The latest and greatest

I have never been a big-purse person. I just don't like dragging something bulky around. For a long time I have used a little bag from Honduras that just fits my wallet, keys, cell phone, and softlips. As that bag has seen better days, I started making little hand bags to serve as replacements. These are a definite work in progress. I don't really know what I'm doing when it comes to sewing, don't have a pattern, but do have a growing box of fabric and a little creative flair. My favorite is the denim at the top, but also love the red check and the little bags I used for Valentines and Easter gifts for visiting teachees. Maybe someday I will get good enough to really whip them out (right now they still take me a while and are all pretty flawed--although I strategically photographed them so you wouldn't really notice). Hooray for learning to sew! (And hooray for big red buttons!)

Just one more thing to be happy about...

Oh happy day!

In all of living have much fun and laughter. Life is to be enjoyed, not simply endured.
--President Gordon B. Hinckley

My sophomore year of high school was extremely hard. I was taking hard classes, decided to play another sport, joined yearbook, and was doing early morning seminary. I struggled, and most of the people around me knew it. That summer, going into my junior year, I did a young women's personal progress goal to not complain for a week. Since it was harder than I expected, I kept working at it long after the week was up. It became a personal goal of mine to stop complaining, to look at the positive. Despite taking three AP classes in addition to everything mentioned before, my junior year was a much easier year. Not that my classes were any less demanding or my alarm sounded any later, but I wasn't complaining about it. I was excited for the opportunities I had to work with and learn from different people. I was learning (not cramming) in my classes. I wasn't complaining near as much. I was happier.

That small summer goal absolutely changed me as a person. I realized that life gives you what you bring to it. The old adage, "if life gives you lemons, make lemonade" still stands on solid ground. The next year--my senior year--I started working at Sees Candies. The motto at Sees is "Samples, Smiles, and Service." I loved that job (not only for the chocolate) because my objective was to do everything in my power to make the customers happy. It wasn't usually too hard to do either (seeing as how we were giving them free samples and filling up their bags with more of it). I loved greeting customers, giving a favorite sample or two, packing their boxes of favorites, and sending them on their way. I have thought a lot about how little it takes to make someone smile or feel better or become comfortable when approached with the right ingredients.

I make a point to make the most of life and my circumstances. Despite the fact that life is definitely not easy, "men [still] are that they might have joy." There is so much to be happy about when we choose to! Blue skies, crisp winds, a smile, a phone call, a rediscovered scripture, a budding tree, an honest compliment, a Sunday nap, an unexpected twist in the road, a good laugh, a (lived in) messy room, leftovers in the fridge...

Today I am exceptionally happy and wanted to share the cheer with you. I am constantly amazed at the blessings and opportunities in my life, for the good people the Lord puts in my path. I am one dang lucky girl and I just can't stop smiling about it!

This is a serious addiction

Oranges. Sweet and juicy and just right. I eat them by the pairs. Two with my whole wheat toast. Two after school. Another two before bed, if I'm hungry. I just can't help myself, they are so good. Oranges, oranges, and more oranges! I even have branched out to orange slice candy, orange sherbet, and today I bought some orange flavored crackers (and two more bags of oranges--one only lasts a few days). What is a girl to do? They drip juicy hints that summer is coming...

The meaningful struggle

I have had a blog post on the tip of my tongue all day and not quite been able to spit anything out, so I hope this is finally it!

The last few weeks in my American Literature classes we have been studying existentialism. Without going into too much depth, existentialists started popping up around the turn of the century (the last century). Their fundamental philosophies centered around the simple fact that we exist. Beyond that there isn't much meaning. They do, however, believe that we have free will (agency). In fact, the only real meaning comes from choosing to create a meaningful struggle, choosing to fight for something that will create meaning. [note: some famous American existentialists include F. Scott Fitzgerald (The Great Gatsby), J. D. Salinger (Catcher in the Rye and "A Perfect Day for Bananafish"), T. S. Eliot ("The Waste Land), and Ernest Hemingway (For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Sun Also Rises and "Hills Like White Elephants").]

