Dear Kristi

You're moving next week. You're worried about your meeting next week. You've got a phone interview next week. You're hoping that paperwork you did was good enough. You need to do your taxes. You're studying for the GMAT. General Conference is this weekend and you're scared of what Church leaders have to say. General Conference is this weekend and you're scared of what you have to say. You want a nose piercing. You need to plan an itinerary. You need to find a new apartment. You're tying up loose ends at your job. Your BYU application needs attention.

This is just to say that I remember this hellish month. April 2014 was a bitch.

Sincerely,

Kristi

On Empathy

It always makes me squirm when people talk about how loving and nurturing women are. Not because of the gender stereotypes, but because it makes me feel out of place. I should be those things and I want to be those things, but they don't come naturally.

I watch how others are so engaged in the lives of loved ones and I start to feel bad about myself. My natural tendency is not to think "I love that person like crazy. I want to be involved in their life" but rather "That person knows I love them like crazy, I can be distant." Even watching people with their pets makes me feel callous. I can tell you with absolute certainty that my friend Sierra loves her HEDGEHOG more than I love my dog. And dogs are like, 1000x better than hedgehogs. I have never let Mojo lick my face. I get that it's a sign of affection. But it's nasty.

I'm a good listener and I try to be a good friend, but I one thing I've always struggled with is empathy. (Here's a great video that talks about the distinction between sympathy and empathy.) A few months ago I remember being home while Kiana (my little sister) was really sick. The flu or something? She couldn't stop throwing up. I walked in on her vomiting in the bathroom and froze. For a moment, I wasn't sure what to do. Should I leave her alone? That's what I would want. But I knew Kiana would want someone there. So I knelt down beside her and rubbed her back. I pulled her hair out of the way. At the time, it bothered me that I had to make a conscious decision to do these things. How did that not come naturally to me? Why did I have to think about it? 

In retrospect, I was too hard on myself. Not only did I identify with Kiana's situation, I thought of how she would want someone to react . . . and I did it. I moved beyond sympathy to empathy.

Brock has been sick this whole week, which is why I've been thinking more about how I show love for others. It's easy to show love for someone when they're sick or in need. That gives you something concrete to do--make soup! put on a pot of tea! etc. I'd like to get better at showing love when people don't need anything at all. (I believe that's the definition of charity.)

I want to call friends just to chat--even though I hate long phone calls. I want to do my visiting teaching--even though I hate small talk. I can be pretty selfish in my approach to relationships, and that needs to change. Hold me accountable,  yeah?

In With The New

2014 is going to be a good one. This year, I'd like to see myself pursuing goals rather than just passively thinking about them. I would like to see myself living my priorities rather than just knowing what they are.

I heard something recently that really struck a chord with me. "In three months' time, what will you look back on and wish you had done now?" I get overwhelmed thinking about the future because there are so many uncertainties--where I'll be, what I'll be doing, you know, basic things like that. But in waving everything off and taking refuge in the approach of one-day-at-a-time, I neglect to think about who I'll be.

That, too, is an uncertainty. And unlike other uncertainties, it's one that I very much have control over. I've been taking things as they come for a long time now. I think I want to start making them.

Reader's Block

I force myself to read non-fiction because, in terms of reading, I figure it's the best use of my time. I like to learn new things and non-fiction is a direct path to that. But I have a problem.

Case Study: Tinder Box 

Beloved highlighter in hand. A flurry of markings and notes fill the margins. I don't know where Rajasthan is. Better research EVERYTHING ABOUT IT before proceeding! Wikipedia! Google Maps! Hey! A New York Times article on wedding crashing in Udaipur HAHAHA that sounds like diaper!

Do you get where this is going? I got to page 70 in Tinder Box like six months ago and haven't finished it. I call it reader's block. BEHOLD: A sampling of The Bookshelf of Forgotten Dreams.

Here's the thing about being an intense person: Everything becomes a chore. I can't just read a non-fiction book. I have to make sure I completely understand EVERYTHING on EVERY PAGE before proceeding. I can't just read the scriptures for ten minutes. I have to decide what reference book(s) to read in conjunction with my scripture study to help fill in any holes or give context. I get so overwhelmed by expectations I have of everything I do that I don't actually . . . do.

Or I'll take the easier route and do the next-best thing. Which, if we're referencing reading non-fiction books, is reading the news. And yet...

Much in the same way that the feuilletons of Kraus’s day occupied readers’ attention to the near-exclusion of worthwhile reading (“furnishing casual readers everywhere with the most agreeable of excuses for avoiding literature” as Kraus put it), the internet “tempts everyone,” writes Franzen, “to consider, under pain of being considered unhip, the positions that everyone else is taking.” The price we pay for this keeping up is time — it takes up a lot of time to see what everyone is saying — and, still, we’re left with an anxiety that attends to what Franzen calls “the restlessness of who or what is considered hip nowadays.” Here, again, Kraus — despite fighting particular figures and battles that have long since been forgotten by all but a few scholars — seems undeniably relevant when he writes that “culture can’t catch its breath.” (via)

When it comes to reading the news, the law of diminishing marginal utility is very much in play.  Do you know what the result is of all the hundreds of hours of news-reading I've done over the last few years? Knowing a whole little about a whole lot. I'm tired of that. I want to be more focused. I want to know a lot about just a few things that really matter to me, and for that you need books.

I read something interesting yesterday about how we shouldn't dictate our schedule by what we have time for, but by what we have energy for. I like that. I once made a Word document called "Daily Progress" and on it I divvied up my daily pursuit into categories--Spiritual Growth, Intellectual Growth, Development of Skills, Physical Health, etc. And under each category, there were bullet points with tasks to complete each day, usually with an associated time commitment (30 minutes of scripture study, 20 minutes of Arabic study, etc).

Obviously, this system did not last long. What my "Daily Progress" did not account for was schedule variations that made ticking off every box every day impossible. So I like the approach of parceling out my energy rather than my time. Reading non-fiction for 30 minutes requires a lot more energy than browsing the Internet for 30 minutes, which is perhaps why I often default to the latter. Instead of slowly draining my energy throughout the day, maybe it's best to bang it all out in a blaze of glory and then go to bed earlier having done more. (What a concept!)

Here's to more focus and less distraction. Here's to spending my time not ticking off checkboxes, but pursuing that which fulfills me and stretches me. To accepting that those pursuits will ebb and flow with the tide of days. But more than anything, here's to words. Words found on pages, not on screens. Words that teach, not inform or opine. Words you can lift to your nose and smell.

