The Ideal

When I was in college, I took several ASL classes.  My school required that every student, as part of their general education, take either an upper level math class or another "language of learning".  I decided I'd rather take four semesters of a foreign language than one semester of statistics.  It was totally worth it.

The first three credits for the language requirement were conversation based classes, but the final class was a deaf culture class.  To be honest, I found this class to be a little frustrating.  The ultimate message of each class at the end of the day seemed to be the same: "You are not deaf, therefore, deaf culture dislikes you because you oppress us with your hearing."  It didn't matter that I was learning ASL and supportive of people doing so - I was (am) hearing, and therefore will always sit on the outside of the deaf world.

My teacher explained all this to us using a rather intricate and complicated series of circles.  The outer most ring of this circle consists of people who fight against deaf culture or have deaf children that they give cochlear implants to.  Slightly in from this are people like me who learn ASL and are supportive of ASL but have no real connection to the world of the deaf.  Next comes family members of those who are deaf who speak ASL, and so on to the core of the circles.  The core consists of the perfect deaf individual.  This person is deaf and born to deaf parents.  He or she attends deaf schools, including Gallaudet University where he or she will meet another deaf person, get married and produce more deaf people.

This ideal, the teacher admitted, is incredibly rare.  The majority of deaf children are born to hearing parents.  Most deaf parents have hearing children.  But the ideal is still there, and still the dream of any proud deaf individual.

I've been thinking quite a bit about this analogy in the last year and how it could, perhaps, be used to explain other cultural conflicts.  For example, in my corner of the world there is a different ideal: A child is born to Mormon parents, who were born to Mormon parents, and so on back to what would, ideally, be Mormon Pioneers who have really interesting conversion stories and were home teachers to Joseph Smith.  (It is also acceptable to be a first generation convert to the Mormon church, because it is a romantic novelty.  Second generation is somewhat more culturally problematic.)  This child will have parents who attended a culturally acceptable Mormon university (or, if they are slightly more rebellious, the other two major universities in Utah, but this is because playful rivalry is the spice of football season and where would we be without it?)  The child will attend one of these universities, where they will marry their eternal companion before graduation (but after a mission.)  If they are female, it is expected that they will be pregnant when they graduate, or that they will work for a year or two after graduation before leaving work to raise their children (like they should.)  If they are male, they will pursue a stable, respectable career.  They will have a decent number of children (somewhere between 4-7 seems to be about average), participate actively in the church and other related programs, and carry on down the line to future generations.

I don't know that I have too much beef with this ideal.  Truthfully, I was raised in it more or less.  My family have been good, church going people for several generations.  I attended one of those previously mentioned "appropriate" schools - as have both of my parents, all of my siblings to date and most of my cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents.  For most of my childhood, my dad was a member of the Bishopric in our congregation, thus making our family one of the "best" or "most prominently known" families in the area.  Rock on.

There is that little hitch in the perfect ideal of my plan, though: as has been widely discussed on this blog, I am perhaps the world's worst dater.  I despise dating.  I don't despise men - I actually really like men.  I am totally open to the right kind of relationship.  I just suck at getting them going and, for the time being, my future looks to be a very single one.  I don't meet that ideal.  The longer the ideal slips away from me, the harder it will be to fit.  And, somewhat more problematic, comes the part where I admit that I don't have a desire for a large family.  Never have.  Both of my parents come from small families, growing up with two siblings each.  (My dad had a third sibling who died when she was quite young.)  And things get even more complicated when I confess that I don't have any desire not to work.  I enjoy working.  I love my job.  I'm not opposed to working part time instead of full time - I do think it's important for parents to actually be involved in the lives of their children - but I also know that I will go absolutely stir crazy if I spend all my time with them.  Small children are cute and fun but I get bored by them quickly and I hate bodily fluids and waiting for kids to sound out words makes me impatient.  What's more, it's quite literally in my genetics to need lots of plates spinning at the same time to be happy and content with life.  I need to be involved in the world around me or I'm a depressed mess.

But this post isn't really about me.  Not entirely, anyway.  Lately my Facebook feed has been filled with a number of posts surrounding a presentation given by the owner of a swimwear line that is anti-bikini.  A portion of the argument that is made is that how a girl dresses can positively or negatively impact the thoughts and behaviors of men; therefore, girls should cover themselves as a favor to their male counterparts.  Now, I have major beef with this argument from any way you phrase it.  I simply cannot condone an argument that suggests that a girl should be responsible for the agency of a boy.  That's a load of crap.  It reminds me of an advisor I had during my first year of teaching who told me once that I should never "unintentionally offend someone".  Unintentionally offend someone?  What the heck does that even mean?  If I were to spend my life completely paranoid about unintentionally offending others I would never get anything done.  Ever.  The most productive people in the world are those who act knowing that they probably will offend or bother others and then they decide that they don't care.

The bigger problem with the responses that I've seen to this video, though, go back to that cultural ideal.  For some reason, people in my corner of the world wear their non-Mormon friends like a badge on their arm.  A sign that they are good and accepting of those who do not share their beliefs.  This is what it is.  But we are, as a culture, far less tolerant of those who are different within our own boundaries.  We can tolerate the friend who drinks or has a tattoo who doesn't come to church with us, but we cannot tolerate the woman who dresses her infant daughter in a sleeveless dress in the middle of summer because she should know better than to allow her baby to project an image of immodesty.  We can support our friends who have extramarital sex because they "just don't know any better", but cannot tolerate the woman who comes to church in pants to support gender equality, or the woman who has questions about why she can't be ordained into the priesthood.  Why is it that we are so intolerant of our own kind?  Those who are coming to church because they need so badly to have the support and understanding of those who are supposed to, in one form or another, share their beliefs?  People who have covenanted to lift the burdens of others - even when they don't understand those burdens.

The fact of the matter is, the Utah Valley Ideal is just not going to happen for everyone and, frankly, shouldn't happen for everyone.  One of the primary factors in the creation of the world was the need to promote variety.  A variety of climates, topography, animal life and - yes - people.  We need traditional, comfortable families just as much as we need less traditional lifestyles in the culture of the church.  It's time that we stop punishing people for applying their worship differently than we do.

This post has gone on long enough.  But if you're still up for more reading, then check out this article.  It says so much of what I've tried to - only much better.

25 in 25

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today I give to you 25 things I've learned in the last year in order of how I think of them.  This will, I hope, make you as wise as me someday:

1. Healthy food tastes better when you're 25 than it did when you're 20.  In fact, it tastes so much better that given the choice between ice cream and red peppers I will almost always choose peppers.

They always welcome me like this.  No joke!

2. Night is still infinitely preferable to morning, but there's a switch that goes off in your brain on your 25th birthday that suddenly makes 2:00 AM very very late.  Also, several years of a regular work schedule will make it impossible for you to sleep in past 8:00 AM, which, when you're still childless, is just unfair.

3. Sometimes you still don't feel like you could possibly be a responsible adult.  Like when you walk around your old college campus or when you go to IHOP in your bloomers after a show.

4. The stranger the food combination looks on the menu, the better it will probably taste.  (Pear and gorgonzola cheese on pork.  Trust me.)

5. That being 25 and single with (two) good jobs means that you have the incredible luxury and privilege of traveling wherever you want, including Disneyland.

