Whoa Nelly

I keep thinking things are going to get easier our something, but that has just not been the case so far. I never made it home Tuesday night-I went to mom and dad's and wore some of my sister's clothes from high school to work the next day. Wednesday and Thursday I left right at the end of school, but just felt brain dead when I got home. Same today. Moments from this week:
Colonial Day was today, and the kids were actually very well behaved and looked really cute doing their dance.
After a shoe-throwing incident from a student other than the usual shoe-thrower, I was talking to some of the aides about how hard it is to love these kids so much but have them struggle and test you. One of them said it's just like raising kids, who scream and tell you you're the worst mom and they hate you, and I realized that was probably why I go home so drained.
Our Captain Hook is going to be so great. He sang his solo today in chorus, complete with a voice he has come up with and gestures and inflection. After seeing so many terrified little elementary school auditions, it is shocking and refreshing and exciting to see talent like that. I'm excited for how the show will turn out-I know it will be a mess all along the way, but the product will be really good.
I saw a headline about a mom suing a school because her daughter wasn't allowed to go to the bathroom and peed her pants, and I immediately thought "this happened in a special." Sure enough, it was the music teacher who denied the bathroom request, because she thought they had gone before class. Every non-teacher and probably most non-specialists would read that and be appalled that a kindergartener was denied a bathroom break, but THE STRUGGLE IS REAL.
I don't know if there is some crisis happening in Saudi Arabia right now, but we keep having kids move in from Saudi Arabia.
I looked up park ranger jobs for the summer and was really tempted.
A story from the past: The greatest compliment I have ever received was from a friend on study abroad. She said I reminded her of trees. To some this would be very weird, and I will try to explain why it meant so much to me. I love both The Sound and the Fury and A Room With a View. In The Sound and the Fury, Benji describes Caddie as smelling like trees, and is very upset when she puts on perfume and no longer does. Her tree scent represents innocence and the natural. Caddie is a very complicated character, but she is always spunky and loving, so despite all of her questionable decisions, I really like her character. And I like the Caddie who smells like trees-who is independent and feisty and possibly the only one who loves her handicapped brother. From A Room with a View, I have acquired the romantic notion that I want to be an "outdoor" person-I want to remind people of a view, not a room. Not that I necessarily spend a lot of time outdoors, but to have that spirit about me. Which is why my friend saying I reminded her of trees is just about the best thing anyone could have said.

11:06 on a Tuesday night

The cast list is done.
Harper Lee is publishing a second novel.

Halfway

Today was the last day of the 2nd quarter, which means I am halfway through the school year. It doesn't seem like it has been that long, but then I think back to some of the things that have happened and I realize that was a really long time ago. So I guess that means I've still got a long way to go.
Tonight, I picked up my cousin from the airport and helped him scout out the location and logistics for his PROPOSAL!!! I am so happy for him, and he has grandiose plans involving a surprise flight, the Netherlands carillon bell tower, and hundreds of tea lights. That I will apparently be in charge of.
Here's hoping it is neither windy nor rainy!
A story from the past: Going back to the "Bad Bad Leroy Brown" story I tried to start once but got deleted. In middle school, we did a line dance unit in gym class. Learning valuable classics like "The Electric Slide," "Cha-cha Slide," or Will Smith's "Gettin' Jiggy Wit' It." At the end of the unit, we had to join groups to present a specific dance to the rest of the class. This was daunting for me, because I was a horrible dancer and had not really been successful with anything we had done past the first week or so. So, I joined the group for "Bad Bad Leroy Brown," which was one of the easier ones, and thought this would be least embarrassing for me. As part of this whole to-do, we were encouraged to wear a costume representative of our dance. Though we had heard the song many, many times, the only words I knew from the song were "bad, bad, Leroy Brown. Baddest man in the whole damn (I don't remember if they edited that word or not) town. Badder than old King Kong. Meaner than a junk yard dog." And that's all I knew. Being in 7th or 8th grade, we discussed our ideas for costuming, and then the teacher came over. We said we didn't really know what to do, and she said "well, you know, bad Leroy Brown was a pimp." I did not know what a pimp was, but everyone else seemed to and the way the teacher said it made it sound like it was bad, but it couldn't be that bad, right? I mean, this was public school. Blissfully unaware of the implications of everything that then happened, the rest of the group said we should "dress like pimps" by wearing suits for our costumes. When I told my mom I needed to wear Dad's suit coat and shoes for my dance, I'm sure I didn't tell her it was because I was trying to dress like a pimp, and if I did...as much shame upon her as upon my gym teacher who told us to in the first place! I don't remember what the other girls wore, but I remember it was a much cuter version than what I was wearing and I felt and looked like a total idiot. Especially in my dad's shoes, which made it very hard to dance even an easy dance like "Bad Bad Leroy Brown." I just looked up the song, and holy moly, I would probably get fired if I tried to use that song in my class. And I would DEFINITELY get fired if I told four girls to "dress up like pimps."