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Adulthood

I've talked to several friends about a problem that's bothering me. We're getting the sense that our elders--parents, grandparents, etc--don't view us as "real" adults. This despite the fact we're in our mid-to-late twenties, financially independent, and college graduates. Some of us are working while others are pursuing graduate or professional degrees. And yet I half-expect to be patted on the head every time I end a conversation with someone over the age of 45. 

Marriage, a mortgage, and children seem to represent the Adulthood Trifecta: check them all off and voila!  Maturation: Complete. I can understand why these are the metrics, but what I have trouble with is this pseudo-Pokemon attitude of GOTTA CATCH 'EM ALL...AS QUICK AS YOU CAN...LIKE RIGHT NOW...NO SERIOUSLY WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU WHY HAVEN'T YOU CAUGHT THEM ALL

A funny thing happened on the way to adulthood. Actually, several things. The Internet, a recession, the housing bubble, an education bubble, some really sucky Presidents and even suckier Congresses. They make the Adulthood Trifecta considerably harder to obtain at 25, 30, or even 35. I'm not trying to cast all the blame on external circumstances, but that doesn't mean they're irrelevant.Yet here we are--navigating an extremely more complicated (and competitive) landscape all while being judged on the metrics of yesteryear.

I have plenty of friends who've achieved the trifecta already, and I hope this doesn't sound like a caustic tirade against them. But homeownership does not represent the apex of fiscal responsibility. Getting married is not the tell-tale sign of a person's emotional or social maturity. There are innumerable ways to plan a family, and some of them include not having children until your thirties (I'm not saying that's what Brock and I are doing, but it can be perfectly reasonable). Hell, I don't think you don't even have to be employed to be an adult these days--I have dozens of friends in law/PhD programs working much harder than people with "real" jobs.

That's why it's frustrating to hear comments like "What a fun time this is for you!" or "Double income, no kids--living the dream!" Or to hear people tell my friends "Single in the city, what a life!" Comments like these are infantilizing. I'm not living the way I am because it's "fun"--to avoid responsibility or because I don't have a plan. Quite simply, some plans--family plans, career plans, educational plans, relationship plans--depend on factors outside of your control. I feel dumb even writing that because it's so obvious, but people forget it.

Look, 30 is not the new 20. I read the book before the TED Talk went viral, so call me a Dr. Jay hipster. I wholeheartedly agree with her. But adulthood circa 2013 is a helluva lot more complicated than adulthood circa 1980. We're the generation that'll retire at 82, not 62. And just because I'm not struggling to run after a toddler or struggling to pay a mortgage doesn't mean I'm not . . . struggling. (My last blog post was totes emo--PROOF!)

That being said, I am enjoying [air quotes] where I'm at right now [air quotes]. It's a good life, and I thank God every day for it--even though He doesn't seem to be getting the message on, y'know, GIVING ME EVERYTHING THAT I WANT RIGHT NOW. But being happy in spite of that? I think that's adulthood. No trifecta necessary.

Tombstones

I like running in graveyards. That's what I did this morning. It was misty and a few wayward turns in the Avenues brought me to the Salt Lake City Cemetery.

I like knowing that my heart is the only heart beating for acres. It makes me acutely conscious of my existence. I'll become a tombstone one day, too. But for now, my bones are my own! The very stars course through my veins! Isn't that something?

I like reading tombstones. Even sad ones, like those of babies who didn't last 'til morning. I think of all the anguish their parents must have suffered, how awful it must've been to have something given and taken away so quickly--but look! The child's parents are right there! Under their own tombstones. Everyone's together again, finally. Isn't that something?

Down another lane, I pass a small hillside of tombstones all written in Japanese characters. Dozens of them--friends, relatives, neighbors, who knows?--all gathered together in their own little borough. Isn't that something? That even in death, we just want to be near each other?

Cemeteries and tombstones aren't monuments to death and loss, but to life and love. I think that's why I like them so much.

Future Me

I was MIA last week.

You'll notice in my last blog post (written on Monday) I had grand plans to finish writing about Costa Rica. I was going to be productive  last week! On my to-do list were two projects around the house, lots of running, fulfilling some church assignments, etc.

But then my body (and brain) got all funky on me. I'll spare you the details, but suffice it to say that even though I wasn't sick  sick, I could tell I wasn't normal. Physically, emotionally--things were off and I didn't know why. 

PMS? Pregnancy? Nope, nope. It was like I had turned into a wimp overnight. I didn't want to do anything, see anyone, go anywhere. The smallest things overwhelmed me. I cried. A LOT. But then I did something brave.

I gave a talk in church about feminism. It was scary because Mormon feminists have all sorts of uphill battles to climb in terms of, you know, people not hating us. I hoped people wouldn't misunderstand my words. 

I think much of what I felt last week was due to confusion. In case you haven't heard, your 20's are rough. Who am I? Who should I be? What do I want? What SHOULD I want? Where do I go from here? You're standing at the edge of your future and going OMG, IT'S HERE. IT'S REALLY HERE.

I think Mormon women feel this acutely because of the conflicting ideals pulling us in different directions. I won't speak for others, but I take on a lot of guilt. Guilt for wanting some things, guilt for not wanting others, guilt for twinges of resentment, guilt for being stubborn, myopic, difficult. 

The talk I delivered seemed to strike a chord with people (in a good way). I was relieved that the response was positive, but even if it hadn't been, I would've been alright. I didn't need that talk to be a validation of my beliefs. I needed a chance to be brave again.

I guess it's dumb to ask Now, how did God know that?  because, well, He is  God and all. But three weeks ago, when I was assigned to speak in church, I had no idea how much I would need it.

If God was looking out for Future Me then, I bet He's looking out for Future Me now.

And that's really, really  nice to know.

***

See here for the article I based my talk on. 

The Mean Reds

Holly Golightly: You know those days when you get the mean reds?
Paul Varjak: The mean reds, you mean like the blues?
Holly Golightly: No. The blues are because you're getting fat and maybe it's been raining too long, you're just sad that's all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you're afraid and you don't know what you're afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?

***

• Brock started work last week and it freaked me out a little. For the past six years, being students was an integral part of how we identified ourselves as a couple. You'd think that not having that label would be a welcome reprieve from years of trudging our way to diplomas, but it shook me because I don't have a game plan for the Whenwheres that come along with this new phase of life. When/where I'll pursue a graduate degree, when/where I'll have kids, when/where I'll work, etc. The pressure to have answers for those things feels a lot more acute now that I don't have the excuse of studenthood to fall back on.

• The prospect of living in Salt Lake City excites and worries me. I'm obviously excited to be near family, friends, and mountains--but the vast majority of work that I've developed skill sets for is located east of Eden. (A rather funny euphemism for DC, now that I think of it.)

