Circa 2000

                                                          Life can really stink

                                         Like a hunk of mouldy cheese

                                                                                       When you think

                           You are on the brink

                                                       Of receiving something grand

But then you don't

 This poem comes to mind quite often. There's no real way to remember what the original thoughts behind this composition were. Somehow, it works.

Occationally hopes for how things "ought" to be are simply poorly thought out. For instance: I figured getting a job at the end of the summer would be a cake walk. As it turns out I am not unique in this hope. There are many with more need and better qualifications competing for the same positions.

If ever I needed patience and endurance; this is a great place to begin learning.

Babies!

Babies are awesome!

No, really. They make me go, "Awwwww!"

Hee hee!

Two of my best friends recently gave birth within a week of eachother. A little boy and a little girl. Both just as adorable as can be -- but what do you expect when both sets of parents are remarkably attractive people? Mark my words: those babies are going to grow up to be gorgeous adults. (And now, since this is the internet and therefore very easily catalogued, we are going to let this comment marinate for about 20 years and pull it up again at the appropriate time only to discover how true I am. Yay!)

I got to hold both of them this weekend! There is nothing quite as sweet as a very tiny baby falling asleep in your arms. I love being used as baby furniture: recliner, seat, swing, and bouncy chair. My body is the correct shape to accomodate babies in my arms, on my shoulders, and in my lap. They simply fit.

Ever since I was small, babies have adored me. It's true. In the grocery store I smile at infants and toddlers alike and they always smile back. It gets a little weird when the parents notice their kid staring at me and I have to try and look the other way really fast for fear that said parents will think I am a kidnapper or creep. I am not a creep. Or a kidnapper. I just love children and they love me back.

Early this year I was asked to be Nursery teacher at church. I worked with two other ladies to take care of all of the 18 months -- 3 year olds. It was a lot of fun and I love, love, loved working there every week. Unfortunately, I had to leave all summer so my position was filled by someone else. I recently substituted for one of the teachers and was surprised that most of the kids still remembered me.

One little girl came up to me, sat right down in my lap and said, "I like you!"

It was all I could do to keep my heart in place as it melted out of my chest!

"I like you, too!!" I replied, with the biggest smile on my face.

When it comes to small children I have a huge reserve of patience that has yet to be tapped. I'm sure that one day it will be spent, but for now, I choose to keep storing my odds and ends for them. How sweet are the little ones.

ET's Mom and The Giddy Human Vampire Head-Nuzzler

I apologize for my terrible grammar and run-on sentances in this post. The poor writing will stand as a testament to how freaking weird this event was for me.

Dang!

Last night I had a really . . . um . . . interesting dream.

It involved my dream-self waking up in bed while being prodded in the back by ET's mom's glowing finger. She's talking to me telepathically via glowing finger and needs a connection. That connection is my spine. Apparently ET was too young to connect with people telepathically via the glowing finger.

But his mom wasn't!

So, anyway, she's all chatty and keeps going on and on about how she's going to decorate or something and I'm like, "What is going on here?!" and she tells me about how the aliens have been communicating with the dolphin-penguins to decide if Earth would be a good place to cohabitate with the indigenous life forms. She looks really happy with her decision to make Earth he new home and oblivious to the fact that people live here too and people are a whole lot more crazy than dolphin-penguins. When I alert ET's mom to this fact she looks really confused; I was the first person she met. How she ended up waking me in my room to begin the conversation in the first place, I will never know.

That's when I start freaking out and telling her about war and how terrible people are to one another and how Earth is the least-friendly place in the galaxy and they should never, ever consider staying here because they would most certainly end up dead! I like the ET family, I don't want them floating in gigantic mason jars filled with formaldehyde fated to tour the USA in a side show run out of 1930's ford trucks behind a giant yellow circus tent!

Then her heart starts glowing and she puts her arms up and run/waddles out to the space ship. "Eeeeeeeeeeee!"

We never see the ET family again but I feel confident that I have protected the aliens from a terrible, terrible fate.

I miss ET's mom and wonder if maybe it would have been ok to let her be my neighbor. She was nice.