Mine eyes have seen the glory

Of the Mariinsky Ballet. I was enticed by The Rite of Spring, which was very cool, but oh my, their classical stuff was incredible. It is late and I need to go to bed, but oh my, it was so beautiful. I kept trying to remind myself that the ballerinas are technically human, but I don't think I believe it.

Bought pencils

I just read an article about how people find recordings of the mundane more interesting than the important, so I am going to make up for the fact that I skipped a few days by writing about mundane things, making this post MOST INTERESTING OF ALL. Here goes: I bought pencils. 48 of them. Hopefully between those and the remnants of the old ones were can get to the end of the year. I bought them while at Target Saturday night, getting Relief Society birthday candy and talking to Diana in the phone. There were these pretty glass water bottles on clearance, but only one design was marked clearance, which of course meant I wanted the other full-price design, but I couldn't justify it, so now we just have to hope I don't break my pretty glass water bottle. I have been in the market for a water bottle for a while, bit I can't ever seem to get one that doesn't leak. This one just proved to be pretty enough for me to get over that concern. I tried to get my nail polish off today, which exposed how crumbly my nails have gotten recently. I don't know if crumbly nails is something that a manicure would help, but I'm too afraid to ever get a manicure unless my nails are perfect. Like people who clean their house before the maid arrives. Kind of related to how I had plucked my eyebrows for years, but Mom would keep mentioning how I shouldn't pluck my eyebrows until she showed me how, so I would try to let them grow out a bit so I could ask and have her "show me how," but having them grown out annoyed me so much I would just pluck them again and start the cycle all over. I just scrolled through my brother's Facebook to see if the girl he likes had liked or commented on anything, to see if I could gauge her interest level (important note: this was not done at the request of anyone other than my curiosity). Turns out, she wished him happy birthday and liked his latest status/funny post, but nothing before that. I think this is better than a few things from long ago and nothing recent, but frankly, he has posted a lot of great stuff that was definitely worthy to be liked. I tried to do laundry today but there was like a three load pileup. Here's hoping there's a pair of clean garments in my drawer. I finally threw out a giant empty chip box and goldfish box and pudding box. I had always been too lazy/would think about it when the weather was gross and I didn't want to go out top the bin, but somehow today, despite the fact it was wetly winter mixing, I found the strength. And now a lot of space on my shelves.
Okay, if that was not mundane, I do not know what is. Since today is supposedly historic, I would be remiss if I did not mention the apparently "worst blizzard in ever" that is hitting New England. A whole bunch of states issued travel bans, which I didn't really know you could do, but which sound like a good idea.
I would also be remiss if I did not mention that it was my brother's birthday and I gave him a Lego set and we went to Outback and on Sunday had a mega birthday dinner with his roommates and my roommates and two girls who bought the dinner at the service auction and another girl in the ward with a January birthday.

Midnight post

Well, it looks like it is already Saturday. How did that happen? Tonight I went to Lake Braddock's production of Hairspray, which I thought would maybe be a little bit of a trial to sit through. Boy was I wrong! The middle schoolers who I helped with were now in the starring roles, and they did a great job. Strong singing, good comedic timing, the pit sounded great-it made me think teaching high school could be fun again.
I learned one of my students has perfect pitch today when he wrote the pitches I had played for a dinky little listening assessment. He is in the same class as the girl who is spending her weekend making recordings for her application to a summer festival at Indiana. #notworthy
A story from the past: Erin had a makeup play set and we would give each other makeovers. One day, she used the eye liner pencil to draw big dalmatian spots in my face. We thought this was hilarious. When I went home though, we had to leave for Josh's baptism. Though it was a kid's makeup set, the eyeliner was very hard to get off, and I had to go to the baptism with the faint outlines of dalmatian spots on my face.

