Summer Time

~The tans will fade, but the memories will last forever.
~Anonymous

I've just been thinking about how summer goes by so fast. I can't believe this summer is already half over. Yes, it seems like it's been forever since I went to class, but at the same time I can't believe it's been two months. Summer is usually a time when the days slip peacefully by. We don't have tons of family vacations or big events-just bein' lazy and spending time with family :)

So, I found some pictures of summer activities from the last couple of years. Haha, some of them are from five or six years ago but I liked the pics :)

Banana boats we cooked? roasted? in the fire pit out back :)

Jumpin' on the tramp

Cousin's from Arizona on the Merry-Go-Round :)

Chocolate dipped strawberries-probably more fun to make than to eat :P

Swimming up at Snowbird

Sparklers!

The fire museum in Toole

Swimming with the brothers again

Walkin' around the lake in Arizona-well, we stopped for the pic :)

Same family reunion in Arizona-not sure what we were doing-but the picture was called "Family Discussion about Zip line" :)

Camping trip to Lava Hot Springs-or is it Hot Lava?

EFY!!! Never mind my face-it was AMAZING!

I Wish

~Everyone who has ever taken a shower has had an idea. It's the person who gets out of the shower, dries off, and does something about it that makes a difference.
~Nolan Bushnell

So, I spent a good chunk of yesterday and a few hours already today typing up my journal from sophomore year. I've probably said that before-as I've been trying to do it for over a month. It looks so much neater typed. Though, I am appalled by my many spelling, grammar, and usage mistakes :)

I don't know if it's true, but in middle and high school I heard a lot of comments about how we would wish we'd worked harder in school... I wish I had worked less. Yes, I am extremely grateful I have my Associates Degree and the scholarship that came with it. Yes, I always made Honor Roll and was a Sterling Scholar. Yes, I learned to work hard and get everything done on time. And I have a half-tuition scholarship through BYU... I'm not saying I would want to give all that up. But I just wish I hadn't been so bent on always being the perfect student.

I can't tell you how many times I wrote in my journal about staying up until 2 or 3 in the morning to get homework done, getting up early to do homework, sitting in the commons or lunch room doing homework, not going to dances, games, pep rallies, concerts, plays, or simply not hanging out with friends... and doing homework. I measured my days by how much homework I did. Every time we had free time or I finished my assignments early...

It wasn't until senior year that I started to let some things go. My grades were still good-I started to get B's, but they were in my concurrent classes and night classes at SLCC. I learned what it was like to sluff! I was tardy, and proud of it. I learned how many attendance points I could rack up without going to attendance school. I talked during class and didn't always take notes. Sometimes I turned in homework late. I went to almost every football game and hung out with friends after. I joined a few clubs-though I have to say I had ulterior motives-like being able to put it on college applications and getting in the yearbook :)

I just wish I'd learned how to have fun before the last six months of high school. Yes, I still spent plenty of time doing homework-I did a lot to get my Associates two months after I got my high school diploma. But I think I learned better how to balance everything. I can't say I'd go back and do it differently because I think I had to experience what I did in order to learn from it. Besides, as much as I enjoyed parts of high school, I am glad that it is over :)

Hands-Braided Essay

~What can you ever really know of other people's souls-of their temptations, their opportunities, their struggles? One soul in the whole creation you do know: and it is the only one whose fate is placed in your hands.
~C.S. Lewis

This is a braided essay I wrote last fall for creative writing. It's a little rough but I spent so much time trying to make it what my teacher wanted that I got sick of changing it :)

Hands

When my father held my hand his rough skin would rub over mine. I hated the feel of skin rubbing together again and again, yet I never stopped him. His dark and tanned skin was usually splattered with drywall mud. My little brother and I would flake it off when he got home from work. Every day when Mom would start dinner I knew dad would be home soon. And every day it was a big deal. Like when he left in the mornings and we would stand behind the glass front door and watch him pull out and drive away. We blew kisses and sent him hugs. Wrapping our arms around ourselves we twisted back and forth. Standing at the frosted front window I never knew what he was off to do. He went to work; though that didn’t mean a lot to me then. I knew he came home covered in drywall mud but I didn’t know what happened in between.

