Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue

Something Old

Once upon a time, a long time ago (May 2007), my fiance, Jeffrey, and I took a trip to his parents' house for a little summer vacation. Being in love, but yet unmarried, we had to go through the usual bedtime shuffle routine. It was decided that Tom (Jeffrey's younger brother, who has Down Syndrome) would sleep in his own bed with Jeffrey, and that I would sleep in the back bedroom on the daybed. Being a lazy college student, I planned on sleeping in as late as possible, but the following morning I was woken slightly before dawn by a man's voice saying softly, "Ooooh....cozy!" as he spooned with me in the tiny bed meant for only one person. My sleep-logged body was too tired to turn around, but my groggy mind slowly realized that the person in my bed certainly couldn't be my future husband, because the hands holding my hands felt distinctly different. Finally I turned around and saw the smiling face of my future brother-in-law, snuggling in bed with me.

I slept with my brother-in-law before I slept with my husband. Yikes.

Something New

Fast forward to present day--we are once again celebrating a few days off at Jeffrey's parents' house in Fort Worth. This time I get to sleep with my husband and our dog instead of with Tommy (although two people and a dog in a full sized bed is only slightly less crowded than Tommy and me in a daybed). Sitting at the kitchen table making conversation with Jeffrey's two grandmothers, I had the misfortune of looking up at the exact moment that Tommy chose to try and scurry from the bathroom to his bedroom in his birthday suit. Problem--Tommy is not a fast runner...the war cry loving yelled by his family when he runs to 1st base in one of his baseball games is "He looks like he's dragging a piano behind him." And so, this mad dash from bathroom to bedroom was less of a streak and more of a slow pour of (naked) molasses.

At least I've seen Jeffrey do that before I saw it from his brother.

Something Borrowed

This is a borrowed story (and I'm sure my in-laws are happy to know that it does not have anything to do with either of their sons...or nudity) from one of my friends at dental school. During our summer screening clinic, my friend Sage (who has an Indian accent) received a patient with a thick Chinese accent. As you can imagine, there was quite a bit lost in translation as they went through the 8000 inane questions on our health history questionnaire. When Sage asked, "Have you ever had surgery?" The man responded by pointing to his pelvis and nodding in the affirmative. Sage asked for clarification, "You had surgery on your hip?" The man shook his head and pointed lower, apologizing that he didn't know the word in English. Sage asked, "Did you have surgery on your thigh?" The man again shook his head and tried to say a word to explain. While Sage quizzically looked between the patient and the computer page with a blank space next to surgeries, the Chinese man suddenly figured out the best way to explain. Quietly he stood up, turned around, bent over at the waist, backed his rear up to Sage's face, and pointed precisely to his anus. Sage quickly typed "hemorrhoids" into the computer form and prayed that no one had seen his patient's about face.

Something Blue

School starts again for me on Tuesday, and in an act of sheer rebellion, I got a blue feather clipped into my hair. When I went home my husband looked at me like I'd lost my mind. I told him that feathers in your hair is a big trend right now, but he didn't believe me until I found the news story that my hairdresser had told me about. Apparently, this feather trend is so popular that fishermen (who use feathers to make their lures) have been unable to fish in some areas because all the feathers have been bought up by hair salons.