Still Haven't Bought Pencils

Which meant one 5th grader filled out his literacy assessment in orange gel pen. Such is life.
Because it did not snow today, auditions continued as usual after school today, until 6:30. There were a few very strong contenders, but you can imagine my annoyance when My Little Pony girl (so called because we once had to take a My Little Pony away from her during chorus, because yes, she was a 6th grader playing with a My Little Pony), was first up and had no idea what she was doing. She had never looked at the song or the dialogue--which we knew because she actually said that to us. We also had a girl whose mother had emailed earlier in the day saying she had forgotten to remind her daughter her audition was that day, and she had her permission to stay after. Turns out, her daughter was never signed up for an audition at all and had absolutely nothing prepared. Or there was the girl who had a complete nervous breakdown while waiting and had to be coaxed into the room like a dog learning how to go up the stairs. And then she had a lovely voice and was a pretty good actress. One of my favorites was our very first audition, yesterday morning. He had written that he wanted to play John because "I have the most in common with John, except that I'm Asian and a little bit fatter in the face." Bless all their dear souls.
A story from the past: I think on my 6th or 7th birthday, Doug told me about this thing called "college." He said that when you got older you would move away from your family for four years and go to college, which I found very upsetting. Especially since it was my birthday, which meant I was getting older and therefore that much closer to going to college.
I have to remind myself when I am teaching the younger grades that there are things like this that they still have idea about and might be fearful of, just like I was. For instance, when I wore my glasses for the first day this year, they were all fascinated. I told them that when I don't wear my glasses I am wearing contacts, which are little pieces of plastic you put right on your eyeball. They were amazed, and the next time I saw them (not wearing my glasses), one kid asked if I had "that glass in your eye?" I was confused at first, but eventually realized he was asking if I was wearing my contacts. It comes up every now and then still-they are just so curious. One day as a first grade class was leaving, one of them grabbed me and told me she was afraid. Afraid of the little glasses, my little glasses. This particular student is kind of a space cadet, so I thought she might just be saying things out of her imaginary little world, when I realized she was talking about contacts. She wears glasses already, and it is quite possible that this makes the idea of contacts much more immediate to her, and the thought of having to put things in your eyes as a first grader would be pretty terrifying. I tried to reassure her that everything was okay, and she wandered off to class.

Thank you snow!

We were scheduled to have auditions until 6:30 tonight. Considering we started at 8:07 that morning, I was not looking forward to that. BUT it snowed a little bit around noon and FCPS cancelled all after school activities! Huzzah!
I still have not bought pencils, because who can remember that?
I could hear the squirrels in my ceiling while working on grades, so I punched the ceiling. Ooh boy, did they scuttle!
Currently I am watching The Bachelor with Doug. Though the bachelor himself is kind of boring, the girls this season are very entertaining. And Jimmy Kimmel is on this episode, which means it is more hilarious than usual. And now Doug is making mozzarella sticks, so yeah, that little bit of snow basically turned tonight from a pit of exhaustion into super happy fun times!
I learned today that Peter Pan music is really hard to sing at 8 am. And that there is no limit to the explicitness of instructions that can be ignored by 6th graders. Oh, you want to audition for the two parts that clearly say "unauditioned roles, no audition required"? Or, you didn't know there was dialogue for this part even though it has a dialogue section listed next to it on the chart? The chart you had to look at to figure out which song to sing? I worry.
A story from the past: in sixth grade, I got a part in the play where I spoke one line. Because I had a "speaking role," I didn't get to sing any of the ensemble numbers, which were saved for kids who didn't get to be onstage. However, my role was so insignificant ("Postgirl"), I didn't get to sing in any of the songs all the main/named characters got to sing in. I was pretty mad about it, and I sometimes wonder if my determination to succeed in singing was partially driven by a need to absolve this.

Tuesday (again)

Oh boy, another Tuesday. It was the kind of day where my makeup never made it on my face. The kind of day where it took an hour to get to work. Where 2nd graders became violent. Where a kid who has been doing just fine in class somehow missed nearly every question on the quiz. Where I legitimately ran out of pencils for my giant 5th grade class, and then forgot to buy more, even though I made myself a note. Where I never ate my actual lunch.
But, I also discovered that a few 6th graders have made significant progress. That a few 5th graders are surprisingly good composers. And that I have gotten my brother's grumpy roommate hooked on The Bachelor. So I'm counting these as small victories.
A story from the past: I don't know how old I was, but at some point I made up a little tune to the words "King Tut Tut Tut King Tut Tut Tut," and I thought it was so catchy out deserved to be written down. So somewhere in a book of manuscript paper by the piano there is my little song. I'm pretty sure it just started on a note for "King" and then went down a perfect fourth for "Tut," so it was just do-sol-sol-sol do-sol-sol-sol. Not very original, and I have no idea why I chose the words "King Tut" to repeat over and over, but I was pretty proud.