6. Also, going to Disneyland is always fun, and no matter how old you are the Peter Pan ride will always make you want to cry a little and walking down Main Street will make you want to skip.

Still pretty sure my letter got lost in the mail.  That's alright.
I'm fine getting it late.  

7. Flying a kite is magical.

8. How important it is to shut down your email when you leave work.  People will understand if you don't answer until morning, and if they don't, they're probably going to be just as big of a jerk at 10:00 PM as they are at 8:30 AM.

9. That seeing a teenager succeed and say something awesome or do something kind or have ridiculous amounts of potential is incredibly rewarding.

10. Also - that I definitely picked the right career path.

11. That a part of me will probably always live in Neverland, Hogwarts, Narnia and Avonlea.  I'll never completely say goodbye to Sherwood or Camelot exactly.  Also I'm not going to try to.  I like my imagination, thank you very much.

12. That not all adults act like adults in the good way.  There are still plenty of oddly petty and grudge-holding people out there.  I don't want to be one of them.

13. That I have some serious work to do if I'm ever going to get to all the books I want to read and re-read before I die.  Also, that there better be books in heaven.  There is no end to the number of times I want to read Anne of Green Gables.  Or Little Women.  Or Sense and Sensibility.  Or. . .

14. There is almost nothing better in this world than hearing beautiful music played live.

15. That I have a pretty incredible set of parents and siblings and extended family.  For the most part, we all get along.  That's so, so rare.  And so lucky.

Alarm = little panda.  Me = big panda.

16. That your work environment can be a living hell with the wrong boss - and heaven if you have the right one.

17. That letting go is sometimes more important than holding on - especially when it comes to annoyance.

18.  That spending all morning devouring a good book is not wasted time, even if it means you're behind on a hundred other things.  You'll be happier doing the rest if you took the time to get away.

19. That my day is infinitely better when my bed is made and I feel pretty.  Taking the time I need to get ready in the morning is worth it, even on Saturday when no one really sees it.

20. That I will probably never be anywhere on time in the morning.  Mornings are the devil.

How I read books.  No joke.  More than one at once.

21. That taking yourself on a date somewhere you like is time and money well spent.  The company is infinitely better (and better looking) than the jerk who ignores you at the symphony or the boring one at the bookstore or the creepers.

22. That no one is immune of an identity crisis.  No one understands themselves as much as they pretend to, and generally you win out by giving people the benefit of the doubt.

23. That I can keep learning without the help of professors and assignments and classes, but it takes more discipline and it's important to surround myself with smart people who can help me talk through ideas.  I still can't learn as well as an island as I can with a group.

24. There is very little in this world that a fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookie can't solve.  (Especially with the ratio of cookie to chip is in favor of cookie.)

Now I want one.

25. I am more capable, more smart, more kind, more gracious and more talented than I sometimes give myself credit for.  I can do hard things.  I can do more and be better.  I am not a failure.  I am flawed, but not wasted.  Weak, but not powerless.  I have the power to be better than I am, but what I am is still pretty good.

Oh Say, What is Truth?

The word "true" gives me a headache.

Growing up, I used the word like I was handing out Halloween candy - freely and to anyone (or anything) that came to the door.  "I know the scriptures are true" I would say in testimony meetings.  "I know the church is true".  "I know the prophet is true".  The word "true" was applied to dozens of things and ideas and people and I felt it.  I felt it.

As a child, I designated truth as anything that was not false.  It was a clean, nice, straightforward definition.  The answer was either right or wrong.  The choice was either good or bad.  There was no middle ground when it came down to it.  No room for a "but what if. . . ?"  There was no grey area in which truths and falsehoods could co-habitate.  It was all or nothing, baby.

When I was in high school, I took a World Literature class from a fabulous teacher.  One unit that still stands out in my mind was a unit where we read several creation stories and flood stories.  Nearly every corner of the world has these stories, we were taught - and our job was to guess why.  We read the story of Noah and the Ark compared to folk tales involving turtle shells and Zeus' angry flood to get rid of the extravagant Bronze Age, and others.  The flood stories fascinated me especially.  It made sense that so many cultures would want to know where the beginning of everything fit - but flood stories?  According to how I'd been brought up, Noah and his family (and their menagerie) were the only survivors of the flood.  Shouldn't there be only one story?  Only one truth?  What if there had been many different flood interpretations - were those stories still valid?  Were they also true?

Later, in college, I took an Anthropology class from a professor who had grown up more or less in a mortuary.  Her father was the mortician and she had found the experience so interesting that she had gone on to study birth and burial rights with an emphasis on East Asian experience.  She told dozens of stories including one about a family who had a dead body in the back room of their house for ages until they could afford an expensive funeral for her - they had ancient royal blood in their family and, though they were impoverished now, had to provide a certain standard of funeral.

The story that stood out to me most, though, was one about a woman she met who had converted to Christianity.  Christianity was rare in that particular location where Buddhism and other local belief systems reined supreme, so my professor had asked the woman what it was that had told her that Christianity was right.  "I had a great pain behind my forehead," the woman had responded, pointing to a spot between her eyes.  "And I knew it was true."

Come to find out, the woman had been raised to believe that great spiritual experiences give a person headaches.  It was a far cry from the "warm fuzzy feelings" I'd been told about all my life.  But since I, too, believed in Christianity - could I also stretch my beliefs beyond fuzzies and into headaches to conduits of truth discovery?  Where were headaches in scripture?

Then there were bigger problems: what about truths that weren't "real" per-say?  If truth and lies are the equivalent of non-fiction and fiction, then it suggests that anything that doesn't exist in the concrete, tangible places isn't true, or at least cannot promote or produce truth.  This doesn't seem quite right either - Christ himself taught through parables - fictional stories that represent good virtues.  I had myself seen hundreds of movies and books, listened to hours of music, pretended to be someone else in theater - some of these experiences made truths clearer to me than any "real" experiences.  Were the truths taught via. Jane Eyre or Ender's Game or Charlotte's Web any less valid than truths learned from the time I spent not reading?   

One of my classes has just finished reading Life of Pi, a book based on the premise that the stories we tell - about our own lives, and about our faith - are part of what bring us to God.  The character Pi Patel is thrown into rather horrific circumstances that involve being stuck on a lifeboat with a tiger.  At the end of the story when Pi has finally reached land and the authorities are questioning him, he tells them two versions of his story: the one he's told the entire book, and a rather more disturbing one.  Although it is never verified - it is suggested that this second more awful version is the "true" version.  The version that has been told the entire book is the version that Pi has been telling himself to help cope with the awful things he has seen.  It is a story that enables him to try and move beyond tragedy - it is the story that allows him to understand the meaning of his experience and what he can learn from it.  In much the same way that we, when faced with things we don't understand, try to predict why God might be "doing this to us", Pi has constructed a highly symbolic tale that he determines is more true than reality because it is the story that changes him more.

One parent disagreed with this analysis.  "Pi's fabrication does not relate a more profound reality," he wrote.  "The story was not about truth, but about storytelling.  The problem I see with it is that if the truth doesn't matter, then any story is as good as any other story.  Or any story is as meaningless as any other."