• I hate that I hate gender-jobs. (Y'know, low-level positions like "administrative assistant" or "office manager" that often go to women.) I shouldn't hate them because any one of them would give me $9 more in my pocket per hour than what I'm currently making, but I just do. Curse that pride of mine.

• Speaking of gender issues, being home during the day gives me a huge feminist chip on my shoulder. For example, if I make dinner and Brock says "Mmm, this is good!" I can't just take that for the innocuous compliment that it is. I start thinking What--did you EXPECT this to be good? Do you EXPECT me to cook dinner? What else do you "expect" me to do? Are you secretly relieved that now I'm the one being domestic? Is that where my worth lies to you? and blah blah BLAAAAAH. Naturally, I am incapable of expressing these thoughts in a healthy way because of the guilt I feel for even thinking them in the first place.

• The GOP race is beyond messed up and I've completely lost interest in it. After a certain point, it's a ridiculous waste of energy to expend so much effort analyzing current events because it's not like anybody will listen to sanity anyway. Especially from a nobody.

• Maybe that's the heart of it all. My fear of being a nobody and the guilt I feel over having that fear to begin with (isn't it silly?). Forgive me while I wax existential, but do you know the name of your great-great grandmother? I don't, and that terrifies me. I am four generations away from being forgotten.

***

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us — don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know. 

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

Where Ms. Dickinson and I differ is that I don't  think it would be dreary to be somebody. I mean, at least you'd probably have your life figured out and  a voice that people would listen to. Because nobodies only listen to themselves, which inevitably leads to wasted Sundays spent over-analyzing irrational mixed feelings of guilt, jadedness, worry, jealousy, sadness, insecurity, anxiety, and fear.

I need to learn how to be satisfied with where I'm at and to just accept  things, but that's difficult because I have this paranoia of satisfaction turning into complacency. In any case, gettin' to The Whenwheres is a helluva lot harder when you've got The Mean Reds, I can tell you that much.

It's A Sign

No, really.

In general, I am not a superstitious person. I don't have lucky this-es or lucky thats. I try not to read too much into things unless I have a gut feeling about them (in which case I would classify that more as intuition, not superstition). But when I drove by this sign in American Fork today (where I'm currently visiting my paternal grandparents), I couldn't help but pause because I am making excuses.

I've had two big ideas floating around in my head recently. Two really good ideas that I'm passionate about. But I'm scared to make them happen because, well, that's the hard part. There are so many logistics and fears and insecurities that you run into during the process of making ideas reality.

And yet I keep coming across various things that seem to be pushing me in that direction--in the direction of doing. One of those was a brilliant TED presentation by Nancy Duarte called "The Secret Structure of Great Talks." Her talk (unsurprisingly) was amazing, but what really got to me was not the actual content. Rather, it was how she built up that content in her intro:

You have the power to change the world. I'm not saying that to be cliche, you really have the power to change the world. Deep inside of you, every single one of you has the most powerful device known to man, and that's an idea. A single idea from the human mind can start a groundswell, it can be a flashpoint for a movement, and it can actually rewrite our future. But an idea is powerless if it stays inside of you. If you never pull that idea out for others to contend with, it will die with you.

Isn't that chilling? How sad would that be to have your best ideas die with you? How many wonderful ideas have already died with those who never brought them to fruition? On a happier note, how greatly have our lives been bettered by people who had the courage to do the opposite?

Anyway, having a literal sign thrown in my way has given me the impetus to go for it. Which is why, by the end of 2012, "Kristi Boyce" will be a name that corresponds with two more adjectives:

1. "Race director." I want to put on a small 5K and donate all the proceeds to Syrian refugees who are fleeing al-Assad's regime. Even if I fail miserably at this, I'll still have a one-up on Russia and China and their soulless, self-serving, disgusting display at the UN.

2. "Writer." C'mon, it was only a matter of time before I wrote a book, people. I've got this idea in my head for a non-fiction book about the U.S. political system, but I've been hesitating on it. How on earth could I ever come up with enough content to actually fill 200-300 pages? And even if I were able to, who would listen to me? This punk 23-year old college grad with no credibility whatsoever?

Well, doubts be damned. Maybe seeing that sign was . . .

For real. I found BOTH  these signs in American Fork, less than a mile from where I'm staying.
Pinterest-worthy? I say yes.

Limbo

I've been a bad wife this week. No, not in the sexy naughty way. Like in the unfun bitchy way. I don't know what's gotten into me. Maybe it's a combination of PMS and just general life stress? I feel so dumb even calling it that. Yeah, life stress from the girl who's bumming around in Southern California (75 degress today) and needs to do a couple returns at Nordstrom tomorrow while her iPad 2 is being repaired. Ugggghhhh I suck I suck I suck.

I've been a bad wife this week, and it's because we're in limbo. That lovely graduated-but-jobless limbo. It would be a lot less daunting if we had any leads or connections, but we don't. We're going about things the old-fashioned way. None of this graduate-and-work-for-your-dad-slash-spouse's-dad business. If I have this conversation one more time, I'm going to go postal:

"You just came back from . . . Israel, right?"

"Well, we were only there for twelve days. We spent four months in Jordan."

"Oh! That must have been a great experience. Were you ever scared being there?"

"No."

"Oh, good. I've heard all those Muslims just want to kill you. Did you pick up a little bit of the language or anything?"

"Um, that's why I went there."

"Wow! Can you like read and write in Arabic, too?"

"Yeah." [In my head: I sure hope so! I only learned how to do that two years ago.]

"That's great, great. Sooooo what's your next step?"

"Not a clue."

"Huh?"

"We don't know."

"What do you mean?"

[In my head: Right now Plan A is to bum around at my parents' house in Colorado until we find something somewhere. Scratch that: Anything, anywhere. Because despite 6+ years of college each, we have NO IDEA WHAT WE WANT. Plan B is to get on "The Amazing Race" and kick adult responsibilities down the road even further. There is no Plan C. We'd love to spend more time in school waiting out this recession with Master's degrees, but neither of us know what we'd want to study in the first place. And you know what's making all this even better? Getting asked this question for the 300th time. So thank you, person, for reminding me that in spite of all the hard work my husband and I did in college to NOT have the job prospects of art history majors, we have the job prospects of art history majors. Now, please excuse me while I go drown my sorrows in the pint of Baskin Robbins ice cream that my mother-in-law bought for me today after I accidentally snarfed down half of Brock's double-double at In-N-Out before realizing the extra patty in there. Which, of course, will only add to the eight pounds I gained in the Middle East eating !#$*&% falafel and lamb 24/7 in an effort to hone language skills that would set me apart in a workforce that BLOWS because your generation bought mortgages they couldn't afford. Maybe if they hadn't, I wouldn't have felt inclined to drag my husband across two continents over the course of eight months to improve my job now-non-existent job prospects. So yeah, I've got a bigger ass, a smaller bank account, and a guest bedroom at my parents' house. Any other questions, Curious George?]