While existentialist beliefs don't really coincide with LDS doctrine, there is something about existentialism that I love. It is their dogged determination in choosing a meaningful struggle. They are fighters. They want life to be meaningful even while much of what surrounds and overwhelms them is the material and the meaningless. Today we continued reading and talking about "A Perfect Day for Bananafish" in which the main character, Seymour Glass, is at the end of his rope. His wife, his mother-in-law, even his psychiatrist think he is going crazy. But I don't buy it. I think everyone else around him are the ones going crazy; they are completely caught up in themselves, money, clothes, martinis, and social class. To Seymour they are like his imagined "bananafish" that

"swim into a hole where there's a lot of bananas. They're very ordinary-looking fish when they swim in. But once they get in, they behave like pigs. Why, [he says,] I've known some bananafish to swim into a banana hole and eat as many as seventy-eight bananas. . . . Naturally, after that they're so fat they can't get out of the hole again. Can't fit through the door."

And when they can't get out, they die. The way I read this parable, everyone around Seymour has become like the bananafish--gorging themselves on materialism until they are metaphorically dead. Only Seymour sees the meaninglessness of their money, their social standing, their frivolousness. He wants the innocence that Sybil, a 4 or 5 year-old girl, embodies. He wants the meaningful struggle.

Unfortunately for Seymour, he doesn't see a way to obtain it, and so he commits suicide. Of course I don't advocate such an act. But I do believe in the meaningful struggle. I think far too much we (I) want life to be easy. We expect things to come without much pain or heartache or struggle. But it just doesn't work that way. I was rereading my journal today in which I wrote down that everything meaningful is painful. I feel a little skip in heart telling me again that it is true. The most meaningful things will be the most painful. To be a good teacher, I have to work hard, sacrifice, think, be myself (even if that means being vulnerable to a group of 15-18 year olds). I have to open my heart to them and let them see what is inside if I want to have any sort of influence for good. To be able to empathize and sincerely love someone I have to experience a piece of the hurt they may feel. We have to struggle, we have to suffer, we have to become humble. Oh how I sometimes wish it was another way! But I just don't think it is.

And while I often fight against the struggle and pray for the trial to be over, I know deep in my heart it is the only way. The goal isn't to simply endure whatever the current struggle is, but to become like God while in the refiners fire. The witness never comes until after the trial. It is the pattern God shows us over and over in the scriptures and over and over in our own lives in ways both large and small. I am so grateful for that pattern. I am grateful for the struggle. It is what gets me up on my feet and doing something for someone else. It is what encourages me to make myself vulnerable one more time.

Yet again, this is what I love about literature. I love how it makes me see the world from a new perspective; I love how it helps me change my perspective; I love how it helps me to remember the things that I already know. To remember that I am here for a reason. Never fear, never doubt. How is it I am so slow to remember that the Lord has promised that He will lead and guide me if I will but ask. And I do ask—so I must also trust in the answer. If this is where I need to be, so be it! I really do love it here in Blanding. I love the peace of my little home. It is a sanctuary, a safe place. It is where I am learning to cook and clean and sew and go to bed early. I am learning to listen to the solitude and reach out to others. I am learning to look inside myself and see what is there. I am so grateful for this time—as painful as it sometimes is. I am learning to love my family and to be strong and independent (not that I really think I needed to learn that—I already am too much!). I am glad I am here. I am glad for what I have to offer and the opportunities I have to give it. It is hard, when you are in the midst of it, to really see what is going on in your life. And yet, I do catch glimpses of how lucky I am to be here, to know these bright and talented young men and women, to read and read and read, to be learning what I must learn to be a good teacher. I am so grateful for this chance. Where else in the world would I get to teach juniors and seniors and AP English as a first year teacher? Where else in the world could I have too much time to think and plan and meet new people? So even if it is a struggle, it is a joyful (and often fun) and most importantly, a meaningful struggle.

April by Marcia Masters

It's lemonade, it's lemonade, it's daisy.
It's a roller-skating, scissor-griding day;
It's a gingham-waisted, chocolate flavored, lazy,
With the children flower-scattered at their play.

It's the sun like watermelons,
And the sidewalks overlaid
With a glaze of yellow yellow
Like a jar of marmalade.

It's the mower gently mowing,
And the stars like startled glass,
While the mower keeps on going
Through a waterfall of grass.

Then the rich magenta evening
Like a sauce upon the walk,
And the porches softly swinging
With a hammockful of talk.

It's the hobo at the corner
With his lilac-sniffing gait,
And the shy departing thunder
Of the fast departing skate.

It's lemonade, it's lemonade, it's April!
A water sprinkler, puddle winking time,
When a boy who peddles slowly, with a smile remote and holy,
Sells you April chocolate flavored for a dime.