"No!" I wanted to shout.  "The truth does matter!  It is everything."  And then I would, if I could, tell him how much I need stories in my life.  How much we all do.  How stories of Mormon Pioneers remind me of my heritage, and stories of my childhood make me laugh, and how stories of a desperate prostitute doing all she can to save her child inspires me to never give up and how stories of magical wardrobes teach me about the purpose of my life.  I would tell him about how the Book of the Dead teaches me not to fear dying, and the writings of Confucius teach me to be patient with myself and others, and the stories of Peter remind me that even flawed sinners like me can become great. That the Olympics remind me of the essential qualities of human goodness and that Claire de Lune taught me how to feel.  I would tell him that the story of springtime bursting into life again after an awful winter is awe inspiring to me.  And I would tell him, more than anything, that all of these things have brought me closer to God.

I don't fault this parent for being frustrated with the end of Pi, but I do ache for him.  I ache because, from my perspective, the world is full of stories.  From how we interpret the events around us to less spontaneous, more artistic and refined variations - they matter.  And they change us, and they make us better.  And they teach us to empathize with perspectives that are not ours.  Is that not a less limiting definition of truth?  Truth is more - so much more - than simple exact reality or total fantasy.

Read the Instructions Exactly

Dear World -

Today my students are sitting in a nearly silent room taking a state test.  It's very exciting.

Yesterday we had ethics training on the proper way to administer a state test.  For example, I'm not allowed to distribute colored candies to my students suggesting correct answers to them.  I told them this, and they laughed.  I'm glad they laughed - it meant they know me well enough to know that I wouldn't ever do that.  I hope they see me as an honorable person.  So no candy.  I am, however, encouraged to bribe my students with bonus points or prizes for doing well on this test.  "They won't do well any other way," the government says.  "Teenagers need to be tricked into learning" is what I hear.

I was livid.

I also had a conversation recently that bewildered me a bit.  "You don't have your class rules posted," the individual said.  "No, I don't." I replied.  "I don't need to."

"They should see the rules.  It's helpful for them because then they know what is expected."

I don't need to post rules in my classroom.  I don't have class management problems.  Instead of posting rules, we post values.  Each year we select a quote from a poem or essay that matters.  We post them in the classroom and every year we add a new one.  This year the quote is 'Carpe the heck out of your diem.'  Last year it was 'I am a part of all that I have met'.  One year it was 'Live like a champion today'.    I don't want to set a ceiling on expected behavior, because I want them to do the unexpected.  They don't rip up my room because that's not the kind of student I expect them to be.  But sometimes the administrative world of teaching doesn't quite get that.  "If rules aren't posted, how do they know?" I can see them thinking.  "Teenagers are always looking for a way to goof off.  Posting the rules fixes that."

Clearly these professionals don't see what I see.

I told my students about those thoughts today.  Reminded them (as if they needed reminding) that there are people in this world that think very little of them.  That think they have so little integrity and honesty that they won't do anything without a cheap, tangible, sugary or point laden reward.  I told them that I think better of them than that.  That I trust them.  That I love them - each of them - for the wonderful individuals they are.  I told them to kick the test in the face because they are the kind of people who should do everything to the best of their ability because it's right, not just when they feel like it or when they care, but all the time.  Even during state tests.

I've been aching for them lately.  For me too.  Because although I carry myself with confidence, I feel like I'm still flying by the seat of my pants most of the time with this teaching thing.  There are still many topics that I don't present as well as I could.  Subjects I'm a little more vague on than I would like to be.  Ideas that I struggle to communicate well.  I'm still learning, still so new at this teaching thing.

It's hard, teaching.  It's such a strange balance of instinct and study.  Every now and then I get emails from parents wondering why I don't teach a certain topic a different way.  "Clearly," they tell me, "This would be so much better".  Maybe they're right.  "You should start an after school writing club," another parent suggested.  "Not everyone is as good at writing as you."  Yes, I think.  I know that.  I read more of their writing than you do.  Maybe I should start a writing club.  Maybe that would fix it.  Or maybe your kid should pay attention in class.  Or maybe I picked vocabulary the day I taught certain lessons that just didn't connect.  Or maybe the kid came in from lunch tired from a full stomach or frustrated because of an argument with a friend, or tired from a late night baseball game.  Or maybe my instructions were confusing and I could have been a little more clear.  Maybe somewhere between the kid and me it's just going to take a few more tries.  Maybe it was a perfect storm of all of the above.  Who knows?

Oh, how I wish that teaching were as easy as giving a state test.  Wouldn't it be wonderful if all I had to do was read the instructions exactly on how to teach a topic?  How to understand each student?  How to communicate with each parent?  How to talk about each book?  It would be so much easier.  So much less stressful.  It would make so many more parents happy.  It would produce wonderfully predictable results.  "If you take my class," I could say, "I will turn you into THIS."  But it isn't that easy.  I'm an imperfect person still trying new things.  Sometimes I connect better with one student than with another.  Sometimes my class changes lives.  Sometimes - hopefully not as often - it stresses and frustrates them instead.  Is that a sin?  I don't think so.  It's unfortunate and inconvenient and downright frustrating - but that's life.  I can't be everything for everyone.  I'm not that good.

In the mean time, I keep trying to move forward.  I pray that my students will be patient with me as I try to figure things out.  That parents will forgive me my imperfections and that God will help students to learn when I fall short.  I do my best.  I try to learn from mistakes and get better each time, because I owe it to them.  They deserve the world.

Please - for me - the next time you see a teenager you know, please tell them how wonderful they are.  And remember that with few exceptions, their teachers are honestly trying to do what they think is best.  Maybe what the teacher is doing isn't best.  Maybe for some it is and some it isn't.  It happens.  But they mean well.  No one in their right mind would enter this profession otherwise.

The Young and the Beautiful

My birthday is coming up.  It isn't an overly significant birthday other than the fact that it marks a decade of dating failure to celebrate.

When I was sixteen I had my future figured out.  I'd go to college and get good grades, of course.  But I would also date regularly because I'm hott like that and I would have my pick of the boys because I'm smart like that and I would be married when I wanted because I plan like that.  And I would be young and beautiful and fresh faced in all of my pictures and everyone that came to my wedding would congratulate me on my wonderful success of graduating head of the marriageable class.  A++ to me.  And years down the road my beautiful, smart, well planned children would look at pictures of that day and talk about how awesome and young and Audrey Hepburn-esque I am.  Extra credit, small child.  Extra credit.

Reality, as you know well oh regular reader, has turned out somewhat differently.  I'm at the point in my life where the Mormon community will breathe a sigh of relief if I ever get married at all.  "That was a close one!" they will say.  "Dodged a bullet!!" they'll add.  "Thank goodness they found each other.  How wonderful."  If I do get married, it won't be purely an occasion of celebration.  It will also be an event tinged heavily with relief.  "Glad that's over." they'll think.  "You finally made it!" they'll write on the cards.  And my pictures will feature an "older" dress because the younger styles will look weird and pretentious on me.  (Business suit, anyone?)  My friends with their 3-4 children will come and I will smile awkwardly back.  From where I sit now, I totally wish that elopement was a culturally acceptable option for an overaged Mormon woman still navigating blind date waters.  Then I could disappear for a year and everyone could just forget the whole thing ever happened and treat me like normal.

