remembering the good, forgetting the bad

Life handed some me some lemons, my mother was diagnosed with brain cancer during the Christmas holidays. I was the one who made the call to take her to the hospital on Christmas Eve. I thought she was suffering from a mild stroke, at the time a very scary thought. An MRI found two glioblastomas, fast growing tumors – which turned a bad diagnosis to a worse one. Doctors’ appointments were made, surgeries scheduled, treatment plans decided. If everything went to plan, there may have been a year. Instead the family got four months from diagnosis to the day she passed away, blissful in sleep.

It’s hard to believe that when I walk into my parents’ house, my mom will not be there to greet me any longer, or to drive me bonkers as mothers tend to do. I will miss picking up the phone just to say hi, or complain about my day. I’ll miss the texts between Mom, my sister and me, where Mom would just ask for more nephew pics (she never could get enough). I’ll miss knowing my biggest fan is always waiting to hear about what I’ve been up to no matter how boring. I will miss her.

Life will continue to adjust to a major change, grief will continue to sneak up at unexpected times, and I’ll make it through.

Donna Martin Graduates

Beverly Hills, 90210 – was a show that I was not allowed to watch as a kid. My mom thought it was far too risky for my eight year old self to be allowed to watch. Unjustly, my sister could watch this show, and all I wanted to do was sneak this. I would try my darnest and just sit and be so quite on the couch in hopes Mom wouldn’t catch me still there eyes glued. Sometimes I might have gotten the first tiny bit before I was told to go to bed. I knew this show was cool, and my friends and I would call play Barbies with the character names from the show – I always wanted to be Brenda (she wasn’t so bitchy in the beginning) and my friend loved Andrea (who I thought was a total nerd). Once I became an adult I watched the entire series on SoapNet when that network was still on and was good for all the reruns in chronological order. I’ve learned many a life lesson from watching one of the best shows ever (and really could have totally spent better parts of my adult years not watching TV, but I’ll blame Mom for not letting me watch in my youth). Some of the better life lessons?  

Brandon Walsh will always be the boy scout, and Dylan McKay will be the bad boy that you shouldn't want to be with, but oh he's so broken and dreamy. You should pick Brandon, he's going to treat you better then Dylan.

Brandon works with the coolest adults in both his jobs, anyone else pick up on that the Beach Club boss is none other then Richard Weber from Grey's? Nat and Richard (cannot remember his name from 90210) treated B.Walsh with respect but also stepped in when he needed some non-parental adult guidance.

Everything can be solved at the Peach Pit. I've always wanted to have a place like the Peach Pit in my life, you know some of your friends will always be there anytime you swing by.

Mrs. Walsh (Cindy) gives the best advice - everyone wanted a mom like Cindy.

If you make a mistake, your friends will rally around you, hence the title. When Donna was drunk at the prom, because David's dad gave the kids champers, she was told she could not graduate. Low and behold a rally was held, and the entire school chanted "Donna Martin Graduates".

(pics via pinterest, pinterest,

movie memories: center stage

I love movies, going to the theater seeing some epic moving on the big screen, watching at home. When I was in college my friends and I use to have regular movie nights where we’d gather in our pajamas and round up snacks and watch old favorites from someone’s VHS collection (yep, I went to college with a TV with a built in VCR – I was fancy). It was the early 2000s and for some reason movies involving dance were big, for example Save the Last Dance, Center Stage were some we watched on repeat.  I have fond memories of Center Stage, it made me want to be a dancer even though I have little to no experience and figuring that out that dream at 19 was well, far too late in life. This does not stop me from putting on my ipod and hosting my own personal dance recital from time to time in my apartment (downstairs neighbor, sorry about the leaping, but ballerinas leap).

It’s been probably 10 years since I’ve watched Center Stage, but my memory serves as this: Girl wants to be ballerina, girl’s parents want her to go to college, but she gets into a very prestigious ballet academy in New York. The dad from the OC is a jerk, who runs the ballet company that the academy is associated with, who tries to crush girl’s dream. Girl makes friends, has a roommate who’s a b*tch, but also an eating disorder making roommate hangry. Girl meets guy who she puts in friend category, girl meets ballerino star – who thinks she's

cute enough to sleep with, but not date. Girl gets big part in jerk ballerino’s workshop for the final performance before finding out what ballet company wants her. Ballerino has a vision and its ballet for the rock and roll generation – we all dance to Jamiroquai and everyone’s dreams come true.

Honestly, I think my favorite part of that movie was some of the great/terrible music. I sadly really love the song, Friends Forever by the Thunderbugs. It’s cheesy goodness that only a movie can give you.

(photo via all posters)

party like its 7th grade

When I was in middle school in the mid 1990s, we use to have dances all the time which were probably the best thing ever. I remember the first time one of my friends and I were like should we go to the dance in sixth grade, when we were the babies of middle school. It seemed like such a big decision to go, and well dance – and it’s not like I grew up in the Footloose town. I just remember that not many sixth graders got to go to the dances, particularly in the fall of that year, by the time you were a seventh grader parents got over that fear of letting you go to a chaperoned outing (or finally figured out they could go out for dinner by themselves by letting you out of the house for 3 hours on Friday night). In true form these days, I’ve been listening to a heck of a lot of music from those formative years. I remember slow dancing to Boyz II Men (wow, some of those lyrics are racy, did I get it then?), grooving to TLC, and the weird dance the girls made up to “500 Miles” – we thought we were cool, but I prefer the notion of tragically hip.  I also remember wearing bigger clothing then I probably wear now as that was all the rage – it was like a flip between 7^th and 8^th grade when the more fitted clothing made its way back into the norm. Definitely enjoying the trip down memory lane provided by Spotify these days – some of the recommendations are so spot on it is scary!

PS – my seventh grade self -  loved me some JTT. Oh those hours of watching Home Improvement.

(photos via pinterest via )

childhood nostalgia

I went to the playground this weekend- something that you can only do if you go with friends and their children, otherwise it’s creepy. While we watched the kids play around, and climbed some of the equipment ourselves – and banged our knees in spaces meant for the under 12 set, I was reminded of how much fun it was to play outside during recess as a child. My elementary school had at the time a very large wooden playground called “The Funspace” – which was built probably 2 years before I started first grade. It was probably one of the best parts of being a kid, twice a day we got recess outside to play. I remember playing in the theater a lot with a bunch of girls from my class, spending many an afternoon at intramural sports playing the best game of capture the flag, and doing gymnastics on the hill.   My grade was also responsible for shutting down said “Funspace” during a boys vs. girls game of Cops and Robbers when we were fourth graders, where one kid pretty much got the splinter of his lifetime.  In the winter, when we use to get snow (remember when that was normal) we all would get to sled outside down a hill that ended in a parking lot – it probably wasn’t safe but it was glorious. Did you have a favorite playground game?

(photo from pinterest)