I have long loved this poem... and I love April! Here in Blanding there are little purple flowers popping up everywhere and blossoms on the trees. A delicious breeze won't stop blowing and the weekend is just minutes away. And for no good reason I can't stop smiling today. Happy spring!

Awkward moments...

My life is awkward. I sometimes wonder--even marvel--at the awkwardness of it all. I'm only going to tell one story (out of many from just this week) for today....

Saturday afternoon the Young Single Adults here in Blanding had an activity to go to Moab (about 80 miles north) to have dinner and go bowling. The activity was actually very fun. We went to a Mexican restaurant with great food and servers who primarily spoke Spanish (I wanted to cry when one of them told me I spoke Spanish well, it made me that happy). After dinner, we got to the bowling alley. I'll be honest, I hadn't been bowling in at least 5 years (to my memory) and was doing much better than I expected.

Then suddenly in comes one of my students (a junior girl--one of my all time favorites) on a "date" with one of the single adults. Awkward. She and her date (note: she is 17, he is 22... awkward in and of itself) take the lane right next to us. Since I know her pretty well, I make an effort to chat and cheer when she does well. But mostly I try to leave them alone, because, well, she is on a date and I'm her English teacher. I felt pretty bad for her having to be on a date with her teacher. Come to find out Monday, her date planned on joining the YSA group all along (since he is one) and didn't tell her. So they walk in and there we all are and she had no idea. And I was trying to ignore her on her date when she was supposed to be with us. Is it just me, or is all that a little bit awkward?

Anyhow, I have thought a lot about the fact that my life is filled with perpetually unusual, uncomfortable, or just plain awkward situations. I wonder, is the problem in my perception rather than the actual situation? Is it only awkward because I see it that way? I don't know. Maybe I am just an awkward person and can't help but find myself in random situations-- it is inevitable. The truth is, I am getting used to it. I am not surprised by most situations any more; although, there is the occasional one that throws me off my guard. Sometimes I just don't know what to do with myself!

I don't think words can describe

how much I loath, detest, and procrastinate taking out the garbage. But maybe these pictures can...



Seriously, I will wait until it cannot possibly go another moment. Usually when I finally empty the trash, I have to fill up a whole other bag because it is stacked so high. I will do anything to not have to take out the trash (usually involving stomping and swashing whatever is already precariously perched atop the towering load). Am I alone in this? Or does anyone else hate this household chore??

Love, Grandma

A month or so ago, when I was home, I fell in love with my Grandma T's red retro kitchen stool. It was tucked away behind a door when I found it, pulled it out, and gave it a test drive. It had a convenient set of steps that could be pulled out or tucked away, was the perfect hight for eating or chopping or stirring, and best of all, it was RED. Well, I gave that darling stool a long loving look and then not a second thought as I made my way back to Blanding. Then to my delight, a few weeks ago, my Grandma called me up to say she had found the very same stool and was having it sent to me. You can only imagine my surprise! Well, it has arrived! 24 screws and almost an hour later, that little retro beauty is sparkling up my kitchen. I tell you what, aren't I a lucky gal?

The Indian Ruins

I went today with a somewhat random (but very fun) group of people into the canyons just south of Blanding to see some Indian ruins. I am not going to lie, I love these little adventures. I love getting out and walking around and seeing new things. Today specifically, I loved the company and the great picnic lunch at the top. I loved the clay-like sand, the little pools and creeks of water, the looming rock. I loved the sunshine and the cool breeze, the climbing, and the rock-skipping. I loved seeing the tiny little houses built out of the rock itself and hidden beneath large overhangs to protect against the weather. I didn't take many pictures; these are all from the second set of ruins (at the very end of the trail). The trail was probably about 2-2.5 miles in and then we hiked up the slick rock, but couldn't get up to the actual ruins. Thank you to Kaiden for taking the last two pictures (I, sadly, am a terrible photographer!). Isn't it beautiful?





Doesn't this make you want to come and visit me?? Just think of all the fun adventures we could go on...

Whoot Whoot!!

Today my little brother, Chad, got his mission call to Tampico, Mexico (on the Gulf of Mexico, a little way down from the tip of Texas). He leaves July 16th, and I tell you what, I am stinkin' excited! I seriously was jumping up and down, I was so excited. I love that all of us who have served missions have gone Spanish speaking. I love that he is going to Mexico (dang, I am jealous). I love that he will be a missionary. I just love, love, love missionary work and I can't wait for him to become part of it. Oh, happy day! I just can't stop smiling :). I seriously wish it were me going on another one, but since that's not a feasible option, I can't wait to start writing letters! Ya se va, hermanito. Sepa que te quiero mucho!