So.  In the name of trying to forget not really significant birthdays that are still a little bit significant in the not so great way: I am laughing at this, very appreciative of the advice offered here (especially the part about giving me dating advice if you got married at 18.  Completely different ball game now, y'all), and thanking my lucky stars that I am, on the whole, happy as a social menace (thanks a ton, Brigham).  I'm quite content with my independent ability to grow old while traveling instead of changing diapers and cleaning up vomit volcanoes.  Look on the bright, bodily fluid (and fart) free side of life, right?  Of course right.

Justice

When I was a freshman in high school, I remember walking into choir one day and hearing rumors about one of the cheerleaders.

"I hear she's suspended," one person said, pointing to her empty seat.

"No she's not," another student nearby piped in, shaking her head with an all-knowing scowl.  "She's pregnant.  She's going to that special school."

Pregnant?  "Well!", I thought, "I wouldn't put it past the girl."  She'd always been a bit of a pain to work with from my estimation.  Didn't seem that bright.  Didn't seem that put together.  Of course she'd managed to wind up somewhere stupid.

Fast forward a few months.  I'm on an overnight trip with my show choir and there's a girl vomiting.  As a certified, life long member of the emetophobia society, I'm freaking out.  I'm steering clear.  "I don't want to get sick!" I say to another choir member.  "I'm washing my hands like crazy."

"She's not sick," my friend tells me.  "She's hung over.  Don't feel sorry for her."

I didn't.  I was furious.  How could she be so stupid?  She totally deserved what she got.  Hung over and whining about it?  What a moron.

When I was a teenager I had a decently simplistic view of bad things happening to people.  I wasn't quite so extreme as Miss Prism from The Importance of Being Earnest who claimed that the good end happily and the bad unhappily ("that is what fiction means!").  I knew from my own life that bad things happened to good people.  No one is immune.  Some people were stupid and brought troubles upon themselves more often and more readily than others, but that was their fault.  Some people just had rotten obstacles to overcome and that was just a testament to God working in mysterious ways. . . whatever that meant.

To be honest with you, the justice in the universe hasn't ever really eaten at me as much in my life as it has this year.  I can study Holocaust literature and, perhaps horribly enough, find the poetry in the story that God is weaving in his universe.  Sure, the Holocaust was horrible; but how wonderful that the world now has so many examples of the triumph of the human spirit in the face of incredible odds, right?  Isn't that a blessing?  It's so easy for me to write off the crap of the world as just another step on the hero's journey.

But it's getting harder.

This year has been, more than any other, full of inexplicable injustices on people around me that I know and love.  It's been an especially hard year for some of my students.  I've seen so many of them struggle with illnesses and family drama and friendships that aren't easy any more.  I've seen them given challenges that adults would crumble under.  That I would crumble under.  It's breaking my heart to watch.  The world is in front of them and so full of possibilities.  Or it should be.  "Why is this happening to me?" one student said, looking completely exasperated.  "I'm going places with my life.  I have plans.  I am smart.  Shouldn't this be happening to someone who is destined to a life of flipping burgers?!"

Yes.  Yes it should.

To have students come into my office seeking refuge, understanding, help, a listening ear - I feel completely unprepared and unqualified to offer anything.  Every time I open my mouth to try and offer whatever advice I can I feel young and inexperienced and completely moronic.  What do I, with my healthy, safe, convenient life know about helping them with their struggles?  With my family that is whole, with my finances that are secure, with my job that I didn't even apply for?  How can I help?  Everything comes out so trite and pithy and easy.

But I can't turn them away.  I can't pass them off to some counselor.  Because, somehow - and I'm not entirely sure how this happened - they learned to trust me, and I can't give that up.  I can't break that. I owe it to them.

They don't prepare you for this in school.  They don't talk about this on the stupid state test I had to take to upgrade my license.  They'll warn you a little about how you'll love your students and want to do anything for them.  They don't warn you at all about how they'll worm their way into your own dreams and heartaches.  How their successes and failures will hit you too.  How an uncertain future for those who deserve so, so much more will make you wish that you had done more with your own life and question the judgment of God.  I heard all these stories about your biological children.  But what about the other ones?

In Memorium 55 - Tennyson

The wish, that of the living whole

No life may fail beyond the grave,

Derives it not from what we have

The likest God within the soul?

Are God and Nature then at strife, 

That Nature lends such evil drams?

So careful of the type she seems,

So careless of the single life,

That I, considering everywhere

Her secret meaning in her deeds, 

And finding that of fifty seeds

She often brings but one to bear,

I falter where I firmly trod,

And falling with my weight of cares

Upon the great world's altar-stairs

That slope through darkness up to God,

I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope,

And gather dust and chaff, and call

To what I feel is Lord of all,

And faintly trust to larger hope.

Brothers

Growing up one of my favorite shows was Road to Avonlea.  It was on cable, which meant that watching it was a rarity in my house.  We only got cable during special promotional times when the neighborhood got it for free.  I remember asking for those channels and hoping that the free promotions would come back because I was convinced that I was Felicity King.  I was the oldest child, I had a younger brother that annoyed me to death, and I was always right.  It was meant to be.  I'm convinced that I asked my mom to get my hair permed when I was about five for the sole purpose of looking like Felicity.

Of course I completely missed the part of the show where they let you know that Felicity is a jerk.  I remember one episode, for example, where the parents leave overnight for an anniversary trip leaving the 13 year old Felicity in charge of her siblings and cousins.  Whoops.  While the rest of the world felt bad for poor Felix and his nasty sister who made him do chores when he wanted to fish, I sympathized with Felicity for having a brother that was hard to punish because he always looked so dang pleased with himself.

So when the younger of my two brothers was born, I was determined to "train him up in the way he should go" by indoctrinating him with a love of sarcasm, British humor, and a healthy dose of cultural sophistication/snobbery.

I lucked out on siblings.  Andy (the Felix in my life) and I learned to get along as we got older (and I moved out of the house).  Although he still claims that I "made" him watch Avonlea related media (you could have left the room!) we get along great now.  Jared and I are great friends and always have been. I don't remember ever arguing with Jared.  (Minus, I suppose, the time when I determined that I wanted my own room and pushed him, in his crib, out the door.  Or as out the door as I could.  It got stuck.  Whoops.)

Yesterday, Jared got a mission call.  In my church, boys and girls have the opportunity to go out into the world and serve their fellow men.  Only they don't get to choose where they go.  Most people find out via. letter from the presidency of the church.  Families and friends gather around in the living room or Skype from long distances, people post videos of their call-opening on the internet - it's a pretty big deal.  But in true quirky Jared fashion, things didn't go quite as planned.  His call was accidentally sent to a girl's apartment and then lost.  Desperate to get his call, he contacted the mission office and was, after a series of strange events, emailed his assignment.  So instead of gathering around the fireplace with video cameras, my family called in from the most random places you can think of.  Dad was at work.  Mom was in the office at school surrounded by her co-workers.  Alli was pulled out of class to go to the office of her school and surrounded by a different set of secretaries.  I was holed away in the office next to my classroom.  Andy was, of all places, locked out of his apartment.  And Jared, best of all, was sitting in one of the buildings at BYU by a vending machine and random people that had no idea he was about to open an email that would change his life.

I love when the universe throws comedic irony into otherwise important moments of our lives.