Mom’s hands are softer than dad’s, smaller than mine. Yet they have so much to say. They haven’t worked with the heavy tools or done rough work like my father. They are worn from years of being soaked in water, doing dishes, mopping floors, and washing windows. They have experienced so much more than I could ever know. Still, their work is never done. For me, it was always more visible than my father’s, for years I just never knew to call it work. Somehow Dad leaving and the farewell we gave him everyday made his job so different from Mom’s.

Mom started working when I was three. The small room in our basement became a classroom and I was one of just six students. We danced and sang, painted and read. I learned my letters, my colors, how to draw and color and play with friends. I would lie awake at night listening to her stop and start music over and over for the next school day. She coordinated with Dad to make sure I was busy when they got ready for preschool parties and special activities. I never knew what we were going to do each day in class. Every night I would climb on Dad’s lap and pull my papers out of my bag to show him my work. He wasn’t there when I did it in class; even if he was the one who copied the worksheets. I never really saw Mom teaching as a job. It all seemed so natural to me. We didn’t send her off to work like Dad. She never left us.

When I was little I wanted to be a ballerina when I "grew up." I was unaware that every other little girl wanted the same thing. Back then dancing was something I looked forward to. Not knowing how much work it would be or that it had the label ‘job’ made it exciting. I would dance around my house, unashamed that I didn’t have the moves down right. I was never worried what anyone would think about my dancing. It wasn’t until I was eleven that self-consciousness set in: my mother found me dancing and snapped a picture. For some reason I was distraught to think that she had captured my practicing forever. She told my dance teacher how I danced everywhere I went. I guess it wasn’t bad because she said that was what good dancers did.

My niece and nephew pretend. Lilly is four years old and plays doctor. She pretends she is sick or makes her brother lay down so she can take care of him. She is very matter of fact about it. Someone is sick, this is what you do, and they will get better. Mahone is three now and last I knew, wanted to be an astronaut. He gets so excited when he sees the moon his eyes get big and he talks on and on about it. Casually he tells me he will go to the moon again someday with his daddy. He thinks he has already been because he walked on ‘the moon’ at the museum. It fascinates him and he does not consider it a job or think about making money or what it will require for him to make it there. Nothing is out of reach for children. They don’t know what the costs are; what failure is.

My dad pulls in later now. Sometimes we eat without him. He does not receive a warm welcome of running and hugging nor does he always come inside right away. At times I watch him climb out of his truck, limping slightly, carrying heavy tools to the shed before pulling out the lawn mower. Pushing the mower in straight rows over the stringy grass, hauling preschool toys out of the way and shoveling up apples under the tree, he never complains. He works until he collapses, usually in his leather office chair. He doesn’t always get much done around the house but he is always doing something.

I had a job over the summer one year. I did not go looking for one but took it when it came. It was different everyday; different place, different customers, different managers, supervisors, and co-workers. I worked for a carnival company. We met at the warehouse in the kind of neighborhood you wouldn’t expect to see life in. We loaded trucks and trailers with games, toys, and inflatables, and piled in fifteen-seater vans that pulled our rock walls. From set up to take down it was almost always fun. The long days in the heat were made bearable because those were the days we had huge breaks when no customers came. We rode the rides, played with the prizes, and joked around. I didn’t make much money but that I made any having so much fun was a reward in itself.

I used to look at my little brothers hand in mine and marvel at how small it was. He is two years younger than I am, but I felt so much older back then. I remember the day that I realized his hands were big, that he wouldn’t always be my baby brother. It was a sad day. Now I look at the small and soft hands of my nieces and nephew and wonder at all the things those hands will do in the years to come. More than likely they will do things they never expected to do. More than likely they will not do all the things they wanted to. This is not to say that they won’t be great, they just won’t be great the way they expected.

Recess

~You are worried about seeing him spend his early years doing nothing. What! Is it nothing to be happy? Nothing to skip, play, and run around all day long? Never in his life will he be so busy again.
~Jean-Jacques Rousseau

I totally meant to blog yesterday but didn't find the time. We were up early (haha, ya, 8:00 is early now dayz) cleaning the church. I got really hyper-doesn't happen a lot but I guess it was the getting up early... but I had fun :) I didn't mean to but then I took a three hour nap! I love naps! They're amazing. I got to hang out with a friend for a while and went to see fireworks later :) It was a good day.