You know what all this feels like? It feels like a Mormon wedding night. You've been so good and followed all the rules, so the payoff should come easy and be awesome. But in reality, you finally get to the hotel room and are confused as hell.

We speak foreign languages. We did internships. We were involved in extra-curricular activities. We are both good writers. We're gregarious. We're honest. We carefully crafted our time in college--majors, minors, everything--to make us competitive in the work force. We did everything right.

Didn't we?

The worst thing about having no idea what you want is worrying that you're missing opportunities. Brock comes at me with all these great ideas of what to do with his life and I just shoot them down because, for some reason, they don't fall in line with what I think he should be doing. And don't ask me what that is, because I don't know. Remember that episode of Modern Family when Phil accuses Claire of crushing his creativity and squandering his life's potential as a result? I'm so worried that I am that wife. I'm worried because sometimes I look at myself and all that Brock has to deal with and I legitimately think that he would be better off without me. DANG IT whyyyy does that have to sound so melodramatic when I mean it so much???? (Not like quadruple y's and !'s helped my cause there.)

The hard thing about marriage--or at least a marriage where neither partner has a defined career path--is that you're not just worrying about yourself finding work. You're not just worrying about your spouse finding work. You worry about how your actions, choices, and behaviors are affecting two destinies.

Why can't somebody just give me the answers so I can go back to being a nice wife again? So we can figure out where to move and I can end my eight-month streak of living out of a suitcase? So I can buy a gym membership? So we can actually think about when to start having kids instead of it being some amorphous box on a future to-do list? So we can know which church ward to cut our tithing checks to? So we can be us again?

False Summits

I just took the test that concludes my journey into Arabic.

I still have other finals to take this week (writing, reading, and the dreaded OPI), but this translation test was the big kahuna: Four hours of deciphering newspaper articles that I'd never seen before. I so vividly remember my very first day of Arabic classes when Ustaaz Doug taught us the words for "he," she," "you," and "hi."

You know what it feels like? It feels like I've been climbing in the Himalayas this whole time, and I've been going and going and going and working like crazy to bag a foreboding peak.

And here I am. Looking out over everything below me thinking I DID that?!? And although I'm proud of myself, I'm also very humbled because now, from this vantage point, I realize that the goal I'd been reaching for this whole time was a false summit. It's not over for me. Life does not end at this study abroad.

The thing is though, I get a buzz off this. I love false summits. I am the World's Most Annoying Hiker (ask Brock) because I never want to turn back. Just one more corner! There might be something really cool around there! Just this one last hill! What if it opens up into a sweeping valley with deer eating wildflowers and scratching their antlers on aspen trees?!?

I enjoy false summits because they psyche me out. They make me push past the exhaustion and dig deep so I can finally get where I'm gettin'. And digging deep has a way of teaching you about life and God and all the uglies and pretties about yourself.

This is a good gauge of whether you studied the right thing in college (learning about the uglies and pretties of yourself, I mean) It's important to not confuse a good major with a difficult major--just because a major challenged you doesn't mean it challenged you.  Did your major make you re-evaluate yourself? Not your opinions or interests. You. You as a soul. Studying what you love is important, and I did that with political science. But I'm grateful for my Arabic minor because the lessons I've learned from it--particularly this last semester--have been life-altering. Between political science and Arabic, I feel like I got the perfect mix of learning about my interests and learning about my character.

It's been the year of false summits for me. I left BYU behind for good in April, but still had more credits to finish.Then came August, when I completed my internship in DC (and a B.A. in Political Science along with it). But again, there was still more to do. And now here I am in December: wrapping up my two-and-a-half year journey into Arabic and my entire college experience in general. It feels like I've finally reached the top, but I've been on the trail long enough to know that's not true.

The only thing that's weird now is not seeing the next summit--false or otherwise--in the distance. It's a white-out and I can barely see three feet in front of me, let alone three years. (Or hell, even three weeks!) Come January, I'll hit the trail again toward whatever and wherever it is, but it's nerve-wracking not knowing which direction to take to get to . . . someplace.

The call to prayer is happening outside my window right now.

Maybe I should start there.

To the Virgins, To Make Much of Time

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying :
And this same flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,
The higher he's a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.

That age is best which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer ;
But being spent, the worse, and worst
Times still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time,
And while ye may go marry :
For having lost but once your prime
You may for ever tarry.

***

This poem was written by a 17th-century English poet named Robert Herrick. Isn't it beautiful? I was reading about him recently on Wikipedia, and was struck with this sentence: "The over-riding message of Herrick’s work is that life is short, the world is beautiful, love is splendid, and we must use the short time we have to make the most of it."

For as much as people poke fun at me for all my random ideas (get my Master's in Azerbaijan! No, wait, Rome!), it sure is fun to dream like crazy.

Mantra

I'm a wee bit embarrassed to tell ya'll my mantra, because it's kind of pathetic. But it's helped me a lot this past week--I've been crazy productive and I'm feeling gooood.

It all started out a few weeks ago with I approached Brock with a proposition. I love the guy, but sometimes his humor is a little too Wayne's World.  After a particularly "That's what she said!"-heavy day, I plopped onto the bed and said "Honey, I just want to feel like I'm married to an adult. Could we lighten up on the junior high jokes?"

And that's exactly what Brock did. Things were going along just peachy until the tables turned.

The sink was full of dirty dishes, and it was my turn to wash them. "I'll do it later tonight, don't worry!" I assured Brock. But, you know, life came up. And when I say "life" I mean The Internet. Before I knew it, it was 11:30pm. Brock walked into the kitchen and looked at the sink.

"Lovey, you forgot."

At that moment, a light bulb went off in my brain. Did I seriously not have the self-control to pull myself away from what I wanted to do? How did I let an entire evening pass by without accomplishing the one chore on my list? Why did I need Brock policing me? I'm sure he wants to feel like a husband, not a parent. Needless to say, I felt pretty stupid. 

Hence, my mantra: "I am an adult."

I say this to myself (sometimes outloud...) whenever I have to do something I don't "feel like" doing. Because that is the essence of adulthood--putting work before play and realizing that life isn't about you and what you want to do. This mantra has helped me with . . . 

