Great Moments In My Life

Sometimes the stars align. Sometimes impossible things happen. Sometimes these things happen to me. I was reminded of these few times when one happened the other day. But first, a little commentary. It seems like more often than not, toast lands butter-side down, dogs have to sneeze right when your face is closest, toothbrushes seem magically attracted to the toilet, Lindsay Lohan doesn't overdose, and Justin Bieber's music keeps getting purchased--almost as if by some magical force. Along with natural disasters, I think these moments are God's little way of letting us know that we are not in control. I'm not saying God causes these things to happen, He just allows them to happen. (Because he definitely has nothing to do with Lindsay or The Biebs.) The most exciting thing about these moments for me is that I cannot wait to watch the replay in heaven. Or wherever I end up when I'm dead. It will be like youtube, but more personal. Maybe it will be called metube.

But onwards to my first greatest moment. Picture me. Six years old. White-blond hair. Cowboy boots. That is what I looked like the day it happened. I guess it was a day like any other. On this day we happened to be playing football in the street with the college kids who lived across from us. So there I was. On a team. Running around being generally useless, I'm sure. That is, until I went long. I clomped northbound on 200 East, arms outstretched. I wasn't even looking for the ball floating toward me in the air. I must have looked like a little cowboy zombie, running like that. And suddenly there was a football in my hands. In my little kid perspective I looked backward at the cheering students, and they seemed to be a hundred yards away. I had just caught a touchdown pass. I was a hero. I had done an impossible thing. It was the start of my amazing career as a pro-football player. The celebration lasted into the night.

In heaven the video will be short. Maybe ten seconds. It will be shot in that old-timey style that flickers and the people move too fast. It will show little me running for approximately 3.54 feet and catching a ball thrown right into my hands. Less glamorous. But hey, you gotta start somewhere.

Amazing moments in my life took a 10 year hiatus. I guess catching the pass of a lifetime filled my amazing quota for quite awhile. That is until one fateful night in the Bozeman Stake Center I was center court, holding a basketball. I gave the ball small toss with heavy backspin. The ball sprung backwards and I kicked at it. The heavens shook for my good that night. The ball soared through the air. Going, going, going. Time slowed. Emotions ran high. Swoosh. A perfect half-court shot.

The replay in heaven will be boring. It will show a bunch of awkward zitty teenagers kicking balls at basketball hoops for two hours. Shane and Chet and I all taking turns. And finally one will go in. The celebration lasts longer than is needful for the moment.

Fast forward 8 years. Monday December 20th 2010. I'm pushing carts at Costco. I'm waiting for a line of oblivious customers to get out of my way so I can stow my line of carts in the entrance. Suddenly a rogue cart comes careening into my peripheral vision. Pushed carelessly by some old dude, the cart is headed straight for a stray toddler. He stands like a deer in the headlights right next to my row. I don't have time to think, so I stick out my leg and kick the murderous cart towards the motionless lines of extra carts. The cart does an elegant spin and then lands right on the end of one of the rows. Perfectly stowed and interlocked. Disaster was averted. Not only did I save a miniature human from what surely would have been a most heinous death and/or dismemberment, but I stowed an extra cart without using my hands. I was super-human for half a second. This time no celebration was needed. I just smirked to myself and thought about how awesome I am. No thanks was necessary.

Yeah, right. Where was the mother?! She should have showered me with gifts and affection and different creams and lotions. But I didn't even get a, "OH thank you, you are so great, take this cash." Lame. There better be replays in heaven so I can show this mom what happened and get my dues.

[Keep following. There is more where that came from. Filler... fillerup... FILL 'ER UP PLEASE!]

I'm (Almost) Back.

This isn't a real post. Sorry to disappoint all of you who have been so patiently waiting. And I know you've been waiting. I looked at my Google analytics readout, and despite the notice I gave about not blogging for the whole month of November, I still only had 5 days during the month when no one visited my blog. I don't know whether to laugh at you losers that had nothing better to do than visit a stagnant blog or to thank you for being so dedicated. So I guess I'll do both: HAHA. Thanks so much!

To those of you who are wondering how NaNoWriMo went, I have an answer.  My expectations weren't not exceeded further than possibly allowable considering the dire circumstances under which the writer found himself inevitably placed. Moving on...

Finals are coming, and I'm beginning to find that "the soothing light at the end of [my] tunnel / is just a freight train comin' [my] way." Which is why this is only a slight, poorly written, hold-over post until I can scoop my brains from the pavement and get my bearings again once finals are over.

The good thing about this hiatus has been that I now have a few good ideas for new posts. Be excited.

[Keep following, there's always next time.]

Pardon Me While I Do This

http://www.nanowrimo.org/

[Keep following, To Be Continued]

I Share Something With The Greats.

What do Paul Dunbar, Washington Irving, Samuel Johnson, Franz Kafka, John Keats, D. H. Lawrence, Molière, George Orwell, Alexander Pope, Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson, Henry David Thoreau, Voltaire, a vast majority of Bronte Sisters, Igor Stravinsky, John Calvin and DJ Scheerer have in common?

If you guessed Tuberculosis, you get nothing!

TB is one of those diseases that you hear about, but seems like a distant fantasy; the plague of days gone by and people unknown. The sickness of those of lower socioeconomic status. What you didn't know is that TB is alive and well. "The Consumption," as I am privileged to now call it, is far from eradicated. Over half a million new cases of drug resistant TB are diagnosed worldwide every year.

I was almost one of them.

Upon arriving--home (oooh!) from my mission I had to get the mandatory TB skin test. This consists of the awesome idea of injecting a strain of the disease into your skin. If your body reacts to the infectious disease sitting in a bubble beneath the first few layers of dermis, it means your body recognizes the disease and you have most likely been exposed to TB.

I got the blob injected me and came back in a week, ready to proceed with life, when the nurse assigned to analyze the test recoiled when I pulled up my sleeve. There is only one way to describe her face during that moment. You know the look your mom gave you the first time you swore at her as a teenager? Not the look right after when she swats you with the fly-swatter, I'm talking about the exact moment the four letters leap from your tongue. The surprise and confusion and horror and disgust all at the same time? The nurse's face was something like that. I felt like I needed to apologize.

Anyway, after shooting some X-rays into my chest, giving me way too much literature and things to sign, solemnly interrogating/consoling me and sufficiently scaring the hell out of me, I was told I had latent TB and that I would most likely die of "The Consumption" sometime before my mid-life crisis. That is, if I didn't go on an intense regimen of antibiotics.

Eventually after making it to Provo, they did a blood test, and found that, no, I didn't have latent "The Consumption" after all. What most likely happened is that I had a false positive on my skin test. I don't know how my skin could have possibly gotten irritated and swollen after they stabbed me with a toxic disease-filled needle. It makes no sense at all.

I was relieved and saddened; knowing that I would live longer but most likely never achieve musical, religious, or literary greatness. So here's to all those great famous persons who've gone before and established the greatest heap of bloody handkerchiefs ever created. I may never write something worth reading, but I now know that if I ever need to get inspired, I'll simply go to sub-Saharan Africa or China and let someone cough in my face.

[Keep following, you might learn something.]

Rainy Day

Weather does strange things to people.

It rained on Monday. I happened to be working. Outside. On Monday. I heard the sky open with an echoing crack and watched the deluge that followed. The water poured off the vestibule, making a hundred-foot wide Costco Wholesale waterfall. And a sea of humanity gathered underneath. 