Monologue Mode

One of the side effects of living by myself is that I, eh hem, on occasion, find myself muttering, or mumbling, or well, talking to myself. Now don't laugh. There really is nothing wrong with people who talk to themselves. I come from a long line of women who talk to themselves. And while I did, maybe, laugh about it as a young child wondering if my mom was talking to me or someone else, I have come to see it as quite helpful and even practical. We just have so much going on in our heads that we can't process it all up there alone. My fish was supposed to take some of the edge off of this for me, so I could use the excuse, "I was talking to my fish..." So far that hasn't worked too much. I am sure Bella is bored to death and swimming in circles while I jabber away in the other room and leave her out of all the fun.

Well, talking to yourself isn't so bad when you are alone. But unfortunately, I find myself carrying on a monologue in the most unexpected places. Usually when I am walking home and processing the day. But the worst is the high school bathroom. I can't tell you how many times I suddenly realize I am talking aloud and frantically check the other stalls to see if they are empty. I actually have started walking across the building to the faculty bathroom just so a wide-eyed student doesn't emerge from a neighboring stall wondering if her English teacher is off her rocker. It happens that much.

And I have begun making off hand comments about people who talk to themselves being normal to some of my classes, knowing full well that it is only a matter of time that one of them will walk in on me in the middle of a heated debate with my other half. I want them to be prepared for it. (And I really was starting to get offended at how crazy they choked Hamlet up to be simply because of the endless monologues. Come one, there are lots of reasons you might come up with to charge the poor guy with lunacy, but the mere fact that he talks alone, on stage, a lot, is not one of them.)

So, I really want to know: how many of you have found yourself in monologue mode? Come on now, fess up. I spilled my guts for you here in the blogosphere. Only on occasion? Or more often than you pretend?

Hey, it's Monday!

And I hope it's a good one :). I think the Mondays after General Conference are the best two Mondays of the year. I always wake up ready to go, eager to be better, and aching to reach out to people a little more. Today I only snoozed my alarm twice (record for the month), got in the full half hour of scripture study, and made it to school with plenty of time to get my sub plans ready (I have district meetings today--hence the post at 8:10am! I don't have to be there for 20 minutes). I ate an orange and whole wheat toast for breakfast and am wearing red. Can a day start any better? I just don't think so.

I hope you are smiling brightly and looking forward to a good day too :)



ps. I didn't take this picture (I googled it), but it is a bona fide Blanding sunrise. Isn't this worth waking up for??

Only on the outside

On my desk I keep a picture of two small boys sitting on the slab of concrete in front of their adobe house in Talanga, Honduras. The walls of the hut have been whitewashed numerous times, but are left looking dingy and gray. The roof is made of tejas, or clay tiles, but from the angle the picture is taken, it appears as a flat line across the top of the irregularly shaped wall, as though it is caving in. There is one door and one window. The door has been pushed open and since it is approaching twilight, the inside looks like a cavernous hole. The window is shuttered closed. Juan Miguel, the older of the two--perhaps ten, sits with the heels of his feet resting on the edge of the concrete, his knees wagging in the air, and his hands folded across his belly. His smile is broad and sincere, excited to be getting his pictures taken. His younger brother, noticeably chubby next to the stringy Juan Miguel, does not yet talk, only cries incessantly. His hair falls in long curls around his pouting face, as he inches toward his older brother and away from the gringa taking the picture.

I sometimes wonder why I love this picture; why I am drawn to it. Most of the pictures I took in Honduras had me or a companion on the center stage. This one, however, has nothing to do with me. I did not know Juan Miguel long or well. He was eager to meet and talk with us, but his parents wanted nothing to do with the American and El Salvadorian missionaries who followed their son's directions home. Juan was eager and cheerful, would often walk with us for blocks at a time, asking questions, would show up on Sundays at random. In many ways, he epitomized the children and youth that I met. No money, no shoes, no education, no worries.

When I look at that picture, I am reminded not so much of the disparity between myself and Juan Miguel, but of the different ways we view the world. Its not that one is better than the other, just different. When I lived in Honduras, I grew accustomed to seeing little girls with matted hair, dirt floors, and gas lamps. I learned what it was to eat rice and beans with tortillas as utensils, to see the "gutters" flowing down the side of the dirt road with black water, to hear little children selling their wares--perched atop their heads--house to house. I never saw a water heater or carpet, and only in the city was there a supermarket. I saw heads pop out of unseen windows buried in trash heaps on the side of the highway. I was not surprised to find chickens, even ducks or pigs, or in the winter, donkeys, sharing the house with the one small spring board mattress and a stray plastic chair for the family of six. Water came once a week, if at all, and power-outs at least once a month.