Next thing I know, I'm in a motor home trading the contents of my change purse and two new novels I had recently purchased at Barnes and Noble and could validate their origin in exchange for tickets to some event Noel really wanted to attend at the high school auditorium. A human Edward Cullen, who happened to be the high school quarterback, is behind the cash register. He gives me a good deal on a deluxe ticket which turns out to be the seat next to him. Edward nuzzles the back of my head and messes up my hair. Apparently this means that we are officially dating, even though I'm really not too jazzed by the prospect.  He squeals with delight because he gets to be my boyfriend and proceeds to parade me in front of the entire school.

I try to let Noel know that I can't sit with her as formerly planned. She is angry with me because she doesn't know anyone else in the auditorium and is all alone. I can't even talk to her about it because I'm being dragged up to the popular kid's section of the auditorium with the cushy seats by an overly-affectionate Edward.

I woke up very confused with a stomachache.

First Day of Fall

Tonight is the Autumn Equinox!


As a nod to Fall I made butternut squash soup for dinner tonight. Somehow my family really liked it, so we may have it again -- only with bacon! or clams! or corn! It's quite a good substitute for potato based soups.


Mmmm, potatos butternut squash!


It feels like Fall. The mountains are changing colors, there's a bite to the air, the days are getting shorter, and Halloween candy is everywhere. Yay!
The old couplet: "Fall is for falling in love; Spring is for springing out" comes to mind during this season. Every year I look forward to something/someone new to fall for. I haven't quite decided what it ought to be this year. Perhaps I'll try a new approach and stop looking.


This is a season of celebration. Harvests are over; there is plenty to do in preparation for the future without looking for more work.


There is so much to be said for being happy with what has already been accomplished and learned.


Contentment without complacency.


I love this time of year because of the mild weather and festivities. I also love it because it is a time for both new beginnings and rest. School, sports seasons, television programming, and social events begin again in full force. They don't let up until Spring.


The earth takes a break and reclaims all the things that were fresh in the Spring to recycle for next year. Lessons and changes have the opportunity to settle in the Fall. A chance to seep into the ground, into our bones, into our souls. We won't really see these changes until they are challenged by the hot sun to test how deeply they hold.

Fall is for preparing, Winter for waiting, Spring for planting, Summer for determining.

The Iris

In the fall I planted you. It wasn’t so much that I did anything, really. The hole was already there, left vacant from something that had died. You simply fell in and the earth closed around you so I let you stay.

All winter I try to forget you. But, as soon as I succeed in pushing you from my mind and stop staring at the place where you rest – safe and protected from the gales I blow around myself – you’d disturb the ground and cause me to notice your existence once more.

The only thing I have left is to wait. I wait patiently for the spring to show me if you ever intended to live.

I would dearly love to see an iris in full bloom.

A Trip Down Memory Lane: BYU

Things I miss about going to school at BYU:
1. Talking or doing Sudoku through the forums.
2. Meeting up with friends for lunch.
3. Meeting up with friends in between classes.
4. Meeting up with friends to go to the MOA.
5. Meeting up with friends between classes to go to lunch at the MOA!
6. Randomly finding people I know on campus and stopping to chat.
7. Organizing study parties.
8. Walking around like I own the place.
9. Listening to/watching performances on the steps of the Wilk.
10. Watching the looks on people's faces when I say something very loudly that I probably should have kept to myself because it may or may not cause offense to the tender-minded out there.


I got to do all of these things today! Well, except for that one...

A trip further down Memory Lane. Pay attention, children, there might be a quiz at the end!

1. Every Tuesday at 11.

2. Pretty much every day. Ashley, Noel, Holly, Robert, and I had a standing lunch date freshman year. Our lunches would typically include "studying" and last for hours on end. Mmm, butterscotch brownies!

3. Hahahaha! We called them study sessions, but you know what? I'm not convinced that anything was actually happening except that we were all falling in friend with each other. Hard core!

4. Hey, Amy, remember that time we were supposed to go to the MOA to see the Beholding Salvation exhibit but then I was certain that we were supposed to go to the library achieves and they didn't know what we were talking about but we got to see a real-live Rembrandt print of Christ teaching in the temple as a boy? Up close! With white gloves, velvet, and everything! That was so cool! Best mistake, ever!