The huddled masses milled about, supporting their general sense of awe with off-handed comments to their new friends; all united by the common desire to stay dry, the atmosphere was pleasant. 

Until all hell broke loose. 

I think Mother Nature has a switch that turns people's brains off. She must have flipped it. All at once the parking lot was full of cars. It must be an instinctual reaction to go shopping when the weather is the worst -- a sort of hibernation/famine gorging instinct. The affable crowd that had once so peacefully exchanged smalltalk, turned on itself. Friends were suddenly mortal enemies in the jostle for vehicle loading position. Grandpas with two items in their carts looked to be the first because, "we'll be finished the soonest." And Soccer moms with two arms and two carts full waved their husbands into the newly-created loading zone because, "we would be out in the rain longer than the rest of you." 

Now, I wasn't in Vietnam. But I'm sure the war here, spoken and unspoken, raged just as fitfully. Spoken because some elected to justify their wrongdoing with loud logic, and unspoken because some just double parked and loaded their cars with a solemn stern expression, saying not a word to anyone. I was engulfed in horror. Cars piled and parked with no regard to the cones so carefully set in place to keep the peace. Cars and people covered the fire lane like moths. I even saw a grandma punch a baby.  

We've all experienced this. The first day of snow is just as bad. Traffic crawls for no apparent reason. People drive in a manner that seems to say, "what is all this white slippery stuff on the road?" Even the most seasoned, Ice-Road-Truckers-watchin', badass in a huge SUV is scared to turn into an intersection for some reason. Again, Mother Nature flips the switch and people go brain dead. Just you wait for it. 

At some point, my heroic instincts kicked in. I raised my hands and said in my most calm but firm voice, "you aren't allowed to park or load your cars in this area." And there I stood, glorious in my victory. My head held high, I was triumphant.

But no one responded.

So I did the next best thing. Now slightly flustered, I started tipping empty carts over on their handles along the road. As soon as a car moved, I silently wheeled into place and tipped a cart over. Thus sealing off the entrance to the precious dry-zone. I seem to recall wearing an American flag as a cape during my endeavor. This act was much to the distress of the water-droplet-hating clientèle. I soon heard spiteful cries of, "what are you doing?" and, "you can't do that!" and, "listen pal, I pay your wage..." and so on. But the law needed to be upheld. And I withstood the mob to do so. 

[Keep following, I hear there is a new candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize.]

You Get Inspiration In The Darnedest Places

Her spectre-steps linger and prolong her arrival to whoknowswhere. She clutches stacks of papers and books in a desperate hug. The scrunched brow and thin-lipped expression damn up a reservoir of emotion. And her eyes see things beyond sight. Those hollow orbs view a memory; an unholy vision played out on an ethereal stage. The sun does not exist for her, simply a waning moon this afternoon. And she'll never be like the women she spends her savings trying to imitate. Now her concrete cracks and saline lines collect in the open space of her lids. They don't fall. A testament to pure numbing steel of will. But the pressure is patient. Pressure to be, to do, to love, to resolve. In this moment she learns to live. She must spend this night outside and learn to sleep in spite of it; to make the most of dawn. She doesn't know the flaming star will rise to burn out those dewey drops. This, like all good times, will pass.

[Keep following, and you too can get your very own free limited edition signed t-shirt.]

untitled.

These my palsied hands
          struggle with weary script.

I Hate Being Sick

Like you really needed to hear that. No one enjoys being sick. Well, I'm sure there is some weird Finnish guy sitting in his basement somewhere wearing a traffic cone on his head and gloves on his feet with a garlic-clove necklace on just trying to get sick. But I'm not that guy.

I got food poisoning. Don't ask me how. I eat pretty much the same types of food everyday. Miles also eats those same foods with me, so don't ask me how I got sick and he didn't. Don't ask me what it's like throwing up in the JKB bathroom in the middle of class. And even though it was the middle of class, all of the stalls were staked out when I walked in there like some kind of cruel joke. So I leaned pale-faced over the sink and practiced Lamaze childbirth breathing patterns until one opened up.

I would do almost anything to not throw up. It is number one on my least favorite things. If an evil genie showed up and offered different kinds of torture in exchange for barfing, there aren't a whole lot of options I would turn down. I don't blow chunks very often, but when I do, it's always bad news. I won't go into details, but I'm just a mess afterwards. I look like I've been crying for weeks and I go so pale I make dead bodies look rosy-cheeked. I always  feel like I need to apologize to anyone who has to listen to my harrowing trial. Yesterday, that awkward apology went something like this, "Sorry you had to listen to that, guys."

To which I received the reply, "You don't have to apologize, it must really suck to throw up pieces of your femur."

I would have laughed if I hadn't felt so sick.

[Keep following. I know it was gross, but at least I didn't post pictures.]

God Wore Black

Bozeman, MT - 6:30 AM

DJ rolled out of bed and groggily shuffled to his noisy alarm clock and slammed hard on the top to shut it off. The radio announcer babbled on... something about a special offer... slam! Again he slapped down hard on the buttons. "I hate that stupid thing..." he muttered on his way to the bathroom.

6:51 AM

He walked swiftly back to his room. He must have only hit the snooze button the first time because the radio was still blaring. "All we know at this point is that a plane has crashed in Lower..." This time, instead of sleepily mashing the buttons, he gently clicked off the alarm switch. DJ had never accidentally set his alarm to radio mode before.

Lower Manhattan, NY 8:45 AM Eastern

Jonathan Briley sat in his cubicle on the same chair that he had sat in for the past three years. He sat unblinking, staring at the cursor blinking at him from an empty spreadsheet. He sat, thinking of  Molly. She would be riding her bike through heavy traffic, courier pack full of legalese. He hoped she was riding safe. He sat on floor 106 with a hundred others. A regular day.

Without warning, a chilling shriek made him explode to his feet out of his old chair. He rose only to be knocked full force into his cubicle wall. He was deafened by a crushing, fiery noise. The squealing ring of his ears blocked out the yells of pain from those on the floor below. He lifted his bruised face up from his now horizontal cubicle in time to see a few bloody and blackened staff from floor 105 stumble with a plume of smoke out of the stairwell. They were shaking and dazed. So was Jonathan. He shifted a cubicle wall off of his leg, got to his feet and limped calmly over to the stairwell. As he opened the door, a pillow of heat pressed against his body. Fire was already making its way up. He thought of resting there, but the smoke made it hard to breathe. His head was pounding.

After awhile someone came running around the corner and almost ran straight into Jonathan, "...elevators don't work... and dat staiwell on da uder side already went up. You alright pal?" asked the man.

"I dunno..." said Jonathan.

"Yeah well, seems like we're trapped for the time bein'," said the man.

Trapped. The thought closed hard like vault doors around Jonathan's mind. No way out. No way out. No way out. I'm going to burn to death if I don't move, he thought. He walked slowly over to his old chair and picked it up. No way out. He stepped over debris and paper and headed towards the nearest heavily cracked window. One way out. "Hello Molly," Jonathan said as he threw his chair hard and followed it down.

Bozeman High School 8:32 AM Mountain

A class full of kids stared open-mouthed at the glowing T.V. screen. The morning's have-you-heards and rumor exchanges had died out, and there was only the news. Mr. Andriolo stood, dry-erase marker in hand, gaping along with the kids at what he was seeing. The algebra lesson was long forgotten. It was like a movie--a sickening thought. Then he realized that all that debris falling from tower one wasn't all debris. A closer shot of a falling man confirmed his horror and drew gasps from the girls. Is this real? This is real.