But they were doing the best they could with what they had. Women spent hours scrubbing thread-bare clothes in river water, and men expended all their physical strength in the land in order to feed their families. Many of them believed that the grass is greener on the other side. They believed that if they lived in the fairy tale portrayed in American Soap Operas (beautiful homes, clean yards, paved streets), they could be happier. They failed to see that going to the United states not only mean a potentially higher wage, but a whole new set of problems as well. One way isn't always better than another.

While coming home, almost three years ago, was a clash of cultures, I was not surprised to find neatly lined houses or 15 aisles in a supermarket. Moving to the small town of Blanding, again did not create the surprise or culture shock one would expect. Of course I encounter(ed) the unexpected, but it was not overwhelming. I would have been disappointed if it wasn't different. I love the flavor of living and experiencing new places, cultures, and perspectives. All over the world are people who live in big houses and small houses. We buy ready made dinners or carefully prepare them. We get up in the morning and worry about getting to work on time or getting our bills paid. We breathe in fresh country air or the haze of city life. We spend our time and energy on the things that matter to us, hoping and praying we will overcome life's difficulties. We feel pride, love, fear, hope, and devastation. We are not all that different, despite the outward ways we live our lives. It does not matter if we wear crusted and weathered work boots, classy flats, or no shoes at all. What does matter is that we live and breath, hope and dream, work and struggle, and make it through.

I get tired of the prejudices and fears that seem to plague us when confronted with someone who lives differently than we do. When I look at that picture of Juan Miguel and Jesus, I am reminded to seek and appreciate the differences around me. They are what make us human. They are what make us need each other.


ps. I wrote this just now during my creative writing class. We are currently working on personal essays. Mostly we come together every two weeks for an hour and write. And write and write and write.

pps. I can tell that most of you don't like my philosophical posts as much as the funny ones (not as many comments), but I can't help myself! I can be funny much of the time (my students ask if I ever stop laughing. What can I say? They are stinkin' funny!), but at my core, I'm a thinker. I can't help but write about what I'm thinking about. Sorry. Even on my mission my family would tell me to be more specific and less philosophical. Bare with me :)

Writing the details

"It is important to say the names of who we are, the names of the places we have lived, and to write the details of our lives. 'I lived on Coal Street in Albuquerque next to a garage and carried paper bags of groceries down Lead Avenue. One person had planted beets early that spring, and I watched their red/green leaves grow.'" --Natalie Goldberg (Writing Down the Bones)

As a reader, I love details. I love knowing the color of the quilt on the white wicker chair or the number of pots on the front porch. As a writer, I wonder if I record enough of the details in my life. Will I remember in ten or twenty years that my fish bowl has blue pebbles along the bottom or that it is three miles round trip to the baseball diamonds on 300 West? Will I remember that Jamal called me "Ms. Crazy" every time he saw me or that Stuart was a handwriting perfectionist? Do I take note that my desk manages to always pile up during the day or post-its litter the periphery of my screen?

This winter and spring I have grown into the habit of going on long walks. At first I was a bit self-conscious of being seen by students or parents or whomever. I have sort of lost that pena. I find Blanding an interesting place to roam. There is so much character here. Beautiful brick houses with shanties in the back for drying out the hunting kill, next door to small houses with pain chipping and toys strewn about the yard. Some streets have side walks, some do not. Some yards have beautifully laid out lawns, others towering cactus. They are rusted cars permanently parked, wagon-wheel fences, and an occasional motor home. Randomly squashed between houses will be a stable for horses who stick their noses out to passing cars and pedestrians. And just over the rooftops is the great expanse of the deserts. At night the stars hang low on the horizon and in the morning the same horizon gleams orange against the deep blue of daybreak. Overall this town has an air of being unfinished. It could not be compared to a gated community or city suburb. Few houses are perfectly tailored. Even the streets, laid wide, add to the open feeling of the environment surrounding us.

And I love to stand at my kitchen window, facing out to the street and patch of empty land behind the truck-stop and watch the occasional car or kid passing by. I like to people watch. I like to look in their houses and wonder what their lives are like. Where do they come from? How do they live? What are the details of their lives?