The Weekly Room Picture

Okay, I said I was going to do it, so here it is:

As you can see, it was that kind of week. I thought today (Monday) would be my day to clean up and get things under control. It was not. I went to the temple (which was great), I got a pedicure with the January birthday extravaganza (which was great), and I saw Into the Woods (which was great). But I did not do any grading or cleaning (which was not great). Oh well.
Today, I learned what it's like to get a pedicure-can you believe it! Today was my first time! It was very nice, but considering one toe is already chipped, I realize I was really paying for the massage and such, not the toenail painting.
A story from the past: The only time I have ever had a manicure was before homecoming sophomore year. I went with a friend, and I didn't quite know what to expect. Even if I had known, I probably wouldn't have been prepared for the experience. The manicurist did not speak much English and was very rude. She shouted at me to move to another chair (not because I sat in the wrong one, but because she had to move tables), and then did a very quick job. When I went to the dryer, I accidentally touched one of my nails to it, so it smeared, and then I got to try to understand what the cashier was shouting at me about how to pay. Scarred me so badly, I've never had another one.

Temple Thoughts

One of my jobs as Compassionate Service Leader is to put together a brunch for new girls who move into the ward. I attended one when I was new, and I really appreciated getting to know other new people, but it was a little awkward because we were ALL new. Conversation didn't ever get past introductions. So, I decided that this time, the whole Relief Society was going to be invited, in the hopes that it would have a more party-like atmosphere. This quickly snowballed into a stressful situation for me, because the number of new girls seems to have doubled the size of our Relief Society in the past three weeks, and it was going to be right after church, which meant people would probably actually come. Which I wanted. For sure. It just meant I had to make a lot of food. I ended up making 6 (5 initially, with a backup thrown together during the party) dozen muffins, the Relief Society president brought about 2 dozen more, and we ate them all, including two fruit plates and two whole bags of tater tots. Considering the last time I threw a party was my 13th birthday slumber party where everyone fell asleep before midnight (worst party ever), I am surprised at how well it went. I have spent the rest of the day fairly brain dead in an attempt to recover, but it was good.
The reason I titled this post "Temple Thoughts," though, is because I'm going to the temple tomorrow and I want to take the opportunity to write a little bit about my temple thoughts. Especially since I made no record of anything this past summer, which seems really stupid because this past summer was a MAJOR turning point in many aspects of my life-festivals with Timpanogos, getting dumped, graduation, moving home, living with Mal, the discouragement of job applications and interviews, going through the temple, the archaeology lab (not a turning point, just interesting), getting a job, the epic cross-country adventure, Buddy dying, buying a car, moving into my house, becoming a teacher. Those few months were probably the most significant ones in my life so far, and yet I wrote nothing about it except a few letters to Diana.
Anyway, temple thoughts. I love the temple. I didn't really get why people said that before, because though I think baptisms are beautiful, the whole experience often just didn't feel very holy. Between the jumpsuits, locker rooms and wet hair (and at Provo, the feeling you were either in a factory or waiting in purgatory) I often left the temple feeling more stressed than when I entered. Before Diana left on her mission, I felt very strongly that I was to go through the temple, but my bishop said I was too young. This was frustrating, because I had prayed so fervently and felt very sure about my decision, and this felt very much like what I had experienced with deciding whether or not to serve a mission. I had a righteous desire, but some spiritual authority was opposing that desire. I was upset, but there was nothing I could do, so I gave up on the thought. Fast forward to this past summer, when my parents told me that the age restriction had been removed from the handbook. I thought this was nice, but at this point I had pushed the possibility of going through the temple in the near future to the back of my thoughts, but my parents pushed. And thank goodness they did. I had another fun run-in with a bishop (which I am not going to go into right now because I really intended this to be a happy story) which may have turned me of from the idea for the moment, but there was no time for that! We had plans to go through the Nauvoo temple in a few months, and my parents rightly saw that I was prepared, and had been prepared, for a while already. In the lead up to my endowment, people kept telling me "it's really weird," which I know they meant kindly as in "it's really weird, but wonderful and true and you shouldn't be turned off by how weird it is," but it was getting a bit excessive. I find ritual very powerful and beautiful, and once I confirmed that there would be no animal sacrifice or nakedness, I figured I would enjoy the ceremony very much. And I did. And do. Every time I go, I feel like my mind is touched and opened, and I reach some higher understanding. Somehow, everything about the gospel suddenly makes sense, and I feel I am treading at the edges of the mysteries of God. I love the temple because I truly feel transformed when I am there. I am working on preserving that feeling in my daily life, but my personal failures have not yet precluded me from experiencing that power and testimony when I attend the temple. I think the Psalmist puts it best: "Blessed is the man whom thou choosest, and causest to approach unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts: we shall be satisfied with the goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple" (Psalms 65:4)

