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I baked some scones yesterday. These plump mounds of biscuit-like deliciousness were prepared with today’s breakfast on my mind.

They didn’t disappoint.

The fact that a faint scent of scones baking in a 375-degree oven still clung to the kitchen air made my first meal of the day a totally immersive experience.

What added satisfaction to this moment was that these were the scones that I made. Sure, I had a set of instructions to follow, but I regarded the recipe merely as a compass to guide me in my culinary quest. Had it not been for me, these would have just passed as nothing more than sweetened little quick breads at best. 

It was my vision to dig deep into the freezer to pull out a bag of ripe frozen raspberries and exhume a sealed container of white chocolate chips to complement the tart fruit. I scoffed at the notion that the unadventurous recipe estimated that I potentially could squeeze 14-16 scones out of the dough it was instructing me to prepare. 

“Nonsense!” I shouted at the stationary piece of paper. I’m not interested in making your small nibble-sized scones, I’m set on whipping up huge, big-bite scones!

I’m proud to say that despite adding an overflowing cup of raspberries and a heaping half-cup of white chocolate chips to the recipe, I barely got nine globs of sticky dough onto the greased baking sheet (I’m so proud of myself).

Into the oven it went, and 17 minutes later, the dough was transformed into handheld heaps of heaven I made for my wife, Jennifer, and me to enjoy for breakfast for the next few days.

I imagine at this point you are thinking, “Okay, Dan, that’s all well and good, but you now are exactly 295 words into this essay, and you’ve said absolutely nothing about multiple sclerosis. We actually are here to read about something related to MS. This is MS Focus, after all.”

Point well taken, if that’s what you’re thinking. And this was what I was thinking as I developed the idea for this essay:

Sometimes, I just need to not make MS the focus of my life. 

I get it that it often is hard not to as we all are dealing with MS issues every minute of the day. But the focus of the story I just shared was because I wanted to tell you about the scones that I made. 

Was it necessary to point out to you that my MS-affected bladder forced me to pause the preparation twice because I had to go to the bathroom? Or that I likely offended the baking purists because I relied on a prepackaged scone mix to help me conserve my energy as I made the scones? Or that I needed to rest for about 45 minutes before I cleaned up the kitchen after I took the scones out of the oven?

No, no, and no.

I never said that baking breakfast treats for Jennifer and I was something I wanted to do along with my MS. It was all me, the scone mix, red raspberries, and white chocolate chips. 

MS doesn’t always deserve a place in the stories of our lives, and we all have the power to omit mentioning it as needed.