So very calmly, without pomp or circumstance or tears my family gathered around a phone fireplace to hear that Jared was going to Brazil, like he'd hoped for.  We were happy.  And then we hung up and went about the rest of our day.

Sometimes I wish that I had sisters closer to my age.  Poor Alli is so much younger than I am that neither of us really knows what it is to grow up with girls around.  But even though growing up with brothers brought arguing and being dragged to t-ball and scouting events and other unholy smelling things, I am glad that I have the brothers I do.  For the patience they teach me, for the men they've become, and for knowing that they've always got my back.

(Seriously, though.  They still tackle me.)

Kill the Beast

"Day after day

Give me clouds, and rain, and grey, 

Give me pain if that's what's real,

It's the price we pay to feel. 

The price of love is loss, 

But still we pay, we love anyway."

"Light", Next to Normal

It was like I was watching fragmented parts of my own life swirl together into recognizable shapes through a kaleidoscope.  The story of a family torn apart by the unexpected and sudden loss of a loved one, a daughter that put huge amounts of pressure upon herself to succeed, a daughter overshadowed by her problem causing brother, a mother caught in the throws of depression but unable to find a good way out of it. . . I went to the musical that night expecting to hear music I loved and to hear it performed well.  What I didn't expect was for it to be so personal.

It was like the first time I'd seen The Glass Menagerie.  Stunned at how whiplashed I felt as I saw myself and those I loved echoing through the bodies of fictional characters with lives confined to less than a hundred pages of text.

It started, I think, when my uncle died.  I was twelve and came home to a house so empty and cold and silent.  I remember the silence being particularly dreadful.  It wasn't the silence of a house asleep but the silence of a house stunned.  I remember my mother at the top of the stairs looking exactly as the house seemed to feel, and my father. . . my father had aged a hundred years or more as he told me that his younger brother had killed himself.  I cried because I was scared to see my dad so upset more than for my uncle.  I'd barely known his brother.

Uncle Bob had manic depression.  Later I would find what that meant.  And it was scary at first, but then it made sense.  Scary when I read through sections of his journals and saw the shift in his emotions so rapidly.  One day on top of the world, the next in the depths of despair.  Over and over again.  It must have been utterly exhausting and so, so horribly lonely a life.

But after the initial fear, I started to see it.  I saw it in the way that my father would respond when he was discouraged or frustrated.  The way he would react quickly in anger and just as quickly in sorrow for having lost control.

I saw it in the way that I did the same thing he did.  Lash out.  Say things I didn't mean.  Use words and glares with full intent of injuring the person opposite me until half a second later I realized what I was doing, and who I was doing it to, and I hated myself for it.

But a name for it.  A name for "it".  That helped.  Depression.  Not manic.  No, I was too level for that. Not wild enough.  Too practical by nature.  But it made sense.  It helped me to understand why I so often didn't make sense to myself.  That on a perfectly lovely day in which nothing all that bad had happened I could want nothing more than to curl up alone.  It helped me to understand why it was such a perpetual battle to be happy with myself and to understand why I was the way I was.  If I had a name for it, I could beat it.  Right?

I live in a part of the world where happiness is passed around like a drug everyone is expected to take, or at least pretend to take.  (If you aren't happy, then clearly the solution is that you need to pray more and go to church more.)

Except for me, faith so often works more like what Tennyson describes best in his poem collection In Memorium, where he describes feet that "falter where (they) firmly trod" and "lame hands of faith" that grope for understanding that is out there, but is not here.  Never, never in the middle of my emotional challenges have I doubted that God is there and loves me.  It's not my style.  I have too many evidences to the contrary to doubt that love.

What I learned in that evening performance of Next to Normal was that I may never ever be rid of that depression.  It's part of my genetic makeup, after all, passed to me from one generation to the next and no solution yet.  Temporary remedies, perhaps, through therapy or medication or, in my case at least, downright stubborn will to keep moving forward - but no solution.  Watching Next to Normal I saw a family that fought so hard to keep together it hurt, and when it ended, the solution was not the "normal" happy life they had always dreamed of.  Normal, says the daughter, is "way too far away."  Next to normal.  That was the goal.  If killing the depressive beast entirely wasn't an option, then containing it and harnessing it would be sufficient.

This year, this quarter century year, has been one of intense pressure.  I set high goals for myself.  Goals that are worthy and respectable and good, but goals that are lofty and difficult to reach in the impatient amounts of time I would prefer to give myself.  Perhaps, then, this depression I battle is my kryptonite.  My extraterrestrial reminder that I am, after all, only human.  My reminder of the lesson taught so eloquently by Eve, who learned that the value of love was only as great as the potential loss it was tied to.

No.  I don't need to kill the depression beast.  Chain it down and tell it who is boss now and then - but if the laws of nature or genetics won't let me ever be rid of that awful monkey, I'll get by.  I can't wait for life to be perfect or entirely happy.  "Some ghosts", the mother sings, "are never gone.  But we go on [. . .] and you find out you don't have to be happy at all to be happy you're alive."  And I am happy, so happy, to be alive.

Oblivious

I am convinced that if I'm ever going to get myself a man it's going to be in London.

This is primarily because I'm nearly positive that it is the only place that I get hit on.  At least openly enough that I recognize it.  My gay-dar is infinitely more trained than my he's-just-that-into-you-dar.

Let me explain.

I heard a story once on a talk show by Dev Patel, the star of Slumdog Millionaire.  He told the host of the show about a day when he was riding the Tube and reading one of the papers that they hand out to you as you enter the station.  These papers, I'm convinced, are there for the sole purpose of encouraging people to look at something other than other people.  And it works.  Riding the Tube is generally a quiet, private sort of experience.  People ride alone together, so to speak.  This in mind, it is both surprising and not that on Mr. Patel's particular journey when he discovered himself as the centerfold of the newspaper everyone was reading, that the only reaction from the person opposite him was a small double take and a turn of the page.  No conversation.  No "is this you?"  No autograph request.  Just a shrug of the shoulders and move on.

This is what it should look like.  

This was the experience I was prepared for the first time I went to London.  I dutifully grabbed the paper, read about the latest "news" and gossip and worked out a crossword answer or two between stops.  I must have done it pretty authentically because I was asked for directions.  Twice.  (And was able to give them.  Both times.  After a week in London?  Yes.  I am amazing.)

My goal whenever I travel is to fit in with the crowd.  I don't like to look like I don't belong, especially abroad where the reputation of Americans is nearly always polarized.  But sometimes weird things happen in crowded public spaces.  Such an experience descended upon me once when I was on my way to Mary Poppins with my friend Kate.  Crammed into a car with standing room only, Kate and I stood gripping a pole and trying not to hit the people next to us on our way to the West End.

Now, before you understand the full weight of this story, you have to know that I have never been one to draw attention to myself with amazing fashion choices.  Bad fashion choices, well, that was nearly all of elementary, junior high and high school.  I'm not trendy.  I've got a big forehead that bangs won't cover because a double cowlick makes such a prospect practically impossible.  I have smallish eyes and was in various forms of retainers and braces for about eight years while my orthodontist and dentists worked to widen my over-small mouth (Yes, I see the irony) and straighten my teeth.  I went through a period of time where I was attempting bangs that didn't work.  Probably because there really were only two bangs.  Two little strands of hair that were meant to mask my five-head.  Yes.  I was that girl.

