Skip to main content

Could hear a pin drop

In one of the noisiest places in Saugatuck, last night you could hear a pin drop.
For what seemed an eternity to me,  (it was only a minute or two) Phil's was completely quiet. 

After a lovely night out and dinner celebrating our empty-again nest, I tried to get off my stool at our table, (note the operative word here is 'tried') I could sense things weren't going to end well as they began falling apart. That hardwood stool, the one next to it and me and my hard head all crashed loudly to the hardwood floor. It was loud enough to silence an entire, noisy restaurant. While laying on the floor, I saw many pairs of shoes and boots (there was a pair of tan leather boots that I particularly liked) gather round and I heard many people;

"Oh, my gosh, are you okay?"
"Did she pass out?" (that one to John)
"Can I help you up?"
"What can I do?"

I wanted to crawl on my hands and knees to the door - because while my head hurt a little, my pride hurt a lot. I did not want to have to stand up to face the many people in that packed restaurant. And I thought the Bible verse was the 'pride goeth before the fall' because my pride was wounded but very much present. It didn't go anywhere!

It was silent until I stood, and all could see that I appeared unscathed. And then slowly the talking continued. And then I started to apologize to John, to our sweet waitress, to the woman on the stool behind me that I think I grabbed on the way down, to the strangers who'd come to John's aid in getting me up, to the bartender (a man we've known since moving to Saugatuck) and then to every person that made eye contact with me on the way out. My apologies were for scaring them, or disrupting the restaurant, or grabbing them (the woman behind me) or for being a less than easy date (to John).

As I told John on the way home, I do not like being the center of attention unless I want to be the center of attention. I don't want to fear going out anymore than I already do and the incident last night will only add to that fear unless I find a way to nip it in the bud. I want to be an example of living positively with MS but if I continue to have experiences like last night, it'll be even more challenging. 

When we got home, my head was hurting a lot more and so I took 4 ibuprofen and cuddled on the couch with my worried hubby.

I saw an ad this morning for a tshirt that read "I'm not drunk, I have MS" and thought I could go back to Phil's next Saturday wearing that shirt and helmet - making light of those moments of silence and my embarrassment. John said that would be an even greater embarrassment for me and that in all likelihood, everyone else has already forgotten. 

He's probably right. And I hope by next Saturday, this Saturday will seem like a distant memory.

Comments

It's not a popularity contest, but ...

Francis of Assisi would run away from home if he lived here!

The title might be a bit extreme - Francis might just go to his room and shut the door and put a pillow over his head to silence the 'noise'. I have done that on occasion. And not because I have toddlers, or a kid that plays the drums or even really loud kids - it's because I live in a house where there is one lawyer, one law school student, and two more potential lawyers. And me - the one singing "Let there be peace on earth . . ." The other four Piggins family members enjoy debating. Sometimes, I think for the sake of the debate. John, Michael, Matthew and Delaney seem to really like these 'discussions'. For instance, we were watching a television show recently - I cannot even recall which one, but it seemed fairly bland - when one of the barrister Piggins made a comment that inspired disagreement from another barrister Piggins. That inspired another from another. And then one more from another until the four of them were debating on some point that wa...

You don't know me . . .

I stopped blogging for awhile. I know some might think that I was being lazy, or overly-involved in some community or school venture or in the middle of some really good books or projects. While all of those are true, that's not the main reason. I stopped because it felt strange to be somewhere and have someone refer to something I wrote. It was like they knew a secret about me (though secrets are not usually published on the Web) that I hadn't shared with them. Though in reality I had shared because I wrote it on the blog.  Truth be told, I don't know who reads this - I have a smattering of followers but a lot more readers. Blogger lets me see how many page views for each posting and I can even tell the referral site. The most I have had for any post was 152 and I've had readers from as far away as New Zealand (thank you Gretchen) and Alaska. Most readers are referred through Facebook. I know that if I were more diligent, I could market the crap out of the blog ...

WWJD?

What would Jesus do? I love to ponder that question when faced with a difficult or challenging decision. Like many of you, I had one of the WWJD wristbands and it worked as a great visual, moral compass. In situations like: "Should I start swearing at the driver of the car going 55 in the left lane of an interstate with a posted speed limit of 70 with the three little Piggins in the back seats of my mini-van?" First, even though Jesus never had a mini-van or children for that matter (unless you read or watched 'The Da Vinci Code' and follow the story line of Mary Magdalene being the wife of Jesus ... boy did I digress!), I'm pretty sure in this case, Jesus would not have sworn and certainly not thought awful thoughts about some idiot that didn't know that the left lane was for passing ... or how about a situation like this: You're in the express check out lane at the grocery story with the granola bars you promised to bring to your son and his team...