Cairo, Egypt 3:46 PM Local Time

Umayma Atta held a pot full of simmering Ful Mudammas, her wrinkled hands straining with the weight. Her head bowed with age, she leaned further over the pot and smelled the Fava bean mixture. It needs garlic. Seshafi could fetch me some. Though she gives me endless pain about going to market.

As quickly as the smell had filled her nose, all breath left her. She felt her heart begin to pound as if she had been running for days. Finally her grip on the pot failed and her meal splattered to the ground. She sank slowly to her knees, tears filling her eyes. Seshafi, drawn by the sound of the clanging pot, rushed into the room. "What have you done now Umay... Umayma?" The scared look in Seshafi's eyes made the old woman begin to weep. "What is it?" asked Seshafi.

"My son is dead," said Umayma simply.

He was there that day. He was among the wreckage, among the husks of buildings, among the bodies. He was there to receive them that passed. He was there with the new widows and new orphans. He was there with the armed and angry men. He was with Jonathan and Umayma and her son Mohamed. He was with ladder 11. And He wept with his children.

[These are all real people.]

I'm Going to Do This

There is a moment. Emotions and thoughts try to push their way simultaneously through subway doors of conscious. They push and jostle and cram. There is a slow-motion pause when nothing can get past the too-small opening. This dooming pressure builds and steals the breath from already panting lungs. The vessels scream and greedily reach for the non-existent oxygen. There is no coping mechanism. No fail-safe for this scheduled event. The passengers on this ghost train have no protest but presence. They'll ride patiently until you address them. But the slamming rhythm of wheels on tracks deafens until there is nothing but the sound. We all but forget the creeping spiders of numbness that prickle their way down clammy palms. The heat drains from chest to heels to shag carpet to nothingness. We'd all like to do something dramatic like throw our phone or scream or feel hot tears stream down our cheeks but in real life that doesn't happen. In the Hollywood version there is an outlet-- the shared experience with all the ticketed onlookers. In this moment, this real life moment, we feel so damn sorry for ourselves that we can't even do something so basic as weep.

I'm going to do this: National Novel Writing Month

For those that don't want to read the website or didn't know that was a link, here's the Reader's Digest version. You sign up, you write a novel of at least 50,000 words(read: novella)in one month (November). You upload your novel and it will count the words. What you get: 1. The satisfaction of having accomplished a crazy thing. 2. A novella, written by you. 3. The possibility of having it published in one of two ways. Either, like last year, they make a deal with a publishing company to print your manuscript for free if you completed it in time, OR you will revise and edit, revise and edit, revise and edit, revise and edit and get it published for real and make millions.

The reason I am doing this is because I can. Plus, it will be exhausting and fun and I will finally do something with my best idea.

Until then, November, I'll work on polishing my outline.

PS. I know it is in the middle of the semester. But I have nothing better to do. Who needs homework?

[Keep following all you second-rate hacks. Join my club.]

.\ /. <----- These Are My Angry Eyes

I saw a billboard on I-15 today. It read, "REMEMBER 9/11. No Ground Zero Mosque." This text, written in red over a background of 9/11 rubble, was the most Un-American and Un-Christian thing I've ever seen. (As if such an act would indicate our forgetfulness. How presumptuous of this ad.)

Now, I don't normally get too riled up about politics, even when it gets positively insane. But I've had about enough of this.

Let's forget about how the "Mosque" is mainly a community center to which all are welcome. Let's forget about how this building, although only two blocks away, cannot even be seen from Ground Zero. Let's forget about how the almighty terrible "Mosque" will include a basketball court and a culinary school. Let's forget the government's own neglect of Ground Zero still leaves a gaping scar on the face of New York, which is an even bigger disgrace to those that died there. And finally let's forget about the other Mosque, the one that has been open for over thirty years, Masjid Manhattan, that is only four blocks away from Ground Zero.

Let's forget about all of this and focus on some other things.  First, that this is Un-American action and ignorant bigotry. And second, this is an Un-Christian sentiment. I'm not saying that rallying against a "Ground Zero Mosque" means you hate America or Christianity. I'm saying that it makes you a hypocrite.

First, for all the Glenn Beck worshipers, let's focus on the Constitution, the thing that made America, America. For all who don't know what the First Amendment says, here you go, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble..." You are welcome. "But," you protest, "Congress isn't making a law against them worshipping!" Maybe it's the Democrat in me, or maybe just the rational human, but am I the only one who sees this case going to the Supreme Court if their building permit is denied? Preventing them from building would violate this Amendment on two counts. One by prohibiting the free exercise of their religion and two by preventing the people to peaceably assemble. (I know 'assembly' is usually interpreted as a protest, but the language remains ambiguous and can be interpreted either way.) If you want them to move it somewhere else, why do you suddenly take interest now when two blocks further you could protest a Mosque right now for the insensitivity of their worship? Is this a matter of timing? It seems a pretty fickle reason to stop them now, when for the last nine years (since 9/11) no one has said a word against the other Mosque. This is also Un-American because didn't our ancestors come to America for this exact reason? To escape religious persecution? Now suddenly it seems a little crazy when we have fought and died for the last nine years in Iraq, we deny that same desire to those who we went to war to "rescue." As a nation founded by people who desired religious tolerance, we sure have a funny view of tolerance. Or did the founding fathers just mean tolerance for Christian religions?

Second, shame on all of you Christians out there. And ESPECIALLY you Mormons. If you are against the building of this "Mosque" please don't call yourself a Christian, because I don't want to share anything in common with you.

Matthew 18:21,22 "Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven." (Seventy times seven was a holy number and inconceivably large to Jews of the time. Infinite.) I guess Jesus forgot the special addendum, "Unless he is a Muslim extremist then it's OK not to forgive."

We could talk for hours of passages all about loving thy neighbor as thyself and so on, but you know the Bible right? It goes without saying that even if these were the very men who flew the planes into the Trade Centers who were trying to build this Mosque, we as imperfect, regular people are required to forgive them. If you don't like this idea, find a new religion, for this was Christ's message. The fact remains that these aren't the terrorists that flew the planes. These are Muslims. Americans. Children of God. We cannot punish them for the acts of others. Which brings me to my last point. As Christians, why are so many so intolerant of Muslims? They are concerned with the mote in the Muslims eyes and cannot see the beam in their own. The Bible is just as extreme in its wording as the Qur'an. Many criticize Muslims for principles relating to Jihad and yet are more than willing to overlook the treatment of women, and adulterers in the Bible. The Old Testament is very clear, adulterers are to be stoned and women cast out of the city for weeks at a time during Menstruation. We see these as a fulfilled law and archaic, and still see the book as the word of God. Yet many are unwilling to grant this same luxury to Muslims and their book of scripture. The intolerant Christian attitude seems to say, "If it's in the Qur'an, then they believe it." How intolerant and bigoted.

And in conclusion, to all you LDS people out there, it's time to think long and hard about what I will say next. How can you expect others to separate the mainstream LDS church from those RLDS wackos down in Southern Utah when we refuse to separate Muslims from their extremist groups? The Reorganized church believes in Polygamy, a practice that was discontinued over 180 years ago by the LDS church. These break-away groups are not affiliated with us and we disagree with their practices, and we bristle when others try to group us together with them. These groups are radical extremists of our faith. Likewise the terrorists are extremist Muslims, and it is unjust to lump the two together. How can we expect others to separate our church from our radical practitioners if we refuse to do the same for Muslims?