I started a church music station on Pandora-sometimes I can't listen to it very long but I really enjoy it. Oh, and I went to the single's ward today-a lot like my student ward at BYU (I guess that was a single's ward too though) but a lot smaller. I do feel too young for my home ward Relief Society but I'm not very social so idk about single's ward :P

Anyway, I was talking to a friend yesterday and we got on the subject of Elementary School. I was thinking about the games we used to play... oh recess. I think the most fun, honestly, was in fifth grade. We were all kind of united and my whole class would hang out together. We had a long stretch of sitting on top of the "S" bars-the monkey bars in an "S" shape :) We would sit up there and talk and sing all the songs we were learning in class. It was great fun. We sung the "Spider Fighters" song and the "Pink Pajamas" one... and we sung the one that goes, "I don't want to be chicken, I don't want to be a duck, I just want to shake my butt" a lot-and we had actions. Haha, but the principal asked us to stop because the little kids on the other playground were trying the same thing and would fall off-sad day.

The next best had to be when we had the whole grade playing together every recess. Second grade. We would start every Monday with two teams-boys vs. girls-of course. Yes, we played the basic "chase" type game-but if you got caught by the other team they had to drag you across the "potty" (a large circle grate by the portables). Then, you were on the other team. Pretty sure you could be switched back-but the details are a little sketchy. By Friday everything was mixed up and you didn't know who was on what team :)

We spent time playing "Truth or Dare," "Little Sally Walker," and strange games we made up. We pretended we were horses for a while, or that we had imaginary pet cats, or that we had certain stuffed animals we had to protect from the bad guys. Some weird stuff. We played kick ball and collected potato bugs and snails. One time, when it snowed, we make an ice skating rink. It took a while-piling the snow and packing it down so it was slippery... but so worth it. Pretty sure other kids helped make it and used it too-but at least they didn't break it like they did all our giant snow balls :)

Everyone said I'd miss recess when I went to middle school. I guess I kind of did-but not terribly. I would guess going to private school and only getting 15 minutes a day to prepare us for middle school helped. But we did have some pretty awesome times in those 15 minutes-we found baby birds and got sick spinning on the tire swing-we had a system. And we used to play a game on the, like, tile stairs behind the baseball thing. The stairs were pretty big and we would bounce a ball and try and have it hit every step on the way down. Then, we could only jump on the steps the ball hit when we went down to get it. Haha, always fun in our skirts-our uniforms.

But I guess I kind of grew out of recess...? Besides, recess in high school would have been all about competition and cell phones and ipods and who was dating who and who was fighting... just not the same.

Napping

~Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down on our blankets for a nap.
~Robert Fulghum

Bleh. All I want to do is take a nap. I can be tired all day and just want to sleep but when it comes to 11, 12, 1, 2... I cannot, for the life of me, get to sleep. I guess it's just nice that the house goes quiet and I can just be alone. It feels like my own time. It's a good time to think.

I'm not a morning person anyway. Really, I'm very irritable. Haha, ask anyone who's ever tried to wake me up. I love actually being up in the morning-but getting up is rough. But, I guess it works with my being a night owl :)

So, I haven't tried any new foods since Tuesday. The days seem to go by so fast and it'll be ten or eleven at night and I remember... and don't feel like doing it. I've done better with my journal the last few weeks-but, for as little as I do, I sure have a lot to say. Haha, ya know, I don't always talk very much but I can sure ramble in writing.

I also turned in a job application this week and got a call. Had a terrible time calling them back but I have a sewing test this Thursday and if I "pass" or something-then I get an interview. It would be nice to have an income but, for one, I don't know if I can pass a sewing test! I just don't know what I'll have to do. And for two, the hours totally conflict with my sleep schedule :P It's somthing like 6:15-2:30... idk for sure. Haha, not the best for a morning person.