I Want (Maybe Need) a Hug

While volunteering at the Natural History museum, I meet a lot of kids. They are small children who come into my life for an average of probably 15 minutes, and then they disappear out of it, never to be seen again. But for those 15 minutes, I am their best friend. I teach them things, and they are amazed and then they are so excited to show me things and tell me all about what they think and sometimes they grab my hand and run across the room to bring me a picture they colored and then it's lunch time and they leave. Today, there was an adorable 3 year old boy who I could tell was very curious, but he was so shy he would run away when I said hi to him. While he was at the microscope, though, I strategically sauntered over to box of rocks next to him, and started casually dramatically looking at them with a magnifying glass. "Hmm...what's this? Oh wow, what a rock! It is brownish-red!" Since he hadn't moved away as soon as I appeared, I finally took a chance with one of my more successful Discovery Room introductions-(holding a lava rock/cinder) "do you know where this came from?" I had said it in a very low, confidential voice, and he whispered "where?" "a volcano!" "a volcano?" "yeah, this is cold lava. Do you want to hold it?" "yeah." And then we were BFFs and looked at all the rocks under magnifying glasses and he told me which ones were bumpy and which ones were not bumpy and then we held them and compared weights and the whole time I just wanted to hug him. He was adorable. And he was wearing this very poofy orange jacket and he just looked very squeezable. He eventually grabbed my hand and we went to look at bugs. His 2 year old brother was pretty precious, too, and got very into the animal footprint activity and actually remembered which one belonged to a frog AND helped me put all the pinecones back in the pinecone box. I'm jealous of their mom. Maybe I should have offered to become their babysitter. Or kidnapped them.
The book I am currently listening to is called The News Sorority, and it's about Diane Sawyer, Christiane Amanpour, and Katie Couric, who I really knew nothing about beforehand other than that they were female news people. But, now I am getting to know all sorts of things about them. For instance, Christiane Amanpour was college housemates with John F. Kennedy Jr. I know that of all great things she has done, this fact is incredibly trivial, but I just think it is really interesting how random famous people know each other. I also think it would be really interesting to hear them talk personally about "oh, the time before my family was exiled from Iran, those were the days" or "oh, when I used to live in the White House, those were the days" and the fact that Jackie Kennedy has been Amanpour's hero when she was younger and then she got to go hang out at her house. Like how Katie Holmes had had a crush on Tom Cruise, and then she ended up marrying him. Oh famous people.
A story from the past: Back when I took piano lessons, I was once working on a song from Lord of the Rings. I was not good at piano and I did not like practicing, but I liked the song and genuinely did want to be able to play it well. One of my motivating thoughts was "what if Orlando Bloom hears me playing it and it is so beautiful and he falls in love with me," and I would think about that while I practiced. It is a good thing Mr. Bloom never did hear me play, because I never really did get good at that piece.