So I've never had many delusions of grandeur when it comes to looks.  I don't think I'm ugly.  I don't think I'm model material either.  Just normal.  And I'm ok with that.  I'm especially ok with that in foreign places because it means that I get to blend in and hopefully not label myself as rude American loaded with money tourist (since they're, I hope, only 1:3 on that.)

Sometimes, though, fate has other plans.

In the middle of our journey to Poppins we were joined by a man and his (daughter? wife? girlfriend?) significant female other of some variety.  Said man broke every rule of Tube etiquette and he broke them with me.  He asked me where I was from.  "America."  He asked me if I'd ever been to Boston.  "No." (Please stop talking!)  He asked me if I knew where a certain street was in Boston.  "No." (Duh. I haven't been there.)

This is what it was really like.  Creeper.  

And then the coup de gras.  He started to address the entire train, which disrupts everyone and makes everyone feel awkward, and he puts me at the center of it all with proclamations of "Isn't she so beautiful?!!!" directed to randome riders and about me, all punctuated with "And I'm a Born Again Christian, and God loves YOU, and you and you and you-" while he pointed at each member of the car.

Not exactly the subtle ride I'd hoped for.
 

Never been so happy to see the exit.

This may have been the most obvious and public display of affection I've experienced, but it wasn't the last.  The other two were also in London.  One in Kensington Gardens after church (I looked like the daughter of a politician that day - pearls and headband and all) and the other in an Indian Restaurant with a flirtatious waiter who brought me food I hadn't ordered and told me I should move to London.

I'm assuming that this is a sign that if I can get the creepers to come out of the woodwork more openly then maybe I'd have better luck with the Darcy's of the British world.  Right?  RIGHT?!!

(Yeah.  I know.)

A Part of All That I Have Met

I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough
Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.

"Ulysses", Tennyson

There is a quote by L.M. Montgomery, author of Anne of Green Gables, that always made a huge amount of sense to me.  When asked if Anne were based upon a real person, she said that although she had invented Anne, it felt like a lie to say so because as soon as she did, she was sure that she would be standing behind her because she felt so real.

It's the only way I can possibly explain to you the very real relationship I feel with Anne, Jo, Mary and Elizabeth.

Forgive me for a moment while I swoon over books.  This is not my normal philosophical fare - this is pure and total indulgence in what I love.  You see, I didn't have a sister until I was twelve.  Aside from my own mother, there aren't many female influences in my life that mattered more to me than these four, and, later on, their creators as well.

It all started with Anne.

And really, it didn't start with the book.  It started with the movie.  I was obsessed with it.  And when I found out there was a book, I would go to bed every night with my mother's copy of it clutched in my hands.  You see. . . I was only about four at the time.  I couldn't actually read it on my own yet.  But I wanted to.  I still think that Anne was what drove me into reading as soon as I did.  I wanted to read because I wanted to read her.  And it was so, so rewarding.  From Anne I learned that every problem has an imaginative and entertaining solution.  I learned that I could conquer any situation if I had enough nerve.  I learned that it was good to dream and to hope for wonderful things for myself, but that it was also important to be involved in my own life enough to make things happen.  Good things don't come to those who wait - good things come to those who care enough about their life to work for it.  From Anne I learned that the world is a beautiful place if you allow it to be.  I learned that the world is my oyster.

After Anne came Jo.  Little Women was the first beautiful book I ever owned.  For my birthday, or was it Christmas?, the year I turned nine I saw the most beautiful cloth-bound copy of Little Women at the bookstore.  It had a ribbon in it and color pictures.  I read that book to pieces.  It was like reading my own existence.  I found myself sitting somewhere in the middle of Jo and Amy - I was never the tom boy that Jo was.  I loved dressing up and enjoyed pretty things, for example - but most of the time I lived with Jo.  She had a temper she wanted to contain but couldn't.  She had a massive love of life and was placed in a time that really wasn't ready for her.  She wanted a life that was more than most everyone around her would have been satisfied with.  The older I got, the more I felt like Jo was written exactly for me.  Our desires and ambitions were so similar.  We are passionate people who live enthusiastically and don't ever intend to stop, even when it makes the world a little uncomfortable.  From Jo I learned to be happy with myself.

Next came Mary.  She's a little different than the others.  She's a nasty little thing - stubborn to a fault and unkind to others, but the way I saw it she was just misunderstood.  She had been thrown into rotten circumstances and came from a place where she wasn't really cared for.  Who could blame her?  From Mary (and later from Emma) I learned that I could overcome my flaws.  I knew that I was kind of hard to be around sometimes.  I had worked out how I wanted things to be with my life, and sometimes manipulated my friends into fitting that vision - which (rightfully) put them off me.  The word "bossy" was often attached to my name.  Only I didn't like that.  What kid does?  Mary was my guide.  I figured with the right amount of symbolic gardening (my attempts at literal gardening were utter disasters) then I, too, could be someone people would actually want to be around.  I could temper my passionate side and be a good person.

I wasn't raised on Elizabeth.  I didn't really discover her until high school.  And while I enjoyed her, it felt so very cliche to love her since everyone else in the world worshiped her, or seemed to.  (Not that my other literary sister friends aren't cliche. . . ignore that.)  But she was impossible to resist.  It was the banter.  The complete candor about the world and the general sense of snark about everything.  Nothing was safe.  The world seemed built for Lizzie's enjoyment alone, and everyone in it was on a stage where Lizzie sat in the top box like Statler.  I wanted to be the Waldorf to her Statler.  I wanted to be that funny.  To find someone that could handle it and play back.  (Heck, I still want that.)  And although I still find myself relating more to Emma in the long haul (because she is so openly and recognizably flawed but has good intentions), I want to be Lizzie.  I want to be that comfortable with myself.  (And, let's be real, I want to wear the dress.  And go to the ball.  And say "make haste!"  Oh, and own Pemberly.  'Cause it's pretty.

I don't know that I have some kind of overall point to this beyond my feeble attempts to say "I LOVE BOOKS!" in a way that isn't so "kid in a candy store".  If I were to move toward internal philosophy, I would say that these four women/girls are very much so a part of the "nurturing" that enhanced my "nature" as I've grown up.  Their creators as well.  L.M. Montgomery in particular, but all of the women who penned these marvelous characters were independent, strong, forward thinking individuals who fought for their happiness and their place in the world.  Most of them suffered from one form of depression or another.  All of them were religious in some way.  I can't wait to meet them.  I can't wait to thank them for giving me friends that made me not feel so alone, both real and imagined.  It makes this whole "independent woman" thing so much easier to forge through.

Let There Be

Several years ago I had the chance to go see the musical Children of Eden.  The musical is an old one from Stephen Schwartz of Wicked fame, and follows the story of Adam in the first act and Noah in the second.  At it's heart it's a story of the relationship of parents and their children, but it's not often performed in this neck of the woods.  To a conservative audience, any adjustment to the Bible is a little iffy, and in this case there are several story liberties taken that can make people squirm.  For one, the "Father" character, who represents God, is not a perfect individual.  He questions and makes mistakes and can come off as a bit harsh.  (He doesn't agree with Noah's son marrying a faithful girl who just happens to be of the race of Cain?  But she's so nice!  And they love each other!  And she prays and everything.  Where's the forgiveness?!  Jerk!!)  There are also some historical question marks.  (Cain discovers Stonehenge?)  For people who would prefer their Bible stories to be presented with exact accuracy, it can be a little blood curdling.