PS-I got bored of the old background and liked this one... I'm not so sure about how dark it is and I think it's kind of difficult to read on... we'll see if it stays :)

Scarlarou

~Sometimes God calms the storm. At other times, he calms the sailor. And sometimes he makes us swim.
~Unknown


I don't have anything specific to write about today but I've been loading my pictures onto my computer. I love this one... which is probably mean, but she's just so cute! (and, of course, I helped her down after I took the pic :) )

Swim Party

~If you want to learn to swim jump into the water. On dry land no frame of mind is ever going to help you.
~Bruce Lee

So, I've spent the last six or seven hours getting ready for the preschool swim party tomorrow. Oh, the annual swim party. It can be fun. We took my laptop outside and listened to music on "Pandora Radio." I really like that-it just brings up music like what you like and you can dislike songs and they wont' play again. It's pretty great... except that it quit letting me skip songs :)

I don't mind blowing up the pools... and most of it isn't bad with other people. I have to say water balloons are the worst. I mean, they're fun when you fill up forty and use them yourself. To fill up 500 to watch them disapear in 5 minutes... and then have to clean up all the little pieces forever-not as much. Mostly, my fingers just get sore.

We've been filling balloons, blowing up pools, moving toys, setting up the canopy, sweeping, getting out chairs... not to mention the DVDs with pictures or the summer packets or the food... But I guess it kind of isn't summer without the preschool swim party.

Baby Birds

~Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears.

~Les Brown

We have a nest in the tree right outside our window. There are two baby birds and they are pretty cute :) Here are a few pics:

Also, I had a curly fry from Arby's last night-not bad but not the best. And today I tried shrimp at Golden Seas. Yes, I've tried shrimp before-it was different though and this was better. I actually ate two-but I think I'd have to have it a few more times for it to grow on me :)

I kind of just felt like writing...

~A birthday is just the first day of another 365-day journey around the sun. Enjoy the trip.
~Unknown

Happy Birthday to my mom!

My mom and I in my dorm at college

Mom and Bronwen

Mom, Scarlet, Brae, and Boz :)

Haha, so today I finished printing out my journal from my first year in college. It's 135 pages typed-11 sized font instead of 12. I started it after three days in Provo... "I kind of just felt like writing. We'll see what comes out..."

Crazy how much I wrote, how much came from those first two lines. I had a lot to say... and a lot of things I could really only tell myself-haha, things I worked out for myself in my journal. I love the fact that I have so much recorded. And ya, it's cool to read what I did each day but the best parts are how I felt and what I thought about things. The last line turned out to be pretty epic too... though kind of mean and not something I'm going to post on the internet :)

I know I've written about journals before but I just have to say, I love the days when I can just write because I feel like writing. Yes, there were plenty of days that I didn't feel like writing but I did... actually, a lot of posts start out that way: "Well, not in the mood to write..."

I don't know that anyone will ever read it-but it felt good to get things out. And, of course, it's fun to go back and read myself :)

Father's Day

~Any man can be a father. It takes someone special to be a dad.
~Unknown

First of all, Happy Father's Day to my dad :)

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My dad and I on Christmas

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My mom and dad on Easter

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My dad and I when my parents visited me at school :)

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Secondly, I tried three new foods today... okay, one new food-the others were just cooked differently. I tried some carrot, potato, and roast all cooked in the crock pot. I'd like to say they were good and it was worth trying them... really, they weren't good at all (no offense to my mom who cooked). It kind of scares me because those are basic foods. If only I could like some staples like salad and potatoes I could find something to eat at restaurants.


The worst is that if I can try something I think is okay, I can eat more. If I really don't like it, I don't think I can. So, when I go to France I'm pretty sure I can get myself to try the foods... but to pretend it's good or eat more for the sake of my host family... that's worrisome.

Good Week :)

~After you've heard two eyewitness accounts of an auto accident, you begin to worry about history.
~Unknown

It's been a good week :) I love doing things with friends-and I feel happier and more motivated when I've done more than sit on my bed watching TV and reading all day. Ah, I miss seeing friends everyday at school. Haha, but at least when I see them now we have fun :)

Hmm... today I tried an energy drink for the first time. I don't even drink soda anymore! It was actually pretty good. I also tried flaming hot Cheetos for the first time-I know it's not a big change, but still... Haha, they weren't too bad but I don't normally have hot foods. I couldn't eat very many. But it is now on my to do list to try a new food a day. I used to really stick to that list... I'm hoping it will work for this :)

Let's see... I got a letter today informing me that I am now on probation for my New Century Scholarship. You wouldn't think it would be that difficult to stay above a 3.0 GPA... I don't know if it was BYU, if I was burnt out, or if I just didn't work hard enough but those were some bad grades last semester :/ Oh well, it's just probation. Haha, I still get funding for at least another semester-even on a study abroad. I am supposed to go to school in Utah to get the money, but I'm going to France through BYU!!!

