Can’t A Girl Just Pee?

Birthday balloon Bow Tie o’ the Day joins a frou-frou feather Bow Tie o’ the Day to honor the birthday of Georgia Grayson Wadsworth.

One set of Cufflinks o’ the Day represents the sweet slices of birthday cake I’m sure Georgia will scarf down today. The other Cufflinks o’ the Day represent the zillions of tasty food orders Georgia cooked at the Desert Drive-in (I think that was its name) and the Burger Box. I wish I owned a pair of onion ring cufflinks to have included in the picture. To this day, I have never found onion rings as incredibly tasting as the ones Georgia made. I am not stretching the truth. Even as I write this, I can taste them. And they had the exact amount of crunchy consistency. Yum in my head.

In this late-70’s photo, Georgia has interrupted me in my bathroom as I attempt to rid myself of soda pop. (Check out Mom’s superb wallpaper o’ the era. Flowers, anyone?) This took place at one of my infamous sleeping parties, which Dad tolerated with much grace.

I’m pretty sure this was the party when we got high on junk food, then crushed potato chips, in an attempt to smoke them. What wild girls we were!

At this same party, the dozen partygoers and I managed to escape from my house, most of us in only our underwear, whereupon we ran down Lyman Row. We made a ruckus down there, and Bill Cave’s dad came out of his house and chased us down the road and through many back yards. We were convinced he was going to maim us with his hook arm.

Somehow we escaped and made it back to the house– all of us with our bodies intact. Last. Sleepover. At. My. House. Ever. Dad’s grace had run out. Honestly, I don’t know why we would have needed more sleepovers anyway. At the parties we’d had up to that point, we had already done every harmlessly fun thing imaginable.

Flash forward to last summer when I had surgery. The day before I went into Huntsman, a package showed up at my front door. It contained a pair of crocheted slippers, with a bow tie crocheted into the design. It was, of course, from my old pal, Georgia. They were a sign.

I was scared about the surgery, and Suzanne was out of town. I was alone in my scaredy-cat emotions. That slipper-y gift of compassion literally kept me from canceling the operation, which I was so close to doing. Those hand-made, bow tie slippers gave me the push and courage necessary to go through with what I needed to do.

In the middle of one of the nights I was at Huntsman– after my surgery– I was in horrendous pain. I remember actually saying to a nurse, mostly jokingly, “Kill me now!” because the pain was so massive and relentless. As tough as I am, I’d had it. In fact, at some point that night, I thought I was literally going to die. I looked down at the end of the bed, and there were those bow tie slippers on my feet. And I thought to myself, “If I die, I will die with my bow tie slippers on.” I didn’t need boots to die in.

Thanks, Georgia. As I always say, Merry birthday!