• Making myself go to bed at a decent hour
• Not hitting the snooze button in the morning
• Consistent scripture study
• Waking up 90 minutes earlier every day to get ahead on my homework
• Writing down weekly goals and actually doing them
• Pulling myself away from mindless interneting
• Assessing issues I'm having with language-learning and actually fixing them. (Even if this means reading Arabic newspapers for five hours on one particular day.)
• Setting a timer for myself as I set out to accomplish 15-minutes tasks 

I have been a productivity MACHINE this week, I tell you! It's this awesome self-perpetuating cycle: I feel so good when I act like an adult that it makes me want to act like one ALL THE TIME!!!!!!

My mantra is a reminder that I have the self-control to make myself do lame things (or at least I should). It's so easy to excuse your laziness by saying "Oh, I'm just a procrastinator." But really, isn't procrastination just a lack of self-control? This was the epiphany I had as I looked sheepishly at that sink of dirty dishes.

For whatever reason, "I have no self-control" sounds a lot worse than "I'm a procrastinator." 

"I'm an adult"  is a great way to shame yourself into acting like one. Because if you tell that to yourself and then display a lack of self-control, you'll feel so stupid that you'll eventually succumb to self-pressure in a desperate attempt to salvage your pride. 

I'm sure there's a more eloquent explanation, but you get the idea. 

So that's my mantra. Before you know it, I'll be exercising, eating vegetables, and taking vitamins.

I Am Woman

Names mentioned on the front page of the NYTimes last Monday.

I grew up in a traditional household with traditional values and plenty of upstanding male figures in my life. My mother seemed intent on wringing the masculinity out of me by enrolling me in piano lessons, sewing classes, cotillion, ballet. I even studied voice with a professional opera singer. I was constantly being told to walk with my shoulders back, hold my spoon correctly, watch my language. My mother bought me dresses, made me wear nylons to church, and put French braids in my hair each morning before school.

My dad taught me the beauty of sweat and the joy of dirt. He encouraged adventure, bruises, bumps, scratches, messy ponytails, heaving lungs. He praised me when I came home with bloody knees and high-fived me for jumping off cliffs at Lake Powell.

I grew up in a yin-yang.

I believe women should be treated equally, but men and women are not equal. This difference is crucial. You can charge at the windmills all day long, but it won't change the fact that men and women are simply built differently. I think people would save themselves a lot of time and energy if they just acknowledged and accepted these differences.

I don't see feminism as as zero-sum game. One gender's win is not the other's loss. Men and women need to work together on feminist issues. The goal should be a combined crusade toward societal betterment.

I wish some feminists swallow their pride and lower their middle fingers. I think the reason why the word "feminism" leaves such a bad taste in people's mouths is because, unfortunately, a minority of feminists can be hypersensitive, hypercritical, and uninspiring. (To be fair, every group I identified with has "those" people--feminists, Mormons, Republicans...)

The perpetual state of yin-yang I grew up in has helped me understand the value of balance. I am a feminist because I believe women's empowerment is a direct path to a better world (see here and here and here and here). I'm hoping for a new wave of feminism that values balance. I want to work to bring it to fruition.

Care to join me?

I Chose This

A couple years back, one of my friends from high school, Cassie, spent a year in France. I vividly remember reading her blog and looking at pictures of her romantic life in Besançon, green with envy and aching with wanderlust.

A couple days back, Cassie sent me a Facebook: "I'm totally jealous of your travels!"

Granted, Jordan is a lot less idyllic than France and this program is far from being reminiscent of your typical play-first-study-later semester abroad. But even so, Cassie's words gave me pause. How the tables had turned! If you had told me in 2009 (back when I was an elementary education major--seems like a lifetime ago!) that I would not only get to study abroad, but would do so in the Middle East, my jaw would have dropped to the floor. It sounds so corny to say, but I am literally living my dreams.

I feel alive here. Nothing puts you out of your comfort zone more than language learning. Simple conversations can be terrifying, let alone when a new Palestinian friends asks you why America supports Israel so much. And you want to explain to them how difficult it is for a person in America to get elected President, how money really helps in that endeavor and it just so happens that American Jews tend to have a lot of it, and there's also the issue of the Bible-thumpers in the South and how if you turn your back on Israel you might as well kiss those electoral votes goodbye, and how one time during the Holocaust FDR turned a whole shipful of Jews back to Europe and we still feel really bad about that, not to mention that Israel is our biggest ally and arguably the only functioning democracy in the Middle East, and besides, the Tea Party keeps calling President Obama a Muslim which, sadly, is not becoming of American presidential candidates (don't worry, being a Mormon isn't either) and appearing anti-Israel will only further serve to strengthen that misconception; oh, and then there's the pesky little issue of nuclear proliferation in Iran and how America really wants to support Israel as a regional counterweight to Ahmadinejad, but in reality Netanyahu and his Likud cronies frustrate the heck out of us and no, we don't approve of Jewish settlements . . . 

 But all you can manage to say is ma b'araf (I don't know). 

When really you do know and you've read books on this and could probably write a book on this and now your new Palestinian friend thinks that you've never given the idea a second thought. 

Bye-bye, Comfort Zone. At times like this, it's tempting to scoff at people who say they're jealous of me.

BUT: I chose this. Whether I like it or not, this is my dream. 

Sounds funny to say, huh? "Whether I like it or not." Shouldn't you at least like your dreams? What's the point of dreaming if it's not enjoyable?

But what I'm learning is, maybe, the sweetest dreams are the ones that kick you in the face for a while.

***

All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible. This I did." - T.E. Lawrence 

This I am doing.

Thanks for the reminder, Cassie.

Artsy

One of my new friends here on the program was recently asking me why I chose to study Arabic, and mentioned that she'd thought I'd been in some "artsy" major before switching over.

Artsy?

It was the first time someone had ever even implied  that I was artsy, which is why I think this comment stuck with me so much. Because in order for her to say that, I must have been living artfully. Be it in my speech, dress, hair, makeup, actions, whatever. Somebody who barely knew me looked at me and thought "That girl must be artsy."

I took it as a compliment because"artsy" is just another way of saying "unique" or "creative." (Also: "Weird.") Artsy folk tend to notice beauty that others pass by. Like the texture of a sweater or the swirls in marbled wood. And gradually, all this noticing--all the times your parents cocked an eyebrow at each other thinking "Should we take her in to see if she has ADD?", all the incessant double-takes over your shoulder to look at  leaves on the sidewalk and empty Big Gulp cups--makes your life fuller. 

I remember driving in Utah before we left for Amman. Coming out of the mouth of Provo Canyon, I abruptly pulled over and parked the car. A few minutes later, I remember getting back in the driver's seat and thinking Did I really just pull over to take pictures of a sunset? Am I one of THOSE PEOPLE???

I had. I was. And I couldn't help but feel a twinge of pride about it, like I had just joined some elitist club of people who order Chinese takeout on the weekends while they "create" and who actually like "Howl."