Do not give in to misunderstanding. It breeds contempt. Stop listening to T.V. pundits. Remember that Jesus saved his most scathing rebukes, not for prostitutes or murderers, but for hypocrites. And finally, practice what you preach.

[Keep following. That's all I have to say about that.]

The General Rules #2 - The Necessity of "The Game" (Part 3)

Remember Candy Land? It's everyone's favorite board game.

If you don't remember or had a deprived childhood there was a main path that lead a winding and colorful road to the finish line. But if you drew special cards or landed on the right spaces you could take shortcuts. The shortcuts sped the game up and allowed the player to skip out of the rigmarole of some of the candy cane curves.

"What we say about love and what we do about love are generally two very different things." (So reads a favorite quotation of the always sage-like Sierra.)

Whence arises this discrepancy? "The Game" may be the cause. We all say we want undying affection, but we aren't willing to pay the price. (Myself included.) We say we can fall in love and that we want to. But we always have a tailor-made excuse ready as to why we don't date as much as we should. Why we don't open our hearts more. Why we don't let people in.

But I believe that this is mostly because we get caught playing the game in a never-ending cycle. Too often we see the mini-heartbreaks turn into massive ones. And it becomes easier and easier to stay in the cycle. The game then becomes a lifestyle. A safe place. A sanctuary from real commitment. We make a home in the molasses swamp. It becomes easier to say we want commitment and affection, that we wish for eternal marriage, that we desire undying love, all while we thwart any attempts with our static behavior. And our words become half-hearted coinage thrown into an empty well. An atheists faith.  

Like Professor Young, we find it easier make our own worst fears come to pass rather than work actively and have our efforts disappointed.

All too often the game becomes life, rather than an event in it. It's easier to be pessimistic about love because we will either see our ideas continually validated or be pleasantly surprised. We can easily fulfill our own dark prophecies about never finding Mr. or Mrs. Right. And if we let the game rule us at least we can always say, "I told you so."

Remember when I said there is more than one path to true love? What I left out is that there are also more preferable paths to true love. Shortcut paths. Gumdrop Passes and Rainbow Trails. The best being the destiny path. This has only recently been drawn to my attention with the recent marriages of my best mission friend and my brother and the engagement of my sister. They have all told me that it "just worked out." God put someone in their path and once the ball got rolling it never stopped. The love took root and has grown everyday. I still will never think it is in any way easy.

 

I think this is because it hurts. Barring the worst case scenario of a breakup, heartache can never truly be avoided, even when destiny uses its wild-card. It hurts immensely to let someone into our two-sizes-too-small hearts. There is an awful sort of realization that happens after we commit to someone; we must now share everything about us. Even the secret corners that we have gone to such lengths to disguise. But in this process of opening and being vulnerable and progressing, we grow. The tandem upward growth trajectory is true love.

A general authority said recently "True love necessarily includes some degree of permanence." And, "[Love] is actively seeking someone else's happiness." Herein lies "The Game's" biggest flaw. And not only because it incorporates neither of those things. Love looks out to others and is always constant, whereas "The Game" consistently looks inward and is ever-changing. It is selfish. It always asks, "How will this make me look?" Whereas love asks, "How will this make someone else feel?"

I've said this before, the very name is at once a perfect definition and a misnomer. It's just a game. While it may be useful sometimes, it will usually never end well, or at least where and when we want it to end. At its best it is a tool, and at its worst a nefarious ruse meant to trap the weak willed and poison them with virus-like commitment issues. It can be exciting sometimes, but I would rather take the short-cut route through candy land. Wouldn't you?

[Keep following, hilarity will ensue.]

The General Rules #2 - The Necessity of "The Game" (Part 2)

A few quotes, you've heard all of these at some point. "How come nice guys never win?" or "How come the pretty girls are always with the cocky jerk in the center of the room?" or "I just want a guy who is sweet!" (As she gravitates toward the next guy who will treat her like dirt and break her heart.) or "Why isn't he/she calling me back?"

At this point in this extended blog post we should all know the answer. Still, it may be helpful to try and give a short definition of what exactly "The Game" is. And what it is not. The watered-down and painfully simple definition is: the set of techniques or actions that a pursuer or the pursued takes to demonstrate a high social value, thus increasing desirability. The more complicated and cruelly frank version of the definition probably goes something like this: the things that boys and girls do to weed out the unfit objects of our affection. In very short terms, it is modern courtship. (This is why this is a three part post. Trying to define this is like trying to grab a slimy toad.)

"The Game" is not intended to be mean-spirited and cruel. (Though sometimes it may be used, wrongfully, to do so.) "The Game" is not your recent boy/girlfriend cheating on you. "The Game" is not meant to consistently break your heart. (Though sometimes it may feel that way.) "The Game" is not easy.

"The Game" functions in different capacities. Sometimes it may be used gain the object of our desires. Othertimes it can be used to tell someone "no" in a subtle manner. And finally, it is not the only path to everlasting love.

To focus in on a narrow complaint about the game, why DO girls end up with guys who consistently treat them like crap? Certainly no girl wants this. They aren't attracted to jerk guys. They are attracted to some of the qualities that most jerk guys have in common. For example, confidence. The love of your life may sit behind you in class for an entire semester, but if he has no confidence to ask you out, there will never be an opportunity. Girls like confidence. Most nice guys aren't as confident as cocky jerks. Thus, most nice guys won't get as many girls. This is one example out of many factors.

So for guys, "The Game" is focused around building these qualities that will help attract girls. For girls, "The Game" consists mostly of playfully denying the men that pursue them. This process is very circular and emotionally exhausting. A "good game" consists of not knowing what is going on. That confusion, those moments of mini-heartbreak, the late nights, the regrets, the coulda-shoulda-woulda thought process, the frustration, all make success so much sweeter, if it ever comes.

Some give up. They experience these mini-heartbreaks and they become so disheartened that they stop trying altogether. They relinquish all hope because it is easier that way. To quote Professor Young again, "...we are afraid our hopes will be disappointed. We don't want to be fooled, and so we create a life or a way of viewing life that is 'fool-proof' --so limited, so empty of vision, that there is nothing to be disillusioned about. Sometimes we even choose to offend those who could be our friends [or lovers], or we choose to demonstrate our own incompetence or irresponsibility, or we choose to imagine a life of intractable pressures, conflicts, and miseries, because we would rather lose everything we can and choose the worst we can imagine than hope for anything and have our hopes disappointed. ...I have always seemed able to make my life miserable and then say to myself, 'At least this is real.' And for some reason it seems that we find it easier to create what we fear and be done with it than to wait in awful suspense until what we fear comes of its own volition."

I think to some degree all of us share the same fear: that one day we will wake up and our partner will not love us anymore. Or that we will wake one morning and inexplicably not love our partner. This fear is deep insecurity manifesting itself. We all share this fear because, at its heart, is the simple fact that we can NEVER be exactly sure how someone feels, about us, about anything. I believe that even when we are in love, we are afraid. We are afraid that someone may be motivated by some strange sense of duty, rather than undying love. That someone may in fact simply feel obligated to love us back. That someone simply is saying one thing, and thinking another. This happens because on the battlefield of love, the lines of communication are badly flawed. We clutch the receiver with white knuckles and hope to receive some validation of feelings, and all we get are words. Words that are so fickle and fragile in their ability to communicate true meaning. Words that leave us wanting. And often do more harm than good.