Oh, and I love music! Sometimes it amazes me how it can change your attitude and make you feel better. Just a good beat or good lyrics can change the day-it's pretty awesome :)

To Realize

~Did you ever wonder if the person in the puddle is real, and you're just a reflection of him?
~Calvin and Hobbes

I can't think of anything particularly interesting to write about today but I'm trying to write regularly :) I was cleaning out some of my stuff when I moved back home and found the following poem. I don't remember where I originally found it, but I really liked it.


To Realize

To realize the value of a sister:
Ask someone who doesn't have one.

To realize the value of ten years:
Ask a newly divorced couple.

To realize the value of four years:
Ask a graudate.

To realize the value of one year:
Ask a student who has failed a final exam.

To realize the vale of one month:
Ask a mother who has given birth to a premature baby.

To realize the value of one week:
Ask an editor of a weekly newspaper.

To realize the value of one hour:
Ask the lovers who are waiting to meet.

To realize the value of one minute:
Ask a person who has missed the train, bus, or plane.

To realize the value of one second:
Ask a person who has survived an accident...

To realize the value of one millisecond:
Ask the person who has won a silver medal in the Olympics.

To realize the value of a friend:
Lose one.

Time waits for no one.

Treasure every moment you have.
You will treasure it even more when
You can share it with someone special.

Procrastination

~Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at that moment.
~Robert Benchley

I have no clue what to write about. I have all these things that I've been trying not to think about-they keep coming to mind today.

Like how I'm super excited and super scared to go to France. I just feel inadequate and undeserving of the opportunity. I know I should be studying and getting everything together. I need to take an oral interview... like last month. But my biggest worries lie with money :/

Alright, so BYU will work with me waiting for financial aid and scholarships. My program payments are past due but I can deal with that. I can't access any of my money until the end of August. I leave September 8th. I need a plan ticket... soon? :) Those are expensive! But I'm excited about going through BYU travel cuz they can get me on a plane with others in my group-and hopefully seats by them.

And then there are about a gillion little things I wanted to get done this summer-and summer's almost half over. I wanted to type up ALL my journals. I wanted to have my room really cleaned and organized-and change my blinds and put a cute curtain in front of my closet... I wanted to do all these fun summer things and get a tan early in the year.

Oh ya, and then there's the job thing. I know I should have one. Not only do I need the money and "work experience" for future job applications, I also feel like I just should. It's one of two things people ask me anymore at church-if I'm going to school and if I have a job. A lot of it is, "So what have you been doing?" when they find out I'm not taking classes. What do I say? "Oh, sleeping, eating junk food, watching TV, and doing the occasional productive thing"? Maybe I'm blowing it out of proportion, but it is frustrating.

Ya, I know I still have more than two months to get things done... it's just kind of depressing to look at how little I've gotten done so far. And being a procrastinator doesn't help :)

Journaling

~It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by. How else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment? For the moment passes, it is forgotten; the mood is gone; life itself is gone. That is where the writer scores over his fellows: he catches the changes of his mind on the hop.
~Vita Sackville-West

I've written in a journal fairly regularly for about four years. I have stacks of notebooks full of things I've done, people I know, and my thoughts on everything. I don't remember why I started writing but it's fun to go back and read. I've been typing up my journals from high school this summer... haven't gotten terribly far but it's crazy how different I was.

I've heard a lot growing up about how important journaling is. But it's hard for me to believe anyone would care what I thought or did or why I was mad or what made me happy... and on and on. Most everything I write about seems so trivial.

I wrote a lot in the last year. All kinds of details about my first year of college-pages and pages typed up. I wrote almost every day for eight months-an hour or two a day... sometimes more. Haha, sometimes it doesn't seem worth it, but it did help me think through things.

I always seemed to find time to write, even when I was super busy and had tons of homework. I guess it was kind of a tool of procrastination. But I have more to show from journaling than I do from all that homework.

Lately I haven't written very much. Maybe it's because there isn't as much to say and I have people to talk things through with-not like at college. Haha, but I think it's just that it's harder to get things done when you don't have as much to do. I'm pretty sure I'll regret it... I kind of already do. And at this point I have so much I could catch up on that I don't even want to begin tackling it :)

Scars

~God will not look you over for medals, degrees, or diplomas, but for scars.