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized how artsy I actually was to being with. I'm not going to give up my day job (oh wait, don't have one!) to pursue a particular medium, but my passions are a Pollock of writing,  photography, fashion, makeup, hair, architecture, food, literature, painting, dancing, singing, film, music, and design. This is basically just a convoluted way of saying I REALLY LIKE PRETTY THINGS. Nothing quite makes my heart swoon like subway tile in a kitchen, succulents in bridal bouquets, the blue undertones in wine-colored lipstick, or a sentence by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

I'm not artistic because of what I have created (which, in reality, is just a bunch of carbon dioxide and one of those paper Thanksgiving turkeys made from a cut-out of my hand in the second-grade for my mom) . I am artistic because I notice little masterpieces all around me.

I think that may be a trap that a lot of people fall into--the thought process of "I'm not crazy artistic, so I'm not artsy." First off, who even wants to be crazy artistic? That's usually just a euphemism for "substance abuser" anyway. But I think a lot of people are so quick to cast themselves into their own personal stereotype, and it's important to take a step back every now and then to look for all the beauty in yourself that you may not know is there. I am not just a student of politics. I am not just an Arabic language learner. I am not just a Mormon or runner or wife or blogger or bitch or lover or child or mother (NOT AN ANNOUNCEMENT, JUST A 90s POP CULTURE REFERENCE). If I were to typecast myself into just one of these things, how boring would that be? How boring would I be?

Embrace your inner kaleidoscope with vigor! 

Anyway, the fact alone that my neurons have spewn forth this much content from a comment that a person made to me over a week ago is probably testament enough to the fact that I am, indeed, artsy. Or that I'm a Type A, over-analytical, self-obsessed person who fishes for compliments and validation when there is none to be had (aka A BLOGGER).

But I had a dream last night where an elephant walked on water to bring me my shoes (which were in a helmet), right before a porthole in a fjord spat me out in the Comorosian jungle where my friend from Chicago who I haven't seen since 2009 almost ate a poisonous frog.

 So . . . I'm gonna go with artsy.

Purpose

I’ll be able to start posting regularly because we get internet in our apartment on Monday—huzzah!

What a week this has been. Monday was our first day of classes, and it went pretty well. Until classes start at the University of Jordan in a couple weeks, my schedule looks a little something like this:

9:00-10:00: Homework.

10:00-11:00: Issues class at the Qasid Institute. Everyone in the program has been separated into different groups of about eight or nine, and we all have different teachers for both our Issues and Performance classes. My teacher’s name is Fadi, and he’s awesome.

In our issues class we discuss various subjects in Arabic. And when I say “we” I mean Fadi talks for about forty minutes and then the rest of us try to express opinions—which usually end up being a sentence and a half long. I feel good that I can understand the vast majority of what Fadi is saying, but speaking is a whole ‘nother ballgame. This week we talked about the ins and outs of Jordanian government and the rich history of tribal law.

11:00-12:00: Performance class. Everybody in the class prepares a three-minute presentation on a certain topic, and then we get feedback from the class on how our Arabic sounded. This week we spoke about ourselves in ‘aamiyya (colloquial) Arabic, and about the history of an Arab country in fusha (formal) Arabic. I’m getting to the point where I feel comfortable with Jordanian ‘aamiyya. At BYU we learned Egyptian ‘aamiyya for the past two years (remember when this study abroad was supposed to happen in Cairo?), and Jordanian ‘aamiyya is different. It’s really only about twenty words or so that aren’t the same, but they’re twenty words that you use all the time (what, why, I want, I speak, etc).

12:00-4:00: “Free” time. Except not really. We have to find a native speaker(s) to talk with for two hours, and also have a load of homework due every day at 4pm. We also have four half-hour appointments scattered throughout the week during this time (two fusha, two ‘aamiyya, one writing).

4:00-5:00: Culture class and newspaper review with Dil (our program director). Each day we’re given a three or four newspaper articles to read and translate. (At the minimum, this takes two hours.) 4pm is when our translations are due, and then we go over the articles in this class. We also talk about different facets of Arab/Jordanian culture, which is super interesting.

9:00-10:00: Time for a chunk of miscellaneous homework and vocab review before hitting the sack.

***

Crazy, eh? I’m barely keeping on top with everything I need to do, and some of our classes haven’t even started yet! I actually really enjoy just about everything we’re assigned to do. I think the newspaper articles are fun despite the fact that there is so much vocabulary I don’t know. Dil tells us which articles to read, and then says “Oh, and by the way, here’s a list of vocabulary you may not know.” Which usually totals about 80-100 words. Sigh.

The speaking portion of the day is what fills my soul with terror. The easiest way to reach your two-hour goal is to catch a taxi to the gam’aa (University of Jordan) during the afternoon and find people to talk to there. Unfortunately, classes don’t start for another two weeks at the gam’aa so there isn’t a ton of people on campus yet, but enough.

Speaking is my least favorite part of the day because A) I sucketh and B) It’s hard finding girls to talk to. Approaching guys (“Hi! I’m Kristi. What’s your name?) is very forward and can be taken in the wrong way, so I’m limited in the conversations I can start.

The women here seem a bit stand-offish. Generally (not just in the Arab world, everywhere) a guy can approach another guy, say “What’s up?”, and they’re instant friends. With girls it’s soooo different. Also, what’s up with women traveling in huge groups?! That makes it even harder to approach them. (Dear Males of the World: I kind of get what it’s like to ask a girl out. Never realized how hard the Friends Fortress was to break into!)

Anyway, on Monday I did find two speaking opportunities. One was with two girls sitting on a bench, and another happened with a larger group. One of the Arab girls in the larger group spoke pretty good English, and she completely dominated conversation. Unfortunately, an English-speaking Arab does little to help me (yet another obstacle to swerve around!).

Even though my speaking experiences on Monday weren’t completely abominable, I left discouraged. Then I went home and got kicked in the face by 100+ new vocab words from my newspaper homework. I went to bed mentally exhausted, overwhelmed, and feeling completely hopeless. The more Arabic you know, the more Arabic you know you don’t know.

These feelings carried over to Tuesday. I was on the brink of tears all day and couldn’t bring myself to go out and try speaking again. I was sad, angry and jealous that the guys on the study abroad had things so much easier as far as speaking opportunities go.

Things came to a head at the end of the day. After watching the Jordanian national soccer team play China (that’ll have to be a different blog post!), we were exiting the stadium with friends and heard somebody shout “Willyum! Willyum!” in the distance. Will is a TA on the program, and we went to the soccer game with him, his wife, and their adorable baby boy. He recognized the person who was shouting and went over for a quick conversation. Upon his return, Will explained “Oh, him? That was the guy who sold me nuts at the grocery store last week!”