The Deed is Done

There are 195 students in our choir. Every single one of them needed an audition packet by this afternoon. It would have been nice if we could have made them last night when we were at school until 8:30, but both copiers were broken. When we arrived at school today, only one was capable of copying. Imagine the panic and frustration as every teacher vied for position. By some miracle, once I got the packet in and set it for 200 copies, hardly anyone showed up and had to do the awkward "oh can I interrupt? I mean, I have 75 copies of a 5 page packet to make, but I need it for next hour." I really wonder if someone sent out an email informing the rest of the staff that the audition packets had finally made it in and would not be done for another hour and a half. I wouldn't put it past Spinny. After 4 paper reloads and 1 staple refill, they were finally done, which was a true triumph.
I learned today that the third grader who burst into tears in the middle of class yesterday was apparently upset about "robbers, and bad people breaking in and doing bad things." This sounds suspiciously like my cover for bursting into tears in kindergarten, but could be genuine.
Which, brings me to a story from the past: The art teacher at Kings Park when I was in kindergarten was terrifying. She was mean and short-tempered, at least I thought so at the time. Looking back, she may have just not had as warm a personality as kindergarteners expect out of teachers, and that translated into really scary. Anyway, 1e had just arrived at art class, and a kid asked to go to the bathroom. The teacher was mad, because we were supposed to go beforehand, and she said that kid could go but nobody else (having had to do this exact same thing in my own classes, I now sympathize greatly with this woman. Class is 30 minutes, we had time to go when we walked down the hall, if you let one go every else wants to, etc. It's just the worst). I did not often use the bathroom at school, especially with half-day kindergarten, which is why it is so odd that I had to go sooo badly that day. But I did need to go. So badly that I started crying. The teacher asked me what was wrong, and on the spot I said that I was afraid my dad's plane was going to crash (he was flying back from a business trip that day). The art teacher called Mrs. Ritchie down, and she took me to the teacher's lounge. We talked about my "fear," and had me call home. My mom came to pick me up. While waiting for my mom, Mrs. Ritchie asked if I wanted to go to the bathroom, and I finally got to go. Then, I got to go home early, feeling great because I had gotten to pee and I really wasn't upset at all about my dad's flight. I told this story to my mom many years later, not realizing that she had never heard my side. She said that for all those years, she thought I really had been concerned about Dad. Nope, I just needed to pee.

Sellenger's Round

Today was the first time I have seen a 4th grade class since winter break, and though I had really nice plans about distinguishing 3/4 and 4/4 and writing melodies to play on recorder, Colonial Day is in two weeks and they have to learn a Colonial dance. So, if you are ever in need of a fun times English folk dance, I've got you covered. I have called out the instructions so many times at this point: "right left right, left right left, back two three face your partner, right left right, left right left, and turn in a cir-cle." It's called "Sellenger's Round" and there is at least one video on YouTube of old people dancing it, with much more finesse and skill than my dear 4C children.
I learned there is a Chik-fil-a by Fair Lakes today, which is dangerous. I don't know what it is about their chicken, and why the secret is so elusive that other fast food places do not rival it, but boy is it good.
A story from the past: well, I had nearly completed my story about dressing as a pimp for "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown," but then the internet crashed and now it is gone and I need to go to bed. So instead, a shorter story: oh my goodness, it just crashed again. Right in the middle of my epic snow shovel to the mouth story. Okay, shortest of short stories because I need to go to bed: I couldn't figure out where the voices giving the sacrament prayer came from (and oh, I peeked to make sure it wasn't just someone who got to and from the pulpit really fast), so I decided it must be the Holy Ghost saying the prayer. I leaned over to my mom one day and told her how great it was that the Holy Ghost himself gave the sacrament prayer, and she said "no, it's just the priests over there. They have a microphone under the table," and I was very disappointed.

Snow Day

Today was a snow day, which meant I made five dozen muffins for a Relief Society brunch and watched The Bachelor with Doug. I also wrote a longer, more detailed post that got deleted, and since I'm writing this on my phone, I'm not going to try to recreate it. Just imagine its genius. With my extra internet time today, I read an article about a study where two strangers replicated the intimacy of a romantic relationship by asking each other a series of 36 questions and then staring into each other's eyes for 4 minutes. This sounds a lot like a favorite library find of mine: How to Make Anyone Fall in Love with You. Obviously, I am not a good applier of the things I read, but I do find stuff like this fascinating. And there are some really good questions on this list that make for interesting date conversation. Here they are:

1. Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?

2. Would you like to be famous? In what way?

3. Before making a phone call, do you ever rehearse what you're going to say? Why?

4. What would constitute a perfect day for you?

5. When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?

6. If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the mind or body of a 30-year old for the last 60 years of your life, which would you choose?

7. Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?

8. Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.

9. For what in your life do you feel most grateful?

10. If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?

11. Take four minutes and tell you partner your life story in as much detail as possible.

12. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained one quality or ability, what would it be?

13. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future or anything else, what would you want to know?

14. Is there something that you've dreamt of doing for a long time? Why haven't you done it?

15. What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?

16. What do you value most in a friendship?

17. What is your most treasured memory?

18. What is your most terrible memory?

19. If you knew that in one year you would die suddenly, would you change anything about the way you are now living? Why?