~Elbert Hubbard

I have to admit, scars can look pretty cool. But really, most scars have stupid stories behind them. Ya, you can make up something awesome about a fight or saving children but most of us get scars in really stupid ways.

Okay, so I really only have one very light scar. Short story: I fell off my bike. I get crap from my friends whenever I bring up the long story. It's on my knee in a strange shape that you can't see unless you look.

I also claim I have another scar. It's not a white line or anything, but there is a permanent line indented in my pointer finger. No one would notice unless I pointed it out. Story? I was wrapping a friend's birthday present... with tin foil. That was a very painful cut. Very painful.

So, last week I was making chocolate chip cookies. I had enough extra dough to make two more on the last pan. I put both pans in at once and set the timer. When I had to turn them around I wasn't thinking about how close the two shelves were. While I was trying to turn the bottom pan my hand touched the top shelf.

It's been four days and it's starting to look better. (the picture doesn't quite show how it really looks :) ) No, I don't know that it will scar. I've never burned myself this bad before. My brother thinks it looks pretty cool and wants an awsome scar :) I don't know, as much as I hate skin things... which is hard to explain if you don't know... I think it looks pretty cool, too.

Sleep

~Sleeping is no mean art: for its sake one must stay awake all day.
~Friedrich Nietzsche

~There is no hope for a civilization which starts each day to the sound of an alarm clock.
~Unkown

Man, the days go by so fast anymore. I didn't realize it'd been almost a week since I blogged. I sleep too much in the summer. I am a total night owl-which means I end up sleeping all morning. Generally I go to bed around 3 am and get up around 11am... sometimes later. There's my 8-9 hours a night :)

I know it's a terrible schedule. It's not just a summer thing though... thinking about it. I did about the same thing in school. My roommate stayed up later than I did-every single night. Didn't matter what time I went to bed. I like night time anyway, so I stayed up until 3 or 3:30 no big deal. Second semester my classes started at 11 am three days a week and 9:30 two days a week. So, five days a week I didn't have to get up until 9:30 or 10:00.

It was nice and it felt normal. All my roommates stayed up pretty late and Saturdays my apartment was dead until about noon. But now it just feels like I should switch it around. And somehow I always end up going to bed at 3. It's like impossible to get to bed earlier.

Two nights ago I decided to get to bed early. I figured my body was on a time clock of 8-9 hours and I could switch things around. I was in bed by 12:10-and not a bit tired. I'm used to it being silent when I go to bed and the sounds of the dryer and the TV and everyone else still awake drove me crazy. My MP3 Player has been having issues staying charged so I borrowed my brother's and listened to music for a while. And Bronwen visited a few times-to jump all over and lick me or to curl up next to me to sleep :)

It took me over two hours to fall asleep. It didn't help. I slept longer. I wasn't tired last night. I prefer being up at night and I am NOT a night person-just ask my family. I am rude when I wake up... and not easy to get up. I have to admit I do like the morning time... once I'm up and ready for the day. But getting up is probably THE hardest part of any day.

Indolent

~A total history of almost anyone would shock almost everyone.
~Mignon McLaughlin

I am lazy. There, I said it. Sometimes it's nice to just be lazy... but there are no breaks from being lazy-if that makes sense. You can't relax from relaxing. It's like when you're on a hike and you stop for a break. You're half way up a mountain and you sit down, take a drink, and eat a snack. The next step is to get back to work hiking the mountain. You're stuck in the middle of the trail, it's not like there is another way out.

I have a flashcard with "indolent" written on it posted on my bulletin board.

On the back of this card is the definition: lazy, idle

This was a vocabulary word in my Honors English class Junior year... two and a half years ago. I don't know how it ended up on my board. In the fall I was dedicated and made tons of flashcards-went through them all the time. The stack was ginormous. I'm guessing I threw the rest of them away, but that one is still posted on my wall.

I could take it to be something of a motivation to NOT be indolent... but I've just become used to it :) Really though, it's become one of only 10 or 20 vocabulary words I remember from that class. It was kind of a joke with my friend for a while. I can see the irony in it. We studied sometimes, but the word we remembered meant "lazy."