The guy who sold you nuts at the grocery store last week?!!?

Like I said: So much easier for guys to make friends here!

Will is a really outgoing, fun person and makes friends everywhere, but what kills me is that so am I! But I can’t be that way in Jordan. Around men, it comes off as sexually aggressive. And most women here seem pretty reserved (at least at first)—I feel like my strong, Western personality is a turn-off to potential friends.

So, let’s see what adjectives I’ve used in the past few paragraphs: Discouraged, exhausted, overwhelmed, hopeless, sad, angry, jealous, and sexually aggressive. That’s a lot of emotions! (Okay, so that last one was taken out of context, BUT STILL.)

Anyway, I woke up the next morning and felt prompted to turn to the scriptures. I went to the topical guide and searched for verses that talked about struggling, since that seemed apropos at the time. I turned to Ether 12:27.

27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

“I give unto men weakness that they may be humble”—this really hit home for me. It’s no secret that I’m a very independent, headstrong person (dragging my husband with me to the Middle East so I can learn one of the hardest languages in the world . . . go figure). I prefer to navigate through things on my own and sometimes scoff at people who do this thing called “asking for help.” I look at them and think I figured it out. Why can’t you? I think being an oldest child is a double-edged sword for me: On one hand, I’m a very resourceful person who doesn’t rely on others to solve her problems; on the other, I tend to view humility as a sign of weakness.

All my life, I’ve set goals and achieved them through hard work. Most of my biggest goals have been physical--helping my track team win a state championship, completing an Olympic triathlon, the Boston Marathon, a 50-mile ultramarathon. Of course I’ve had the help of the Lord in achieving these things (how else could you explain all these years of running with nary a sprain to speak of?) but physical goals are different than mental goals. It’s a simple physiological fact that if you train hard for something, your body will become strong. And with enough strength, you’ll probably achieve what you set out to do.

Train hard. Succeed. Boom, done.

I wouldn’t say I was overly prideful about the physical goals I’ve met, but I will admit that I felt like I could do them mostly on my own with just a little bit of help from the Lord; i.e. train, train, train, and then say a quick prayer when things got nasty at mile 44. No matter how you cut it, I wouldn’t have succeeded without the Lord’s help, but I’d rest my prideful head on my pillow at night thinking “Well, at least I did most of it by myself.” What am I, four years old?! How awful is that? It takes for granted that the Lord gave me my healthy, strong body in the first place.

I love how Arabs consciously praise God in all things. You ask them how they are? Alhamdulillah. What a beautiful baby you have! Masha’allah. You’re planning on arriving at seven? Insha’allah. Praise be to God, whatever God wills, if God wills. Yes, it gets repetitive and yes, it gets routine, but that doesn’t mean it’s without principle. Arabs are almost humble to a fault, and I think that’s something I’ve tried too hard to avoid. I mean, being humble is one thing, but c’mon—I make my own decisions! I choose my own path, I set the course of my life, O Captain, my Captain, etc. But in an effort to avoid being fatalistic (i.e. whatever happens is God’s will, nothing you can do about it), I have failed to give God proper credit. And by “proper” I mean “all.”

I think the reason Tuesday was so difficult was because I had to come to grips with the fact that no matter how hard I work, I need the help of my Savior. And not just at mile 44, either. I freaking had a breakdown on the second day of the program—mile zero! I’m going to need His help from start to finish. Acknowledging my weakness wasn’t the hard part. I’ve always been able to do that. Accepting it is what humbled me.

I am here in Amman because learning Arabic is one thing I literally cannot do on my own. I need other people to practice speaking with, and I need the Savior to help me buoy me up against continual discouragement and frustration. Comparing myself to others or succumbing to jealousy will only hamper my efforts and lead me farther away from my goals. I know it sounds cliche, but if I hone in and have faith that the Lord will help me be the best that I can be, I’ll walk away from this experience having achieved more than I ever thought possible.

I am weak now, but I know that through faith I will be made strong. I think it’s kind of funny that Heavenly Father knew the only way I was going to learn this lesson was if He dumped me in the Middle East with a seemingly impossible task before me. I must be really prideful! J I am grateful, however, that my purpose in being here revealed itself so early on. To be honest, I’m not sure that I’ll even use Arabic in my professional life, so if I were to go through these next four months thinking that’s the reason why I’m here, it would be very hard to stay motivated. But I know that I am here to develop true humility, true faith, and a true relationship with the Savior.

That will get me through.

Insha’allah.

Change of Plans

Brock's not going to law school.

About a year ago, Brock felt that law was the right thing for him to do. It really does open up so many doors professionally. I'd always told him that his going to grad school was pretty much a non-negotiable for me (grad degrees are the new bachelor's degrees), so he was vacillating between law school and getting an MBA. The more we thought about it, the more we saw a JD as giving you all the opportunities that an MBA does and then some. Seemed like a grand idea. So we sunk $900 into a baller LSAT prep course, and Brock studied tenaciously. At least an hour per day on top of an insane work and school schedule (500-level math classes? Are you kidding me?), 3+ hours on Saturday, for nine months. I've never seen anything like it. In the weeks leading up to the June LSAT, he was consistently scoring in the mid/high 170s. (A perfect score is 180.)

For practice, Brock took every LSAT test distributed in the past ten years (the week before he took the actual test, he literally ran out of practice tests to take). Coming from a guy who can tell a killer LSAT when he sees one, my heart broke when Brock told me that the LSAT he was given on test day was the hardest he'd ever taken. He ended up scoring 163, which is decent, but for Brock it was devastating. (To put things in perspective: A bad practice test for him in April/May was a 173.)

This completely threw us for a loop. For a while, I was even a little mad at God because I felt like he'd left Brock high and dry. Whatever happened to the whole idea of "You do the absolute best you can, and God will be there for you in your hour of need?" I felt like Brock had done more than his share, only to be abandoned. Even though this rattled me a little, I took comfort in knowing that we weren't the only ones to have ever felt like this (Matthew 27:46; D&C 122:5-8).

In retrospect, I am so grateful for that 163.

If Brock had scored a 178 or whatever, he'd be off on his way to an Ivy League law school without a second thought. But a 163 gave us pause. It made us think. Is this really what Brock wants? Is this really the path, we, as a couple, want to take? And the answer was no.

It made zero sense for us to sink $100,000+ worth of student loans into something Brock wasn't crazy about. He doesn't want to be a lawyer. That's not where his soul is. He and I are free spirits, and being beholden to that kind of debt would prevent us from living our best life. In essence, it wouldn't give us the option of not being wealthy. (We would be and we would have to be in order to pay down loans.)

