Low High

Earlier this year I was super excited to head to my first concert in years. I haven't seen a live music act since becoming ill in 2006. I had tickets to see Scissors Sisters way back in 2007, but had to give them up as I was spending more time bent over my toilet or communing with the floorboards than upright. Then this year, which has been my year of worsening health and also the odd, "Screw it!" moment, I decided I was going to a concert.

I wrote about my excitement. Ella Hooper had put out a song The Red Shoes and it seemed kismet had finally gotten off it's arse and said "Here you go Michelle. After a year of shite and nearly a decade of crap you get to have some fun." In all fairness to kismet I may have misheard or misinterpreted it's words. My cognitive function can be a little poor on occasion thanks to that whole poor blood flow thing.

But here was a song about red shoes, put out by an artist I've followed for years, my shoes ended up in her fan video for the song, Mr Grumpy bought tickets, the venue was happy to help me negotiate the stairs, Ella even chatted on Facebook, and the single launch fell exactly on the one year anniversary of getting my pacemaker, Jeri, put in. All I needed was a choir of angels and nymphs throwing rose petals before me to fill in the moment to perfection.

(Artsy photo of The Red Shoes ticket in my red shoes.)

Then I stupidly declared to the world I was telling my body, "Screw you, body. I'm going to a concert. You can't stop me!" And like the petulant child it is, it raised my "screw you" with a "screw you and the horse you rode in on."

A few days before we were supposed to be heading to Melbourne my symptoms started to flare. I put on my blinkers and started some very peppy self-talk.  But things got worse, and worse. So on the day where I was supposed to be in Melbourne seeing Ella Hopper and bopping along to The Red Shoes, I was stuck in Emergency.

(Screw you body, I'm still wearing my red shoes! Even if they are squishy slippers)

I think I held it together for about the first hour, but I am not ashamed to admit there may have been tears. And for about a week after I rocked some fine ennui. Good ole Mr Grumpy did offer to still drive me to Melbourne to catch the last hour or so if I wanted, but a three hour car trip after an afternoon and early evening spent in Emergency was not exactly the best move. So I chose a pity party for one instead.

Cue a few months later and Mr Grumpy spots that Ella Hooper's album launch for In Tongues is happening in Melbourne on the 6th of December. Unbeknownst to me Mr Grumpy contacted the venue to see if they are wheelchair friendly. Sadly no, but they are very happy to accommodate me and hoik me up the stairs so I can go. After some discussion about me not wanting to get my hopes up and not wanting to waste cash again, Mr Grumpy had his own "Screw it!" moment and I am now the proud owner of two tickets to the Melbourne album launch!

(My nanna self is usually putting on her pjs and getting ready for bed at 9pm.)

So next week I am making my way to the city again. Praying to every known deity that my body will hold it together so that finally I can see Ella  Hooper sing The Red Shoes while I dance badly in my chair and sing along. No idea how long I'll last being late at night and the Summer heat, but Screw It! I'm going to give it a go.

I'm going to carpe the crap out of that diem!

Michelle

Update:

We made it! We stayed in a hotel that looked like it would fit in an episode of CSI and I am grateful there was no blue light. I frocked up. We drove into the city. Mr Grumpy carried me up the steep stairs of the Ding Dong lounge while the lovely staff did everything to accommodate us including reserving a booth up front so I could sit and see (kinda good as I ended up having to put my legs up and take extra meds as the nausea and shakes began.) I had a forbidden glass of wine and finally met the lovely Ella Hooper.The show was amazing and I had the latest night out in years. Afterwards we zoomed around the streets of Melbourne in the rain, bouncing across cobblestones and tram tracks in my wheelchair and had a ball. I was wiped out for about a week after but as you can see from the last photo I lay in bed with Freyja by the bed and listened to Ella's album.

Sometimes it really is a case of if at first you don't succeed and end up in a hospital ED, you just need to try try again, and medicate yourself to the enth degree and have a husband determined to make your dream come true.

Low High seemed the perfect pick off the new album. Amidst all the highs and lows of late I'm focusing on loving and living this life I have.

 

Remember to head on over here to donate to my Clicking My Heels For Dysautonomia, raising money for the Greg Page Fund for Orthostatic Intolerance and Dysautonomia research, at The Baker IDI. Thanks to the generosity of many we've already raised over $4,300, keep donating and hopefully we can reach $10,000 (ends Dec 9th 2014).