Apparently I'm not one of those people.

I really love this show.  It isn't perfect, but I trace some pretty big changes in my life back to some perspectives I gained from watching it that first time - especially in the presentation of Eve.

In traditional Christianity, Eve is something like Guinevere of Arthurian legend.  She's a kind, beautiful, mother of all living who totally ruins everyone's lives.  She eats the fruit, tricks Adam into eating it too, and ruins our chances of living in a perpetual paradise.  If Eve hadn't been such an awful sinner, our lives would be so much better.  In Mormonism, we see Eve slightly differently. We see Eve as an intelligent human who consciously makes a decision and understands the consequences.  She sees that in a state of ignorance, they can't have children.  That it is good for herself, and good for Adam, to leave Eden and to gain experience.

Only, beyond those discussions, we don't really talk about it much.  (I suppose I probably shouldn't say "we" in the sense that it includes the entire church.  I'm sure that there are corners of the church were the topic is discussed more.)  And, as many of you will have noticed from a huge increase in publicity and discussion about feminism in the church recently, it's a topic that probably ought to be discussed more openly.

It is not enough any more to assume that women of the church will only have futures that involve (or should involve) a traditional family.  For many women that hasn't happened, or it has and has been disastrous, or it can't happen for other reasons.  For those women who are told that the highest calling they can have is to be a wife and mother when it hasn't/can't/didn't happen for them, it can be hard to figure out how to harness or define what womanhood means for them and how they can contribute in a real way now, not just at some distant point in the eternities.  What makes us divinely different from men and how can we be valuable?  (In other words: am I only valuable because of my uterus and home maintenance abilities?  Or are there other ways that I am valuable that I should be earnestly pursuing?)

To me, the answer has been stated most clearly in Eve's song from Children of Eden.  The song, "The Spark of Creation", is centered around her belief that when God created the world he left a spark of the creative fire within her being.  She calls herself an "echo of the eternal cry of 'Let there be!'" and a "keeper of the flame" (of creation).  I have never, ever had a song speak to me as a woman more than that one did.  Suddenly the calling of womanhood felt so much more broad.  I did not need the power of the Priesthood - I had a calling, a divine calling, to continue with the work started when the world began.  To make something exist that had not existed before I was there.  Creating life is a part of that.  So, too, is creating a beautiful home.  But creation. . . creation covers so many things.  It involves writing, for me.  Photography.  Discovering new ideas and spreading them.  It involves helping to mold my students into confident, capable, intelligent human beings.  It covers so many aspects of life and is a much more forgiving image of the value of womanhood in the world.  It is not limited to one sphere.  It is all encompassing.

And this, friends, is why I align myself in the feminist side of Mormonism.  Not because I want to rob men of the Priesthood.  Not because I hate my bra.  Not even because I intend to campaign for exactly equal numbers of male to female speakers/prayer givers in church meetings (though I think more female representation there would be stupendous.)  I consider myself feminist because I see myself as a woman responsible for preserving and protecting the art of creation in its many forms (even those that I don't entirely understand, re: vinyl lettering).  It is my responsibility to promote and encourage it in the world.  And in case you think that I am overreaching, check out this awesome nugget of wisdom from someone much smarter (and more righteous) than me.

In Pursuit of Excellence

I went on a date once several years ago where we got to talking about the afterlife.

"I can't wait to get to heaven and spend a few hundred years just reading everything that's ever been written," I said.

". . . Everything?  There are probably some books that won't be there," says my date.

"Well, yes.  Twilight isn't good enough even if the author IS Mormon.  But Jane Austen.  She's got to be.  Heaven wouldn't be heaven if I couldn't read Sense and Sensibility when I wanted to.  Or Anne of Green Gables.  Or Harry Potter."

That was the end of that relationship.

I think he thought I was a little extreme.  Or sacrilegious.

Next time I'm asked about my favorite color, I'll show them this.

But I'm completely serious about the books in heaven thing.  I'm also serious about wanting to learn to play a bunch of instruments/play them better (flute, piano, violin, cello, harp, bagpipes, didgeridoo) and I want to dance (ballet, contemporary, swing, ballroom) and I want to hone my acting skills and write, and finally learn how to draw, and I want to sculpt and take pictures and learn more about growing plants and become an amazing singer.  I want to do all of those things in addition to, you know, being with my family and making worlds and sleeping and such.

(Hey.  It's eternity.  A girl can dream, right?)

My problem, as pointed out to me by a friend, is that I want to do all of these things now.

Looking at my teaching schedule for the year, I started to bemoan the fact that I am mediocre to good at many things, but not truly excellent or masterful at really anything.  I'm a good writer, but not a great one.  I'm a good actress, but not West End caliber.  I'm a passable photographer, but I'd never get a job at National Geographic.  And I want to be excellent.  Really excellent.  Except - as you can see above - I'm interested in too many things to hone in on one skill to perfect.

And I'm not nearly egotistical enough to imagine that I'll ever approach DaVinci in terms of genius.  That's mental.

And this, my friends, is why I need eternity.  And why we all do, I think.  There's still so much to learn.  And I want to learn it all!

I suppose my first step may be learning to clone myself to make it happen. . . what do you think?  It might be more efficient.

In the mean time, I don't really see any solution but to keep being interested in everything.  It might mean that I never really become brilliant.  But the thought of giving up any of those interests is about as bad as the prospect of never reading Jane Austen again.

The Summer of the Soul

2012 has been a somewhat hormonal year for me.

2010 was pretty much amazing.  I graduated from college officially (though I was done in 2009 - had to finish the internship).  I landed my biggest dream part in my very favorite musical.  I moved away from the bubble (well, at least to the edge of it) and bought my first new car.  I got a new job and made some incredible friends.  2010 rocked.

2011. . . not so much.  2011 was the year of depression and doubt and trouble.  I spent the majority of the year battling some hard core emotional trials and questioning virtually everything I thought I knew.  I came out of 2011 exhausted and with a very firm good riddance at the clock when the year switched over.

If 2010 and 2011 had a love child, it would be my 2012.  On the one hand, the year has been pretty stinking incredible.  I landed not one, but two of my dream roles.  One of those parts in particular changed my life forever and I will always, always be grateful beyond words to have been lucky enough to be part of that show with that cast.  I took an awesome trip to the south eastern section of the US with three of my favorite people.  I went through the temple for the first time, something I have been praying for since, oh, for as long as I can remember.  I was able to be with my brother when he got married to his sweet wife.  I came to terms with many of the struggles I had in 2011.  The first half of the year was basically perfect.

The second half was pretty close to hell.  Without going into details you don't need to know, work essentially took over my life in the worst way possible.  It left me emotionally beaten and drained.  Many of the things that were making my job so stressful are being resolved right now - I hope.  It's still a little uncertain.  But I can at least say that things are looking up, which is a relief.  But in the middle of it all, things were looking pretty bleak.  I considered leaving more than once.  Anything - anything - would be better than how things were.