20. What does friendship mean to you?

21. What roles do love and affection play in your life?

22. Alternate sharing something you consider a positive characteristic of your partner. Share a total of five items.

23. How close and warm is your family? Do you feel your childhood was happier than most other people's?

24. How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?

25. Make three true "we" statements each. For instance, "we are both in this room feeling..."

26. Complete this sentence "I wish I had someone with whom I could share..."

27. If you were going to become a close friend with your partner, please share what would be important for him or her to know.

28. Tell your partner what you like about them: be honest this time, saying things that you might not say to someone you've just met.

29. Share with your partner an embarrassing moment in your life.

30. When did you last cry in front of another person? By yourself?

31. Tell your partner something that you like about them already.

32. What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?

33. If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven't you told them yet?

34. Your house, containing everything you own, catches fire. After saving your loved ones and pets, you have time to safely make a final dash to save any one item. What would it be? Why?

35. Of all the people in your family, whose death would you find most disturbing? Why?

36. Share a personal problem and ask your partner's advice on how he or she might handle it. Also, ask your partner to reflect back to you how you seem to be feeling about the problem you have chosen.

In case you were wondering about my answer to number 7: either from a massive heart attack at 45 because I don't exercise and have a horrible diet (dinner last night was mozzarella sticks and tonight was pigs in a blanket), or being eaten by something, because that is my greatest fear.

A story from the past: I always wanted a pet, and when I was maybe four years old I decided to do something about it. I captured an ant in a bug catcher jar, and put in some snickerdoodle chunks for him to eat. When I woke up the next morning, the ant was gone, having escaped out an air hole in the side of the jar.

Tuesday

There is no way to adequately express what today was other than Tuesday. Ugh. I was this close to justifying not writing anything, considering I got home from work 20 minutes ago, and it is 10:09. In  the PM. Right now. Like, I was at school for 12 hours and this was only Tuesday. But boy howdy , what a day. I learned Sellenger's Round, a delightful English dance that I am supposed to teach to 4th grade for Colonial day. If the weather ever allows us to have a 4th grade class between now and February 6th. And when I say I learned it, I mean I watched some old people on YouTube do it, and then around 8:30 tonight I did it with one of my co-workers. I don't really have to be good at it, I just have to know what happens in it so I can shout directions at 10 year olds (is that how old 4th graders are?)  A fun story from today: I had to mail something after school, so I set off for the post office. I figured the experience may last 10 minutes. Pick a box, put things inside print out a label at the machine, easy-peasy. Of  course, it was not. After a frustrating experience with the slowest Wal-Mart cashier in existence, I get there and try to decipher the box options. They do not post the prices for anything or at least have a chart that says "this is the cheap one" or "this is the one to use for precious items." Nope, just random words like "priority" and "express." I choose a box, based on the sign that says "free packing materials" hoping that means it it's cheaper-ish. I put my stuff in it and realize the box is too big. I hope the post office man who keeps turning people away from the desk because it is now 5:01 and "we closed at 5" does not notice that I leave the box I began assembling in a corner and grab a new one. I get everything in, tape it up, and turn around to join the line that has now formed at the self-service machine. The man at the front of the line has three packages and a tenuous grasp on the operation of a post office self-service machine, but then it's just a guy with one package, and me. NBD. After I hear the post office man turn away another poor soul, I comment to guy in front of me that it would be really nice to have a job where you can just say "sorry, 5:00, we're closed," especially since I am going back to work right after this. Big mistake. He asks me where I work, I tell him I teach elementary school, he asks where I went to college, I say Brigham Young University, he makes a joke about whether I ever tried to count the number of black people out there (he was black), I laugh and say it is sad, I make a joke about how weird it was too go from growing up here to school there to teaching here again, and how I was surprised none of my students in Utah had any Jewish friends, and then he makes some comment about how when you look at organized religion it really makes atheism make sense. Not where I was going with that. Then he launches into a discussion of how naturally, woman is most important, but in religion man is most important, and since I did not feel it appropriate to break out Family: A Proclamation to the World, he continued on to the idea of sexual selection and that it is woman that made humans a great species, because she selects strong mates, and needs strong providers if she's going to be pregnant, and at some point Al Capone got mentioned, and I could not believe it could take that long to mail three packages. Hurry up, man at the front of the line! Can't you hear this is an emergency??! Anyway, 30 minutes after entering the post office I had finally mailed my package and was on my merry way. To Panera, to grab a bagel, which despite there being no line, took 10 minutes. Tuesday.
 From the past: really the only thing I remember about my own Colonial day is that I was really excited about making these boxes using the marbled paintstyle, but

The Shower Plan

While in the shower, I came up with this plan for this blog. Every day, I will write at least one thing I learned, one thing that happened that day, and one story from the past (gotta catch up on the years of non-journaling somehow). As a way to hold myself accountable for cleaning, I will also once a week post a picture from my room. This only seems like a good idea right now because I actually cleaned this weekend.