Enjoying the moments when they come: Ella Hooper "The Red Shoes"

(My Dorothy's waiting for me as I went into my last brain and spine MRI.
Photo via Melt Images)

To say the last few months have sucked healthwise may be an understatement. I'm in Over It mode at the moment. I have a stack of referrals to organise and bloods to get done. But instead the paperwork is sitting under a pile of worn-once-but-not-so-pongy-that-they-can't-be-worn-again clothes, a heat pack, and brain-shaped squeezy ball. Get another needle stuck in my vein or binge watch Season 3 of The Walking Dead? It's not a hard decision. Add in that I am on day nine of a headache that has really only differed in intensity from clutching my head and sobbing and sitting on the couch breathing through the pain, and well it's been a funfest of epic proportions. So when friend and fellow patient, Belinda, sent me a tweet mentioning red shoes and Australian musician Ella Hooper I was a tad intrigued.

Regular readers know my love of red shoes. I made my own pair to say "Screw You!" to illness. They are on my header and business card. I indulge my fetish for red shoes at every opportunity, though sadly my quest for red boots continues. And I am wearing my Dorothy's to every medical appointment for a year to raise awareness and funds for Dysautonomia here in Australia. Friend and fellow patient, Kate, even made me a red superhero cape complete with a sparkly Dorothy shoe on the back. I may have a bit of a red shoe problem. But it's a good problem, as problems go. So no intervention required.

I have followed Ella Hooper since the mid 90's when I first sat in my car listening to her and her brother Jesse's band, Killing Heidi, on Triple J Unearthed. Hailing from the small Victorian town, Violet Town, it was easy to relate to Ella, as a fellow Victorian, rock loving, country girl. Killing Heidi's, Reflector took off, and both Weir and Mascara became regular features on Australian radio, and our loungeroom. Weir may have ended up as one of those songs where my boys were known to plead, "Really? Not again, Mum." But hey, as a Mum, you get to tell your kids to suck it up until they reach the age where they finally realise that your music choices are actually quite fabulous. (Many music battles have been fought over the years. The battle over Jeff Buckley's version of Hallelujah was particularly hard fought. Whether I crushed their child brains into submission by repeated exposure, or they simply became old enough to realise the magnificence of the song, I don't know. But I do feel it is a sign of parenting done right.) Having watched Ella more recently on Spicks and Specks, and various Rockwiz episodes (love this duet with Dan Sultan), I also suspect she'd be a great chick with which to have a glass of something fermented, or a coffee. And that my friends, is an important factor in music selection.

But I digress. 

Ella put out a call to her fans to send in pictures of their red shoes to be added to the lyric video for her new single aptly titled, *The Red Shoes. Being a top chick and fellow lover of the red shoe, Belinda kindly pointed this out, and I of course sent in a picture of my Dorothy's. And lo and behold, there they are in Ella's video!

The song is cracking and if I could dance without falling over and face-planting amongst my rapidly reproducing dust bunnies, I would. Red shoes aside, she had me at the first burst of guitars and I was sold after the first couple of lines.

I woke up with courage

What else is there to do?

My love don't worry.

I'll put on my red shoes

Perfection on so many levels.

After much in the way of shitty health and general ennui of late, it's one of those little moments in life that make you sit up and smile. It's kismet, baby.

Mr Grumpy had agreed that we could drive to Melbourne to see her perform for the single launch but unfortunately the venue is down a set of stairs in a basement. And as much as I am keen for adventure, zooming down a set of stairs in a wheelchair, whilst fodder for Funniest Home Videos, may not be the best option. After much lamenting of my bodgy weak legs and declaring a pox on both their houses, Mr Grumpy has mentioned that he'd be happy to piggy back me down the stairs so I can go. So there may be hope yet. Will keep you updated.

But in the meantime enjoy the explosion of red shoe magic and cracking tune. Turn it up, dance, and remember to embrace those moments when they come.

Michelle :)

*The Red Shoes is the third single from Ella's upcoming debut solo album Tongues.

Ooo look mine and my red shoe sista, Belinda's shoes. 

And a subliminal flash of Dysautonomia.Woo Hoo!

It really is the little things.

Remember to head on over here to donate to my Clicking My Heels For Dysautonomia, raising money for the Greg Page Fund for Orthostatic Intolerance and Dysautonomia research, at The Baker IDI. Thanks to the generosity of many we've already raised over $2,000, keep donating and hopefully we can reach $10,000.