There is a line in the song "Feels Like Christmas" from The Muppet Christmas Carol that I've always loved that carried me through this particular December.  Christmas and December are called the "summer of the soul".  What a beautiful image.  And it's true.  For me, right this moment, a thousand literal miles away from how hard things have been and surrounded by friends and family, I feel once again the magic of Christmas.  What a wonderful time of year this is!

I have nothing profound to say just now.  Mostly I want to read (it's not even for school!) and go to bed so that I can enjoy the day with my family tomorrow.  But on this Christmas Day to those of you who read my writing every now and then or regularly, I wish you the very happiest of Christmases and pray that you too will find summer for your soul, no matter your current (or future) circumstances.

As for me. . . well. . . there are some exciting things coming in the unlucky year of 2013 for this girl.  Stay tuned.

The Sisterhood of the Pants

There's been a lot of uproar in my neck of the Facebook woods lately about an event taking place next Sunday encouraging women to wear pants to church.

For my non-Mormon friends out there who now think that we are even more puritanical than you had originally thought, it is the cultural tradition - particularly in America - for women to wear dresses or skirts to a Mormon church service.  It is a tradition passed down through our English ancestry that culturally promoted clothing in women as a sign of her marital status.  Women's clothing has always been subject to such ideas - you don't see it as much in the men.  The modern motto behind this tradition is that we wear other clothes throughout the week and that dressing up is a way to show respect to sacred meetings.  For women, this generally means a modest dress or skirt, for men it means dress slacks, a white shirt and tie.

Welcome to not the 1840s, girls.  

The issue then is coming from women who are hoping to change the cultural tradition of dresses and skirts being the only option for women.  The church itself has nothing that says it is required for women to wear them to church.  The exact wording in the handbook, in fact, makes a point of saying that "The Church has not attempted to indicate just how long women's or girls' dresses should be nor whether they should wear pant suits or other types of clothing."  But there are still some pretty violent cultural stigmas against the action - as seen in this particular article that highlights the arguments on both sides.

This is what they see in their heads.

Like the author of this article, I didn't really see what the big deal was.  Although I don't mind (and actually kind of enjoy) wearing skirts and dresses to church, I don't really care what other people around me wear on the whole.  I can think of many circumstances in which pants would be completely acceptable wear to church for practical reasons or otherwise.  A woman working in nursery, for example.  Or just because it's winter and the building is cold.  It makes sense.  And I think that, on the whole, most people agree with that fact.  Christianity is built on the foundation of loving (and not judging) your neighbor.

So why is it such a big deal?

I think it is because there is a bit of a conflict of standards.  We have days after major school dances where girls wear their prom dresses to church meetings and boys wear their tuxes.  Is that appropriate?  What about the boy passing the sacrament in an untucked and sloppy shirt?  Or super long hair?  Or the men or boys wearing sneakers?  Is it alright to pass the sacrament in a blue shirt instead of a white one?  What about those cheap Old Navy flip flops?  Are any of these alright?  I think most people would agree that they probably aren't the most respectful dress options in church - but do we accuse the girl showing up in her ball gown of going apostate or the boy with the long hair has going against his priesthood duties?

Feminism itself is such a huge buzzword in this culture.  I suppose I can see why.  The word itself conjures up some rather violent images of bra burning and man-hating women.  In a church that promotes traditional family structures, this can be a little unnerving.  It leads to a culture full of women who cannot say anything related to typical "feminist" ideas without being labeled as an extremist who wants to be equal to a man in every way, when that isn't always the case.

This is more accurate.

What they are really looking for in this particular case isn't really the pants.  To me it goes deeper than that.  It's the same stigma that comes from people who rather violently oppose infant girls in spaghetti strap sundresses in the summer time (as if an infant's shoulders are already arousing.)  It's the attitude that comes when we teach our young women that they should dress dress modestly so that men don't think bad thoughts and turn to pornography.  It's what makes stuff like this happen.  Suddenly the girl herself can become worried that she's a walking sin waiting to happen if she happens to choose a shirt some guy doesn't like.  And then women who have perfectly legitimate reasons for working outside the home, or for pursuing higher education, or for not having a huge family suddenly feel the need to justify everything and fight for it.

I think back on my own experiences.  After college I was ready to move to Seattle.  A good portion of that reason, honestly, was that I was hoping to get married.  I had heard from friends that the wards there were good.  I was tired of BYU Student wards and how transient they always are.  People move from one ward to the next always looking for the bigger fish.  I was hoping for something more steady. But that's not what the Lord had in mind for me.  I was told pretty firmly to stay in Utah.  And now I'm living in a small town where the closest single's ward includes primarily 18 year old teens living at home with their parents (some of which are former students of mine.)  I don't know why I'm being taken down the particular path I'm on.  I do know that I've battled through feeling guilty over not being married (or not wanting a large family, or loving my job) because of those cultural pressures.

So what does this have to do with pants in church?  It has to do with women wanting not to be equal to men by robbing them of their priesthood.  These are not women going apostate from the church.  Trying to make a positive change is not equivalent with any of these things, particularly when the change seems to be primarily cultural and not doctrinal. Women should be able to ask questions about their divine role in the universe without feeling badly about it.  We should be able to talk about our Heavenly Mother without feeling awkward or wrong.  We should be able to discuss what we think our Celestial experiences will be.  And we should be able to discuss them without being given the toss-off answers so often used.  We may not have the answers - but fear is not a productive or constructive or even respectful response to a legitimate question.

Relief Society

I won't be participating on Sunday.  At least not directly.  I am afraid that some of these women will find that wearing pants to church is morphing into an act of "rebellion" in mindset, which distracts from the spirit of church.  That shouldn't be the goal.  They aren't "rebelling" against the church - just trying to influence the culture.  At the same time, I return to what I said before: it shouldn't be a problem in the first place.  Cultural expectations that become doctrine are scary to me - especially when they lead to this kind of terrified extremism in response.

The problem is that cultural change can't be mandated.  Not really.  And as one of my friends put it - it is really hard to walk the line between respect and change.  So to those who will be participating, you have my support.  As a woman living an unconventional path in the church, I appreciate you.

Look at that face. . .

I have decided to embrace the inevitable and become a cat lady.

"Kitty. . . "

 Not an old one.  And not surrounded by too many, because that smells.  One is enough.  Maybe two.  And definitely hypoallergenic varieties or my dad will never come see me again, which would be sad because I love my dad.

"Rich kitty...?"

 (Dad, you'll know I'm mad at you if I ever get a non-hypoallergenic cat.  These lovely Balinese beauties are perfect for you.  Promise.)

"Hello!. . . Fluffy. . . "

 And, for the record, I would not be adverse to becoming a cat lady with a cat mister, but you can't buy them for a few hundred dollars.

"Kitty, kitty, kitty. . ."

 (At least not the breeds that clean up after their own poop.)

HOW could you resist that face?!!

. . . only I can't get one of them yet.  Not until I have my own place.  So I am feeding the cat hungry part of my soul by looking at pictures and it is. not. helping.  In the mean time, if you happen to come across any Balinese cat breeders looking to divest themselves of an adorable kitten in about two summers, then think to yourself "Self?  I know the perfect owner!" and give me a call.  Or a text.  Or a smoke signal.