I will admit, that the higher the level of dedication, the stronger the signal gets on the receiver. With marriage being the ultimate affirming step that both parties understand and want the same thing, and most importantly feel the same way. But even then, the only way to be really, beyond a shadow-of-a-doubt sure is probably through some metaphysical process, two spirits communing without spoken words. It may be good that we distrust words so much, because words can be used nefariously.

The point of all of this is to more fully explain why "The Game" exists. It exists because in those fragile first moments of contact and communication, in order to form a stronger bond later, we need to know what the other side feels like. We need to feel what the other person's rejection of us feels like. We need to experience their (seeming) apathy towards us, we need to feel what it is like to have that person break us. And then when those three feeble words, "I love you" are exchanged, they will have some small meaning behind them. Some honesty. If "The Game" was played, we will know more strongly that they mean what they say, because we know what the opposite feels like, and it isn't this.

[Keep following, I know it was a lot of hard reading. It's like homework.]

The General Rules #2 - The Necessity of "The Game" (Part 1)

"Could I trust you with my heart if I was sure you wouldn't break it?" (Yes, I just quoted myself).

This is a touchy subject and I am quite positive that I won't handle it as delicately as most of you would prefer. I also want to re-emphasize rule #1 when I started this segment. There are exceptions. Some of us know people who fell in love at first sight in High School and have been together ever since. This is not that story. This is what happens to the rest of us.

I start by quoting a sage Professor Young of BYU, "Our hopes are not always fulfilled. That, we have been told, is the nature of our existence here. And though good things can happen to us, though peace and joy are assured us according to our faith, the good things must often come through a process of struggle and disappointment and patient waiting." I'd like to take this idea a step further, and suggest that, "struggle, disappointment and patient waiting" are essential to the process of finding "true love."

We all have the same story somewhere in our early childhood. For me it was a CD player. For others it may have been a bike or a video game or a Barbie. I wanted a CD player when I was 12. It was a Philips 45 second anti-skip jogproof CD player and it was $25. It was this one:

Beautiful isn't it? But the problem with being 12 is that you have no money. Or job by which one may ascertain said funds. So I saved. I begged. I mowed lawns. I did extra chores. And slowly but surely I saved enough and the day came when I triumphantly marched into Target and bought my prize. I took amazing care of this thing. I kept it clean, avoided dropping it, and never went jogging with it. And it rewarded me with TEN years of faithful service before being irrevocably replaced by my iPod. (Which is still running strong after almost six years.) The point of this story is that I worked for this CD player. I put sweat and long hours of waiting and daydreaming into earning this CD player. I treasured it because I earned it. And it rewarded me by going the distance.

Most of us also have a sad story that runs in an opposite vein to the story above. It goes something like this: we asked our parents for something and they got it right away for us, and we played with it for a total of twenty-four hours before the infatuation rubbed off and it sat in a box somewhere for years only to be sold for 120% off at a garage sale. Horrible isn't it?

Before I get into the meat of this post, I'd like you all to remember that old cliche that reminds us, "We all want what we can't have."

 Like my CD player, boys and girls will obsess about each other. We will wait for months or maybe years harboring a small, flickering hope that that special someone will eventually want, need, or even notice us. We all have that hopeless crush. That original person that never knew we existed. Oh Megan, how your flaxen locks will forever haunt me. Ironically, the thing that keeps this perversely ridiculous hope alive is the fact that it will never be fulfilled. Read that last line again. I'm proud of it. Why do we do this to ourselves? Why can't we be happy with what is given to us? Why can't we be satisfied with the toy our parents bought us on a whim? Why can't we be satisfied with a "game-free", simple, no-nonsense, straightforward, forthcoming, easy relationship?

The answer is pride. We simply view ourselves and our worth as humans kind of like a university is rated by how many applicants it turns away. There is something grossly satisfying about turning away applicants for our love and affection. It makes us feel wanted. Important. Worth more than we actually are. From this elevated self-view we draw our lacking self-esteem. No one, I repeat no one, wants to be easy. We want to be more complicated than we are. We want to feel as though we are the best around. In love we do not want to be cheap recipients. Nor do we want to earn the love of someone else at no cost. For, in either situation, we feel like less than we are worth. No one wants the cheaply attained gift. We want the challenge. We live for the challenge. When all is said and done and love is deemed mutual, neither party wishes to look back upon the road leading to this junction and think, "My, that was easy!" because this would inevitably lead into thoughts of, "Why did I end up with this person no one else wanted? What is wrong here?" And like many things, at that point we will create the evidence to support the belief. We will start making things up in our minds to get out.

To avoid this thought process, "The Game" was invented. Its very name is laughably ironic. Because the nature of a game usually includes fun. And this Game is only fun if you are winning. And I will tell you right now, in this specific game, there are very few winners. Though the Game is hard and confusing and at times wrenches on our heartstrings. It is a necessary evil. For it alone will help us look back upon our road and be able to say, "I did it. I did it when no one else could. I am in love with a person who is in love with me alone. And while everyone else wanted what we have, only I got it. Now I can trust this person with my heart. Because I know for a fact that they can break it."

[Keep following parts 2 and 3 are coming soon to an internet near you.]

Fruits Of My Labor

I have recently been on the hunt for rad t-shirts. I think I called them appropriately ironic t-shirts on facebook. And I just wanted to share with all of you the bountiful harvest which I have experienced. I braved the sweet sickly smell of Savers and Deseret Industries. I braved the crying children and harsh fluorescent lighting. I braved the unhappy cashiers and mustard-stained clothing racks. I braved the wash of cold, odd guilt that came over me as I realized that I have the money to shop elsewhere. I braved the unorganized ruddy shelves and piercing sideways looks from observers in my furious quest. All for these gems. The beacon and source of artesian hope. I had a large budget, yet this is probably the best $2 I have ever spent.

Ok, Donny and Marie Osmond are cool enough in their own right, right? But what about the Osmonds you've never heard of? The coolness is simply exponential. They are even clad in 90's regalia. The 2nd Osmonds have a phallic 'G' as their symbol. It is a symbol of prowess, kinda like The-artist-formally-known-as-Prince. The color scheme is a delight to behold, as are their shining, quasi-toughguy  faces.

There isn't much to say about this one. Maybe it is the unintentional play on words, that makes us read: "Right on! Freedom!" Or maybe it is the fact that everything is starred and striped, but the fact remains, this shirt made my day. I don't know if Lady Liberty has ever ridden a Chopper. But maybe she should consider it. After all, she looks dang good. This shirt also makes me want to Ride On Freedom. I also ride on the fact that America will continually ruin its own patriotism with strange mash-ups of revered symbols. I love freedom just as much as the next guy, but now I can wear it on my chest. Right on!
 
[Keep following children, I'm saving for a motorcycle.]

Poena intus est.

                                                                                       I'm thinking of changing my name to Lucian Gogonel.

                                                                     And moving to Kiev.



[Keep following]

It's a nice day for a... white temple wedding.

So I have been to more weddings in the last month than I have been to in my entire life. And while seeing live sealing ceremonies has been a major spiritual highlight, it also gets me thinking. Too hard. (This is a bad thing.) I get all introspective-y and I produce stuff like this. I promise the next post will make you laugh or something...

