Lost Weekend

Today's high temperature was: 27 degrees

Sunny all day

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Have you heard of that old movie, "Lost Weekend"?  Ray Milland--I think.  It's about an alcoholic and a weekend binge.

I did not have that kind of weekend.  I don't drink any kind of alcohol--never have --not even wine.  My weekend was lost in front of the TV.  I spent nearly every day--most of the day--watching the basketball tournaments--especially, the Big Ten Tournament.  

The University of Michigan won the Big Ten league.  They played us twice this year and we lost both times.  However, most of our best players were hurt and unable to play in both those games.  We actually came out of the season with a better record of wins/loses than they did.  

As the weekend progressed,  U of M won all their games.  MSU won all their games and today, for the first time ever, the Championship game was between two schools from the same State.  I knew it was going to be a good one for sure.

I knew all along we would win.  When all the players on my team are healthy, you cannot touch us.  It wasn't even a close game, so now--all my U of M friends who have been bragging about how they beat us this year, are strangely quiet tonight--as we won the Big Ten Championship and they did not.  YAY!!

That number 14, Gary Harris, is my favorite player.

I picked him out of the crowd last year when he was

a freshman and said, "He is going to be a great player."

and he is.

My guy with his coach.  Look at Coach Izzo's face--

think he is about ready to cry?

What makes this win so great, to me anyway, is that the first game we play in the NCAA March Madness, is played in Spokane, WA.  Our old coach, Jud Heathcote, (who Coach Izzo learned under) lives in that area, so...he will be able to attend the game in person.  Cool beans--right?

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I did make it to church again this Sunday--although I woke up with a stiff neck and a headache.  When I got home, I stopped at Pearl's to give them the bulletin and Pearl says, "Went to church again did ya."

"Yes, I did."

"Did you pray for us?"

"Well, during the silent prayer, I did ask God to bless all my friends, so I suppose you were in that group."

"Did you give anything up for Lent?"

"Yeah--I gave up sleeping in and staying home on Sunday mornings."

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Then Dar came over and had to tell me all about her new recliner and how wonderful it is and how she and "two of my friends" went to the "Cinema" and out to supper last night.

"I just don't see how you can stay in this house all the time.  Don't you get stir crazy?"

"No..not really."

"Well, I'm a very social person and I just have to get out with friends.  I need people!"

<la dee dah>

"Oh...I'm very comfortable just with myself." I said.  "I don't need to be on the go all the time.  I actually enjoy being alone here--peace and quiet, or watching TV and cross stitching.  I just don't mind being alone.  Maybe it's because I was an only child who grew up on a farm, with no kid neighbor's nearby.  I had to learn to play by myself and use my imagination."

"I want you to come over and see my chair.  You need one and I think you'd like one just like mine.  It has heated massage."

"I don't really need that and I told you...I can't afford a new chair.  But...I will come over and look at yours---tomorrow. Okay?"

So--off she went.  Now I gotta figure out when I can walk over there for a half hour tomorrow.  I've got a lot to do tomorrow too!!!  RATZ!!

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Saturday was the 44 year anniversary of my Mother's death.  Beware The Ides of March--use to be one of her funny sayings--she'd say it in a deep, fearful voice.  She was so young--three months shy of her 54th birthday.  Her death completely broke our family.  My sister and I sometimes try and figure out how our family would have been if our Mother had lived.  My sister was a Senior in school--two weeks shy of her 18th birthday.  She married quickly to get away from my Dad and her marriage was not good.  My oldest--my son Mark, went completely over the edge.  He was a straight A student in his Freshman year in high school and the next report card, after his Grandma's death, he was getting C's and D's  and, he refused to ever go to church again--at one time he wanted to be a minister.  I probably would not have had my 4th child.  My Daddy wouldn't have married the next door neighbor--and we certainly would have not been left out of our intended inheritance.  

Her death is made even more difficult because we never knew WHY she died.  She had been ill off and on for a year with a low blood count.  She had to have a transfusion every three months, but most of the time, she felt well.  

They ran every test known to man (then) kidney and liver biopsies, bone marrow puncture, spinal tap--and in those days, they didn't sedate you for any of those things.  The doctor's here, sent her to Henry Ford Hospital and a special blood doctor--he could find nothing wrong with her.  She and my Dad were going on a trip to Florida--for the first time in their lives.  He had the camper backed up to the back door and they had been loading it.  She and I had been shopping for new clothes for her to take.  After they transferred her, my Daddy sat by her bed for three straight days and never left that chair.  He'd put his head on her pillow and they laid face to face, whispering to each other.  I was there the last twenty-four hours.  She was conscious until the last second and it was a very hard death.  I will never get that picture out of my mind!

Even an autopsy after her death, showed no reason for her death.  It just was not fair!!!  Only the good die young, I guess.

Today would have been my parent's 76th anniversary and, although they probably would have both been gone by now--still we wonder.  They had a wonderful marriage--a fun filled, smoochy, teasing marriage.  It rained the day of their wedding, and after the reception, my Daddy didn't want her to get her pretty wedding shoes wet, so he swooped her up and carried her out to the car.  He had called ahead and persuaded the park service to open the gate and let them into the Muskegon State Park--as it was March and not opened--and they spent their honeymoon there in a trailer her father had built.  When they got back, they had to live with his parent's until the farm up the road--the house was ready to move into.  They stayed with his parent's until late August.  I was conceived in mid September.  There was no running water or inside plumbing in the house and only a kitchen wood stove to keep most of it warm.  We didn't get an inside bathroom until I was seven.  

By the time my sister was born, 13 years after me, they had remodeled the house and had hot water heat and carpeting and all that.  I grew up with my parents.  They were already established when Susan was born.  We often talk about how they were and have discovered, we grew up with different parent's--even though they were the same people.  BUT--I got 30 years with my Mother, and Susan only got 17 1/2.

Life-sometimes it can be very hard!!