Decorating tip: a cardboard box may serve as an end table or just something to be thrown out.
The distinction is in whether you pile things on top of it

So, following my plan, something I learned today, brought to you by Elder Randall L. Ridd, in his devotional "Living with Purpose: The Importance of Real Intent." As my mom warned me, he does talk very slowly, but this talk was something I really needed to hear right now. A lot of big important things have happened to me in the past year (student teaching, graduation, going through the temple, teaching job, new car, new house, new ward), but I have overall felt a bit adrift. One aspect of this I definitely think could be attributed to my casualness towards scripture study and prayer, but I think even that has been part of a bigger problem. Namely, I don't really know what I want and therefore haven't really approached anything with deep sincerity, or as Elder Ridd called it "real intent." So, here's to figuring out what I really want and until then, committing more to the Lord and seeking His guidance.
Something that happened today: My mom (we hang out a lot) brought me a pack of mozzarella sticks, which I was really excited about. My dinner consisted of five of them, which was DELICIOUS, but I promptly felt not so great. Current relationship status with mozzarella sticks: it's complicated.
A story from the past: I mainly needed to start this blog so that my great moments in teaching would be recorded somewhere. And mainly so that THIS great moment in teaching would be recorded somewhere. Here goes: For all of the hours I spent in college attending education classes, they really did not prepare me for the sheer mass of small things that go into running a classroom. One of these small things is preparing seating charts. I have a nice little carpet with rows of different colors that I thought would make seating a breeze, since the kids just have to walk down a row and sit in a square. Not so. With first grade, I had already spent too much time trying to get them to enter the room in an orderly fashion and they were finally all in their own squares, without any randoms by themselves in the purple row, and I was finally writing down names. Again, you would think that having a carpet that looks like a grid would make copying down names into a grid very simple. Again, not so. I teach classes that range in size from 23 to 35, and there are 30 squares on this carpet. This means, some classes use every square on the carpet, plus a few carpet squares off to the side, and the red row has to move to the back anytime we use the smartboard because they are too squished in the front. And some classes don't have to use the red row at all and fit very nicely between orange and purple with extra leg room. This first grade was one of those smaller classes, and while copying down names I messed up by writing a few first-row names into the first row on my chart, even though they were sitting in the second row on the carpet. This threw all the other names off and was basically a small annoyance, but because this was only my second day and there was an instructional assistant there to help with a kid watching me, I was flustered. Flustered enough that I said under my breath "darn it." Not "damn it," "darn it." Of course, this being lower elementary, though, "darn it" ranks up there with "stupid" and "dummy," so I should not have said it. A little boy in the front row heard me, and looks up with his big brown eyes. And then he goes "Can I say s**t? Is that a bad word?" I tried very hard to not burst out laughing and said "oh yes, that's a bad word, we don't want to say that," but the aide was having none of it. "(First-grader's name here), you know better than that! In the corner!" And off he went, to the corner, which he interpreted to be the area next to my desk, behind the trash can. Where he knelt on the floor, like a penitent monk or something. Now I really could barely hold in my laughter, but I had to, or maybe I would have been sent to the corner, too.
Epilogue: that aide and I shared a laugh over the incident many weeks later, and she shared her own incident from her first year teaching. She was teaching kindergarten and would do a "letter of the week" thing, where they learned all about a letter of the alphabet. One of the fun things they would do is say everyone's name but replace the first letter of their name with the letter of the week. This was all ruined when they got to the letter "F," and there was a kid in the class named "Tucker."

Resolution

"The time has come," the Walrus said, to get real about record keeping. I love pretty books, and therefore own many pretty journals, but they are all sad. Sad because they are mostly empty, sad because my handwriting is kind of ugly, and sad because I have had a tendency to only write in them when I am "feeling very strong emotions" (sadness, depression, anxiety, etc.) But while in the shower tonight (the place where I am suddenly most motivated to do all things in life), I decided it is time for a change. 12 days into the new year, it is time that I legitimately record my experiences and thoughts, because dagnubit, a lot of them are really funny. So, Internet aren't you lucky, this blog will be my new journal. We'll see how long it lasts.