I have wondered all my life how it will be to hear violins play.
One day I'll look up into someone's face and the chords will match,
a duet and steps in tandem,
constructive waves will stand still in the moment of met glances.

One plays, the other compliments, notes compile and structure harmony;
Our lives come together and in the most beautiful sense, we will make music.
Whatever my thin tune had sung throughout my solo existence,
she pairs her own into a song I have never heard and yet know.

Sometimes I question if I have heard that song, but have jarred the
rhythm so thoroughly that it has unraveled in my hands.
Still, one day it will happen, the most beautiful chords will resonate
with both our souls and we will feel like we deserve joy.
For the first time.

[Keep following, it's like meth for your brain.]

The General Rules #1 - Breaking Up

A strange thing. To begin with the end. But with this topic, as with many others, the process is cyclical. The beginning and the end are closer than we may think. Also, in light of recent events in my life, this is also a fitting place to start. And until we are taken out of this cycle (by getting married), one dare not speak of love without heartbreak.

Get ready. I’m about to flip your world on its head. Ready? Many think that the opposite of love is hate.

It isn’t.

This last semester in my Intro to the English Language course we discussed this concept at length. This is a semantic issue. When discussing opposites we learned how to make a binary grid to analyze the components of a word. It looked something like this:

                                              RELATION   Male   Senior   Directly Related
                                              Father              +         +                   +
                                              Mother             -          +                   +
                                              Niece               -           -                    -

A binary grid uses randomly assigned components to examine what the chosen words have in common. Based on the features chosen we can conclude that the opposite of a father is in fact a niece. Or, if one were to assign a new feature such as “Animate” after “Directly Related” the opposite of a father would probably end up being a rock or something of the sort. In this particular example we find that the words father and mother actually share many common traits. They are differentiated by one degree. So it often is with what we call “Opposites.”

                                              FEELINGS   Positive    Intense   Concern
                                              Love                +             +            +
                                              Hate                 -             +             +
                                              Apathy             -              -             -

From my cleverly devised Binary Grid, one may conclude that the opposite of “Love” is actually a state we call “Apathy,” which by its definition is a “state of indifference”. Apathy is by its nature a suppression of emotion. Love and hate are only separated by one degree: the positive nature of the feeling. Love and hate both involve a certain amount of intensity and concern (positive or negative) about a person. Apathy, on the other hand, involves nothing of the sort.

I tell you these things to tell you this: You can never “get over” someone without forgiving them. It does not matter in the least what that person has done to you. For if you presumptuously assume that you can banish your love by switching it to hate, in order to forget someone, you will never be able to fully let things go. The two are too closely related. Because of this bond, rousing one will also rouse the other. This would lead to years of pent-up emotion that is only softened by a very human forgetfulness. We can forget our feelings, but all it takes is one chance encounter or errant wedding invitation to stir up those old love/hate emotions.

I am not by any means suggesting that we must become apathetic towards someone we have formerly loved. (Because that would simply be a weapon of buried and harbored hate.) Only forgiveness solves this problem. Forgiveness erases hate and apathy and fills us with contented sincerity towards the other person. It cleanses us, not them. And allows us to move forward with hope rather than resentment.

But wait! you exclaim, what about those who have done the breaking up? I will tell you. Rest easy. A few thoughts can be comforting. First, always remember that no one starts dating someone else in order to hurt their feelings. (This is all assuming you have broken up with the person under amiable circumstances{as far as breaking up with someone allows}and not fickle or petty or evil reasons.) Second, take comfort in the things you felt. As my wise-beyond-his-years brother once said, “It is going to fail until it works.” It is as simple as that. The relationship was either right or it was not. Trust your feelings, though it may be the hardest thing you have ever done. And last, do not concern yourself with whether or not you can express what you feel. One shared attribute that could be placed on the end of the Feelings Binary Grid could be “Inexpressible.” This would be something that all emotions would score a plus on. Trying to describe what you feel would be like trying to describe a color to a blind person. Red is red, just as black is black, just as love is love, and knowing it’s right is knowing it’s right. It simply is. Or it isn’t.

This is one thing that is simple with regards to love. It is getting to this point during which all the confusion arises. But let’s save that for another time.

[Keep following. If it please you.]

The General Rules

No this is not about the online auto insurance company. (Although don't get me started. Those commercials make me want to poke my eyes out with a stick.) This is not a declaration about how the military rules! This is about another type of battle organization. These are the General Rules. Love. Yes, I'm talking about love.

Some of you may remember my poll from awhile back about starting a separate blog about love. Due to the mixed reaction, I decided not to do it. Plus, two blogs is a bit much. So I'm starting a new segment called, you guessed it, The General Rules. But before I get into the meat of this new segment I'm going to lay down a few ground rules for the General Rules:

1. They are the "General" rules. This means that there are exceptions. There are always exceptions. Everyone knows someone who had a fairytale courtship, engagement, and subsequent marriage. This is an exception to the rule. For most of us, dating is more akin to a fight to the death in gladiatorial ring than a delicate dance in  a palace. For most of us, getting engaged and married will require a herculean effort. For most of us, this whole "love process" involves more slogging through the mud than walking on clouds. That is why I titled the new segment the general rules rather than "The rules that are always true no matter what."

2. I am not an expert. Don't quote me on anything. In fact, most of you will be better off not reading any of these segments.

3. I cannot be held personally responsible for any actions you may take after reading my reflections and ruminations on the subject.

4. I am always right. Comments are welcome on these posts, but just know that any comments that disagree with my opinion will be subsequently laughed at and ignored.

Thank you for your consideration. And I hope you are looking forward to the forthcoming mindless blather about the most complex subject on earth as much as I am.

[Keep following. Actually don't. You may not like what you find.]

INterCEPTION

O.K. Here is the deal. I am an elitist. Some of you may know this about me. Some of you may be elitists as well. This causes me to act a certain way in certain situations.  For example, if you saw me in the grocery store or doing laundry you wouldn't even be able to tell. Other times, for example, when I sit nonchalantly in the back of a classroom or pretentiously reading a novel in Starbucks, you'll know just what I am.

I saw Inception for the second time tonight and aside from the fact that this movie is perfect, it is also just as good the second time around. The only problem with this movie is that it is popular. And the elitist in me kicks against this prick. (It's a bible saying. For the layman.) The elitist in me wants people to not like this movie. The elitist in me wants others to "not get it." I hate that everyone and their grandma on Facebook is like "OMG INCEPTION WAS SO RAD DAWG!" Case in Point:

No thank you. I hate that I have anything in common with you. Stop trying to talk to me about this movie. If this movie were any less marvelous I would consider not liking it just to spite this guy ^ . But it was simply too spectacular to justify anything of the sort.

The only way I can reconcile this conundrum is to lie to myself and simply tell myself that "they didn't understand it as well as me." That they simply "don't perceive the movie's metaphorical or philosophical depth." And so it stands. Please don't say that you liked this movie unless you can have a dialogue that ventures deeper than, "I LIKED THE PART WHERE THE GUY USED THE GRENADE LAUNCHER." Christopher Nolan didn't spend $200 million dollars and 10 years perfecting a script so you could ruin it with your insipid, vapid and utterly banal observations. Do me a favor and go get high and watch Marmaduke again.

I know. I am rude.

[Keep following. I told you more rants were coming.]

Lifeguard... Duty...