5. Every Friday! Just be careful during the week to accrue a nice balance on the old Dining Plus card and viola! A lovely lunch at the MOA! Harvest turkey croissant? Yes, please!

6. I sort of felt guilty when my students would stop me and I could never remember their names...

7. Hahahaha! "Study" parties! Hahahahahaha!

8. Hey, Noel, Holly, Ashley, Suzanne, Valerie -- remember how we would run to 8am Inorganic Chem every morning? Yep, that was cool. We didn't look like freshmen at all.

9. Acoustic Explosion, Vocal Point, Noteworthy. . . Good stuff!

10. So this one time all of us girls were going to make dinner for the boys and then they were going to make dinner for us as a big group "date" that wasn't really a date because no one was actually paired up.

We girls couldn't decide on what to make. Someone suggested chicken marsala, but it contains wine and we didn't know where we would be able to cook chicken marsala -- for fear of being kicked out of BYU for a) having wine on campus and b) having wine on campus as 18 year old kids.

The fear was strong.

Plus, I hate wine in food! Blech!

Discussing the problems with this particular suggestion on campus was probably a no-no, but doing so while walking by the JSB right after a ton of religion classes were excused and shouting very loudly, "But where are we going to get the wine!!" is probably a very big no-no.

People actually stopped walking to stare at me.

I felt their judgment.

The judgment was strong.

So, I did the most logical thing I could think of in the moment: I ducked and ran.

What I wish I had done: Very loudly pronounce myself a lush and proceed to beg for change and a ride to the nearest State Liquor Store to purchase more vino. Because *that* would have gone over well.

This whole post was really just me wanting to share that last story.

Hahahahaha!

I've said so many things on campus that made people look at me funny. Mostly about reproductive physiology, actually. I can't help that repro phys is awesome! Come on, people, let's grow some adult brains and accept that the human body is not inherently evil! Really!!

I apologize if this offends you, my dear non-reading public-who-probably-won't-care-even-if-you-are-in-fact-real-and-not-just-a-figment-of-my-arrogant-imagination.

In short: I had a great time tromping around campus with my friends.

I love my people in Provo!

Yep, Today IS a Monday!

1. My eyeballs are tired. You know, when the lids get all heavy and the orbs feel like dry corn cob nubs? Yeah, those are my eyes. Right. Now.

2. This is my 75th post! Huzzah!

3. I have a crazy Booh-bah staring at me from across the room. It makes farty noises when you activate its sensors.

Heh, heh.

Ew.

4. I've accomplished about 75% of what I wanted today. Not bad. Good job, self!

5. The love child of Iron Man and Superman would be awesome. Nuf said.

6. Three legged pigs are lucky. Wait, what?

7. In Bali, babies are considered gods until they turn six months old. At which time, they are accepted into the human race via an elaborate ceremony. If a babe dies before that age, it's no big deal -- they were simply accepted back into the spirit world with the rest of the gods.

The baby is all like, "Yeah, thanks for the world tour and all, but I think I'll just sneak back..." *death!*

I like this veiw better than assuming that the baby is damned if it can't hack this cruel, cruel world. Poor baby!

8. No chickens disturbed me today.

9. I have had a picture frame for nearly years and have yet to manage printing off photosen to inhabit it's many portals of veiwing pleasure.

10. I've taken to saying the plural of "photo" as "photosen" in my head. It sounds more organic and biological and scientific. And just sort of weird, but that's just me.

Don't Worry About It

I love those four words today. Don't worry about it. It's such a grounding statement.

It means “Don't think past this moment because the next moment will happen as it ought to happen and you cannot dictate it's coming to be any faster or slower than it will be.”

And, “Stop thinking of the past and the future – in fact, stop thinking all together, you are taken care of and you are in good hands.”

And, “Just focus on the fun stuff.”

And, “Live right now, where and when you are without stressing over things that you cannot control.”

Today was a good day.

I was happy and peaceful and overcome by gratitude at how awesome my life is -- today, in the here and now. I don't know what is going to happen tomorrow. I have a rough outline of what I would like to accomplish, but I really can't predict the future (that should be evident by now) so I'm satisfied with what I have planned.

Right now is a good right now.