So, I may be lazy, but I'm aware of it :) Haha, I actually started stretching today so I can start working out-as much as I hate working out :/ And, I'm trying to blog everyday and keep up on things. I just had to take a break to be lazy after the semester ended and I finally had a break from school after almost three years... I just didn't think it would take a month :P

Flash Forward

~He said, "We're all prophets now." And ya know, I can't think of a prophet worth a [darn] that didn't suffer. And I also can't think of a prophet that God didn't love.
~Flash Forward

I used to think I might want to know how I died. Wow, my starting sentences seem to come out bad lately :) Just the idea that if we could know, I would have wanted to. I don't think I would now. I've been watching the TV show Flash Forward. Everyone in the world looses consciousness for two minutes and seventeen seconds and sees what their life will be like six months in the future. I know it's a show, but it doesn't seem so grand.

I wouldn't want to be tortured thinking, if I wanted it to happen, if it really would. I wouldn't want to worry that, if I didn't want it to happen, that it would. In one of the first episodes it says, "You'd think knowing the future would make us less concerned about it. But just the opposite has happened: the future is what all of us are living for now, it's what we're living by."

It's like after I watched the movie "It's a Wonderful Life." I wondered what the world would be like without me. Actually, that was kind of depressing :) Lately I've noticed there are some things I would just rather not know, some things I just don't ask because I'd rather believe as I want. Alright, I learned that with a friend in high school who was into "blunt honesty." Since then I've learned not to ask things unless I want the truth-good, bad, or ugly.

I don't think I'd really want to know-what it would be like if I wasn't here, what's going to happen in six months, a year, five... or even how and when I will die. It would feel like a ticking clock... wondering how my life leads up to that point, if I can avoid it...

If You Want Me To

~No man, however great, is known to everybody and no man, however solitary, is known to nobody.
~Moore

So, I've felt pretty unmotivated for a while now. Ya, depressing way to start a post; but a good starting point. I also used to listen to my MP3 player all the time. It started out as a way to block out all the swearing on the bus ride to school... but it became a way to make myself feel better or upbeat or happy. I've had problems with the batteries lately and usually just look up songs on YouTube to listen to :)

Well, I went to the temple last week and found myself going through the words to an EFY song in my head. I usually have a song in my head but I haven't listened to EFY music in a while. It surprised me but made me feel really good. The song is called "If You Want Me To" and it's by Ginny Owens.

The pathway is broken

The signs are unclear

And I don't know the reasons why You brought me here

But just because You love me the way that You do

I'm gonna walk through the valley

If You want me to

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Cause I'm not who I was

When I took my first step

And I'm clinging to the promise You're not through with me yet

so if all of these trials bring me closer to You

Then I'll walk through the fire

If You want me to

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It may not be the way I would have chosen

When you lead me through a world that's not my home

But You never said it would be easy

You only said I'd never go alone

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So when the whole world turns against me

And I'm all by myself

And I can't hear You answer my cries for help

I'll remember the suffering Your love put You through

And I will walk through the darkness if You want me to

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Cuz when I cross over Jordan

Gonna sing, gonna shout,

Gonna look into Your eyes and see You never let me down

So take me on the pathway that leads me home to You

And I will walk through the valley

If You want me to

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Yes, I will walk through the valley

If You want me to

Friends

~A friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you.
~Elbert Hubbard

Yesterday I hung out with some of my friends from high school. Some I see every week or so; others I see every three or four months. And while I've missed hanging out with them, it was like a flashback. We all look a little older. We've all had jobs, gone to school, or moved out. But I was surprised by how the same everything was.

I'm really glad I go to BYU because there is no way I could handle another college environment-I know myself. After a month or two at BYU I was back at Copper Hills picking up my brother from school and visiting my lit-mag teacher. I was surprised by the swearing, immodesty, and overall bad environment... which I was happy about on some level-happy that I noticed it. I had become desensitized to it all in seventh grade-I was happy that didn't last.

I guess I had kind of forgotten how bad it could get with some of my friends. I've forgotten how to think through everything I say just in case it might be taken wrong. This isn't to give a bad image of my friends. I'd have to say one on one they guard themselves better than in a whole group and not all of them are like that. But it's been a while since I felt like the innocent outsider who didn't get what everyone was laughing at every two seconds.

But I love that we have things we can laugh about from high school and that I still talk to them-often or not. I only wish some of us went to the same college :)