Just look at him. All smug on his little tower. Some have called them aquatic saviors. Others have called them guarders of life. Be not deceived, for they are the fun killers. 

You may think they are innocent enough. They have a tough job. They brave the suns harmful rays day after day just to keep us safe. With their cheap sunglasses and billowing shirts, they are like Batman. If the pool were Gotham City. And the swimmers criminals. And after all, we pay them to stop us from doing dangerous things right?

Wrong. We pay them to save our lives if we happened to drink a bottle of Jack before swimming. We pay them to bandage toes and perform CPR. We don't pay them to be the fun police. Who are they to stop me from running? Who are they to put an end to my chicken fight? If I want to run amok and go down the slide backwards, it is my god-given right. And they better be there to save me if I happen to crack open my skull on the bottom of the pool.

The rules they enforce have been handed down over centuries. They are no longer relevant. The "No Running" rule stems from the before-time when Roman baths were covered in tile and running meant certain death to all toga-wearing patrons. This is outdated. Today's poolsides are covered in textured concrete that resembles course sandpaper. Let me run freely to the diving board. 

So to all lifeguards, I say, stop sucking the fun out of the pool. And take off those shoes. If I'm drowning, I don't want you unlacing your Sketchers and pulling off your socks before you dive in.

[Keep following because the summer has just begun. Also, more rants to follow.]

Catshavealoveformethatisnotreciprocated

Cats LOVE me. Sometimes I feel like this:

They SENSE that I just want nothing to do with them.
So they are all like, "Hey guy, like me."
And I'm like, "No."
And they are all like, "Here's my butt."

Then it's all over because I push them away and they think I'm being loving so they try to weasel their little necks under my palm as I am literally shoving them off the couch for humans with real feelings, when really, I just hate them. This an official notice to all cats everywhere: GO AWAY DEMON-SPAWN, I DON'T WANT TO BE YOUR FRIEND. Go kill something that is not a human baby.

[Keep following. Do it.]

Also Old (But Applicable). I'm Too Exhausted To Be Creative.

I've always thought the verb “to pine” was an interesting phrase. The dictionary defines it as, “to yearn deeply; suffer with longing; long painfully.” Not often does one find a word that can be an inanimate object when used as a noun and mean something completely opposite when used as a verb. What does pain have to do with a coniferous tree?

Well, let’s look at the definitions more carefully: “To long painfully.” I guess trees are pretty long. That doesn’t connect unless the length described here does not refer to distance at all, but to time. Pine trees are evergreens. Forever green. Fitting, because when one pines for something or someone, it isn’t usually a short-term thing. Maybe the word suggests a pain and suffering that is continuous, just like the needles that tenaciously hold their color. Stagnant. Ever-green. Like a wellspring of hurt.

The word can also mean “to fail gradually in health or vitality from grief, regret, or longing.” This also seems to be a contradiction. Other trees look sickly and dead in the winter, whereas evergreens do not. Sometimes they seem like the only thing alive in winter. It turns out that that is also false. Evergreens are just as sickly in the winter as other trees, they just don’t show it. Photosynthesis stops almost completely but not altogether. They respirate and have just the right porous surface on their needles so as not to lose too much water. They survive, but barely. So I guess it’s just a façade. A dodge or hustle to throw off those who would put pines in the same class as ruddy aspen or cowardly oak.

Archaic: “to suffer grief or regret over.” What does a tree have in common with this definition? Does a tree regret? Is the mighty pine an optimist? Or a procrastinator? Maybe lingering green is not just resiliency but simple foolhardiness. Could these trees not just send their water and nutrient stores down into dark roots like other trees? Why so stubborn? Why waste the energy to keep creating food when the sky has clouded over? Maybe the needles that rescue its color in the winter suffocate the tree in the summer. Maybe it regrets this; not growing more in the summer and so forces itself to survive in winter. The green is more a funeral shroud of grief and regret than an indicator of life. A sign of a fool’s hope.

Before 900 AD in Middle English the word meant, “pinen: to torture, torment, inflict pain, be in pain.” This green is self-deprecating, a funeral dirge for hopeless optimism. An insidious form of self-torture. Certainly pines cannot be used for torture! you say? Unless the wood is fashioned into a cross, bored into to form a stocks, or cut down to erect a gallows. The needles even inflict pain. Some say to protect themselves. I say it’s to torture those who don’t understand the pine’s message.

Pining may be fitting indeed.

[Keep following cuz it's gettin' started in ha. In here!]

Our Sprinklers Were Installed By Sadists

Seriously. Take a gander.

The Branbury Apartments, aside from being an apparent magnet for rapists, has also hired evil, wet-sock-loving sprinkler installers. What did they pay these people to do exactly?  Last time I checked, concrete sidewalks did not need watering. But hey, perhaps times have changed.

To their credit, they were creative in their devilry. The sprinklers only come on at night. That is the worst kind of diablerie because it is freezing cold at night. At least little children would glory in running through the streams of water during the hot day. These people must have been hell-bent on spreading their malign influence on all who choose to keep hours that are different from a third grader.

There is no sound that strikes more terror into my heart than hearing the sporadic popping and hissing of a lumbering and spiteful midnight sprinkler program coming to life. It engenders a panicked cry of, "RUUUUN!!!" like some third rate action-adventure movie. The sprinkler heads rise slowly from the grass, hissing all the while like plastic snakes before spraying their cold venom on any innocent bystanders. If you are unfortunate enough to arrive after they are in full cycle, an impenetrable obstacle course awaits. Shooting scatter-patterns of death, each sprinkler head seems like it is manned by the last Nazi gunner at Normandy. Last night they had me bobbing and weaving like some frantic, novice boxer.

But I braved the crossfire. A mad courage and longing for home possessed me. I performed spin moves that would make Adrian Peterson blush. I deftly avoided each homicidal stream only to get caught by an unforeseen pernicious trap.

It has been called many things.

I call it the puddle of sullied hopes.

You see, not only are the sprinkler men evil, they are sly and smart. They outwitted me. I am defeated. They must have broken the regulators and extended the cycles in such a way that it causes excess water flow. The water slowly builds to create a mini Lake Michigan every night in the middle of our lawn. The grass can't take it. And there the water rests. Luring the lone traveler before splashing in and seeping to the toes. In an instant your feet are sopping. In an instant you flash back to the last time your mother held you, and you wish that you had held on a second longer.

Beware the Branbury sprinklers. But if pass through you must, abandon all hope. And bring extra socks.

[Keep following, Ris does.]

An Oldie But A Goodie

Perhaps I remember too well how
August ended in snow or
How Lighthouses deceived me or
When I felt empty in Scotland

I am loathe to dock on convenient
Shores;
Finding the first inviting harbor
Yet I know no other way
Fear of whipping winds or
Sails long fallen limp --
Keeps me at bay

For fear of feeling penetrating cold,
Watching flurries of flakes,
I burned my rigging and set fire to the deck
Yet again; Despite pretending
Winter was rain-soaked snow drifts

I long for forbidden routes and
Exotic ports;
Deep bays and long docks on sunny shores
Blue waters on warm skin
Where I can finally rest
And depart again
But not alone.

[Keep following because I have to admit, it's getting better. All the time.]

Masquerading on. And on.

What a difference a day makes. I think Annie was right. No matter what happens in our today, tomorrow still has an imagination. And it's better than yours. Way better.

