably a couple of years and she didn't know that I'd had some disease progression recently. Poor kid, I adore her. But I don't call or send out emails to everyone I know saying, "My last MRI showed more disease activity" or "My legs aren't as strong as they used to be" or "My bad days occur with more frequency than they used to." Why share something that's kinda depressing with friends who can't help? It just upsets them and depresses me and doesn't do any of us any good.

Anyway, as far as I'm concerned the shower was GREAT. I met some totally awesome people and OMG THE FOOD. I'm not going to need to eat again until Sunday night I bet. And I'm sure I'll sleep very, very well tonight!