But what if we didn't want to be?

After reconsidering our life and family goals, here is how things broke down.

1. We want to live and work with passion and creativity.

a) Brock loves surfing, teaching, writing, and--most of all--people.

b) I love nature, languages, humanities, adventure, and writing. Obviously, I love politics--but I'm perfectly fine with that being a continual hobby and interest rather than a profession.

2. We want to live simply.

a) We don't want ourselves, nor our children, to have lives cluttered with "stuff" or endless activities (soccerdancepianosingingkaratescouts) that distract from family.

3. We want to raise grateful, happy children.

a) We want kids who don't feel entitled to the newest gadgets or name-brand clothes. We want them to find joy and happiness in family and relationships, not possessions or entertainment.

4. We want to make a creative living that helps us foster relationships with others.

a) We love talking. We love laughing. We love thinking. But most of all, we love doing these things with people. Relationships with friends/family are our greatest source of joy. It goes without saying that law is, generally, a negative profession that isn't conducive to positive relationships (nor to creativity).

Wealth is a sufficient, but not necessary, condition to these goals. Call us crazy, but here's the new plan:

1. Use Brock's baller math degree to get a job in Chicago's financial sector.

2. Spend a couple years working and saving up cash.

3. Move to Costa Rica.

4. Start a business in the tourism industry. (We'll tell you later!)

5. Pura vida.

We may live there for three years, we may live there for twenty. Who knows? All we know is that we want to live purposefully. A small home, a small community, a quiet life, an adventurous life, a full life. We see Costa Rica as a straight shot to helping us achieve these goals.

Along with having killer surf. Bonus.

Let's Talk About Sex

"Our standards nights and chastity lessons usually focus on the dangers of strong sexual desire. Predictably, we exhort young men to bridle their libidos, which we describe as wild beasts that must be restrained until domestication in marriage, and we caution young women to avoid arousing and indulging the young men -- tempting the beast out of its cage, so to speak.

It's a troubling model for a number of reasons, but I'll address just one: by focusing on physiological motivators for teenage sex, we completely overlook significant psychological motivators. This oversight shortchanges all youth, and exacerbates the risk of young women's needs flying under the standards night radar completely. After dismissing libido as a serious issue for them (which may be a mistake in and of itself), we turn their attention to assisting their male peers without even considering other compelling reasons for sexual behavior. In our outreach we miss the mark by emphasizing virtue, modesty, and chastity without considering what might motivate a young woman to eschew the same.

To put it simply, thirteen-, fourteen-, and fifteen-year-old girls don't have sex because they desperately want sex. They have sex because they desperately want something else."

***

This is an excerpt from a fantastic article I just read. Although it's written by an LDS woman and addresses the way the Church talks about sexuality, the insights from are universal. It made me think about how my views on sex came to be, where they are now, and how I plan on teaching my children.

When I got engaged, a few women told me "If you want a happy marriage, don't ever deny your husband sex." For real?! That is probably the worst advice you could give to a bride-to-be. Since when is sex something that you give to your husband, rather than something you share? I'm sure that wasn't the intended implication behind this advice, but it's there.

Not every eighteen-year old has a healthy attitude about sex. But I think I did. And it wasn't because I had a lot of experience with guys (I hadn't), or because I read stacks of Cosmopolitan (I didn't), or because my parents were exceptionally open and frank (they weren't).

The Church advises its youth not to date until they're sixteen. Growing up, I thought this was torture. I was very good about following this rule (mostly because my parents said they'd give me $1000 if I didn't kiss anybody until after graduation). BUT MY MOTIVATION IS NOT THE POINT HERE! The point is that I did it. Not only did this keep me from doing stupid stuff that I'd regret later, it helped me realize I was powerful.

There were boys who were attracted to me before I was sixteen. Sometimes I was attracted to them as well. But instead of going off and having a stupid six-week relationship like every other teenage couple, I said no. I said no before a relationship even started, which put me in control. Even though I did it begrudgingly, and even though I cast the blame on "that stupid rule my Church does" (instead of proudly standing up for my beliefs), I still did it.

I didn't recognize it at the time, but that helped me take ownership of my sexuality. What a commanding thing for a young woman to have! In addition, I learned how to be friends with guys. No games. Learning how to relate with the opposite sex requires a lot more from a girl than simply being attractive. As I learned to do that, I started basing my self-worth on my personality, not my body.

***

To make a long story short: Read the article. Too many women are growing up with too many misgivings about their sexuality. Let's change that, eh?

Turn to Stone

D.C. bums me out a little. Not because I don't enjoy my internship or the people I live and work with, but because I don't feel quite like I fit with the people here. But last night my attitude changed.

It was brought on by (what else?) a run. I hit the pavement at around 7PM and ran along the Potomac on Rock Creek Trail. I passed the Watergate Complex, the Kennedy Center, and came upon the sand volleyball pits behind the Lincoln Memorial. I looked out upon the dozens of people laughing and playing together, with the sun setting behind them--and the monuments, and the Capitol--and my heart just swelled. Man, this place is beautiful.

I continued running down the Arlington Memorial Bridge. As I crossed over the river and into Arlington National Cemetery, Ingrid Michaelson's "Turn to Stone" started playing on my iPod. I slowed to a stop and listened.

Let's take a better look
Beyond a storybook
And learn our souls are all we own
Before we turn to stone 
Let's go to sleep with clearer heads 
And hearts too big to fit our beds 
And maybe we won't feel so alone 
Before we turn to stone 

My heart started pounding in my chest as I looked around. I was standing among thousands who had turned to stone. After a few moments of still meditation, I crossed back over the bridge again. Instead of running home, however, I ran to the Lincoln Memorial. As I walked up the marble steps toward Lincoln, I stepped on the stone tablet marking the place where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. Looking up and out across the Mall, I saw what is perhaps the most famous stone building in the entire city--the Washington Monument. Behind me, the stone sculpture of Abraham Lincoln. To the left of me, nearly 60,000 names carved in black stone on the Vietnam War Memorial.

I stood inside the Lincoln Memorial watching families take pictures in front of him. There was a white family, an Indian family, and a black family. I realized that this is what Lincoln had worked toward--this day. I reflected on the Gettysburg Address and the line that reads they gave the last full measure of devotion. And it struck me that Lincoln was not exempt from his own words: He gave that himself. As have countless others. How could I not love this city? This city that lives and breathes the sorrows and joys and pains and triumphs of a country?

I walked in my apartment door with a renewed love for DC, and a stronger resolve to let my life become some sort of sacrifice before I turn to stone too.

***