Life tends to be a smug masquerade. We are all dancers on it's floor. We wear our ornate costumes, drape ourselves in exotic fabrics, and elegantly spin as if nothing were amiss. We have our masks; our self-deceptions, pride, and narrow pessimism. As if no new dawn could lavish hope.

Little do we know that around each spinning step slinks an opportunist fate. A met glance. Another chance. Or the audacity of romance. We simple fools. We dance on. Side-stepping our mistress luck for the gatekeeper solitude. We cloud our eyes with ethereal fantasy and drift past waiting out our lives as if it were some one-time-only movie showing.

The sun will come out tomorrow. Though you can't fathom its glory. The while we study the barbican moon. The haunches of its dimness. Shortchange those we love and whittle away the minutes. There is contentment but not joy. We experience a sort of damning lack of progress with contentment. We would have joy but for sadness. Fear whips us into hovels.

I for one am in a beaming moment. Warm-faced and blissful. Spirits akin to longing, now embrace like long-parted friends. Keep me loving and I get away from the dance and tear off my mask; and live.

[Keep following children. Happy days are upon us if you look hard enough. Who knows? Maybe you will wake up 50 years from now to a sterile gray dawn and short days filled with ashen snow.]

If at first you don't succeed, don't reproduce.

So I may have just seen the best YouTube video that I have/will ever seen/see. But before I embed it, a few remarks. First of all, I know that none of my readership will ever go into motivational speaking so this may all be moot. But just in case any of you ever consider it, please remember: "The motivational speaking profession requires no formal training or certification, however skills in public speaking in many cases addressing large audiences are vital" (Wikipedia).

This is one of those things in life that encourages dumb people because they think, "No formal training required?! Bonus bonus bonus! I can do that! Easy!" What they fail to recognize is that this is exactly what should discourage, rather than encourage them. If the movie "Little Miss Sunshine" was any lesson, not just anyone can be a motivational speaker. If something requires no education, it is usually the hardest thing you can possibly do. Things like being an inventor, entrepreneur, or freelance writer should be viewed with more caution. If you are amazing at any of these things naturally, then by all means, jump in. But if you don't have anything more to say besides:
1. Figure out what you want to do
2. Believe in yourself
3. Formulate a plan of action
4. Follow through with it
5. Never give up
you should probably consider trade school. Well enough babble, just watch. And hold on, or you may fall out of your chair, as I.



Also, some things just can't be done. Or at least without maiming yourself. Maybe he should change #1 to: Figure out something USEFUL AND PREFERABLY NOT UTTERLY ASININE that you want to do. Watch the hilarious follow up. It won't disappoint.



[Keep following. And I promise you will be inspired to climb Everest. Naked.]

A Fair Warning

This is a bathroom story. I had to pee. It happens sometimes. This time it happened at work. I walked in and saw this old guy standing at the middle of the three urinals, in clear violation of proper urinal etiquette. Rather than opting to wait, I just went to the closest to the door. So I done did ma' business, and was zipping up when said old guy (STILL at the urinal) turned to me and said, "Be grateful for your young days. A steady stream and strong flow doesn't last long." To which I replied chuckling, "Thanks. I'll remember that."

And I will. I was grateful for that small reminder that the clock is always ticking. I've been in a contemplative mood all day since then. I was walking up my stairs on my way home from a vigorous run (partly still motivated from the bathroom incident) and I was remembering, not thinking, I miss my freshman year in college. Things were fun then. After having that thought I had to laugh at myself because I didn't think things were all that grand when I was in the moment Freshman year. In reality, a lot of really crappy things happened freshman year. The funny thing about time passing is that it automatically and simultaneously also applies a rose-tinting. We forget pain. We forget heartbreak. We forget stress. We don't forget happy moments. I think the function of this paradox is to try and remind us that we are in "the good ol' days" right now. Today. If we keep in mind that we will look back with longing on days like today 20 years from now, we will live differently.

None of this makes problems go away or pain any less real. But maybe we can react differently and perhaps even preemptively apply that rose-tinting. This is advice so often heard and repeated that it is much worse than cliche. It is also that way for a reason. Every one of us needs this lesson. We all should keep in mind that "a steady stream and a strong flow doesn't last forever." I am grateful for a normal sized prostate.

[Keep following. I know where Jimmy Hoffa is buried.]

Practice makes...

I had a moment of clarity the other night. (I've been going for drives a lot lately -- mostly because Miles is in Australia.) I was thinking of a mind set that many of us who have been on missions know about. Maybe I'm generalizing too much, but I'm usually right anyway so it doesn't matter.

On a mission it becomes necessary to create a buffer between yourself and your message and/or your method of delivery. Many of us were encouraged to do this with words like, "Remember, they aren't rejecting you, they are rejecting God's message." There is nothing wrong with this. It's good advice for anyone who didn't want to go insane or spiral into depression. There is nothing wrong with it because it is a true statement. When people said no, it wasn't usually because they disliked us as people. They just didn't want to listen to us. And that was OK. In other words, we just couldn't take the rejection personally.

My realization came the other day when I realized that this is one thing that none of us should ever have brought home with us from our missions. It is something that clings to us like a TB exposure or tapeworm. They told us to make our missions springboards for the rest of our lives. This is also good advice. We should all keep the work ethic, dedication, and determination we learned throughout our lives. But one thing we should have left with our ragged suits and tattered shoes in the mission field, was the idea that people are only rejecting an aspect of you when they reject you post-mission. Yes, I'm talking about girls now.

In my naive way I thought that missionary work would somehow also apply to the realm of dating. (Ha ha.) I thought, "I'm used to rejection. It happened to me everyday. Dating will be easy." It has taken me a year to realize that everything I learned for two years doesn't apply here. I was rudely awakened the first time rejection came. Something was different. It hurt more. No matter how much I told myself that it was the same, it just wasn't. "I must be doing something wrong. I'll won't do this or that next time. I'm still adjusting," I thought. So I did it. I asked for advice, experimented, and yes, even read a book on the subject. And at each small rejection, I changed. Because they weren't rejecting me, they were rejecting my message, an aspect of me.

Don't get me wrong. I was not getting dumped and humiliated and snubbed every Friday night like the word rejection implies. It was in little ways. Just starting up a conversation that would end up going nowhere, and so on. You get what I'm saying. Anyway, my revelation was that this is personal now. I'm not presenting someone with a message anymore. I'm presenting myself. And this whole time, this whole last year, I've been presenting only aspects of me. The parts of me that I think people will like and admire and accept. My realization was that this has been a safety blanket. If I get dismissed, I can chalk it up to being the fault of my technique, or a part of myself that wasn't as likable as I had previously thought. I've really let no one see everything, for fear that they would find something they might not like. I guess that is what people mean when they say just be yourself.

In losing yourself for the sake of love or getting to know someone, you gain nothing. You can separate aspects of yourself from who you truly are, and present that to someone. It works. I've been doing it. And if you are rejected it doesn't hurt because, "hey, it wasn't really me they were rejecting." You can make that separation, but that isn't you. Contrary to modern attitudes, you shouldn't have to give everything up for love. You don't have to sacrifice your identity to show your love for someone. That only hurts. I'm not saying we shouldn't try to constantly strive to be better. You can always be better. But you don't have to give up what defines you to accomplish it. It all comes back to being honest. Not just with other people, but with yourself. That is all.

[Keep following. You may get to know me yet. Like the one time I got crocodile wrestling lessons from Steve Erwin.]