The Revival of Chivalry

This morning I woke up and was stumbling into the bathroom to take a shower when I heard voices. No, not the kind of voices that crazy people hear in their heads. These were real voices and it sounded like they were coming from just outside my front door. I hesitantly walked to the door, stood on my tip-toes, and peeked out the peep hole. What did I see? Several inches of snow and several guys in the ward shoveling our walks. My heart melted just a little. Nothing gets me quite like good, old-fashioned chivalry. I think I was maybe born in the wrong era, because when I watch movies like Pride and Prejudice it makes me wish I lived in a time when men respected women the way Mr. Darcy respects Elizabeth Bennett. Sure, it's a little extreme for the man to stand up every time a women enters or exits a room, but a toned down version of that would be nice. It's unfortunate that in today's world a man can't open a door for a woman without the fear of her becoming offended. Obviously I can open a door by myself. I can do a lot of things by myself, but the simple acts of courtesy from a man to a woman are appreciated. Call me old-fashioned, but I get a little offended if the boy doesn't open the door for me. When he helps me with my coat, pulls my chair out, or offers to carry something heavy for me it is not implying that he thinks I'm incapable of performing the acts myself, rather that he has some respect for me. And so today when I saw the boys in my ward going from apartment to apartment, shoveling the snow for all 80 girls in the ward, it gave me a little hope. Perhaps chivalry isn't dead after all. If it is, perhaps the men in the BYU 84th ward are doing their best to revive it. Here's to the resurgence of chivalry and gentlemanly acts of courtesy and respect.

Farewell Carlos y Espanol

Isn't it weird how emotionally attached you can become to fictional characters? Almost every time I read a book I for some reason think that the characters are my best friends and that I know everything about their lives and they know everything about mine. I have to contstantly remind myself that they are fictional and have no idea that I exist or that I am reading their story. They don't even know they have a story, I think. Nevertheless, I become attached. Weird, I know. When the characters in my favorite book, The Book Thief died, I felt like a family member had just passed on. I cried hard. No, I wept hard. Tears streamed down my face, snot ran out of my nose, and I was hyperventalating/gasping for air. It was that kind of weeping. I think I used an entire role of toilet paper to wipe away the combination of tears and mucus. I am slightly embarrassed by the way I reacted to reading that novel, but I justified it by the fact that it is incredible literature with excellent character development that I had invested hours into reading. I've decided that it's okay to get emotional in books. Books being the key word.

Remember Carlos? He is my friend from spanish 101 and 102. In each of the 18 chapters I have studied through out the two semesters, Carlos has had 3-4 'escenas' in each chapter. Each escena is about one page long of dialouge between Carlos, his relatives in Mexico and his girlfriend, Patricia. These dialogues are put in the Spanish 101 and 102 packet purely to engrain spanish vocabulary into our venacular with the ultimate goal of us becoming fluent spanish speakers. They do not include Carlos in the packet in hopes of us becoming emotionally attached to him and his family. He is not a real person. He doesn't have any character development or intelligent conversations. And yet, he somehow managed to get a hold of my heartstrings.

This week I have my final chapter test in spanish. Unfortunately, Carlos's story ends in 102; he doesn't continue on to 105 or 106. Today, I sat in the library and read the last 'escena' in the packet. The story ended by Carlos boarding the plane to head back home to Argentina, saying a heartfelt and emotional goodbye to his realatives and Patricia. And thats the end of Carlos.

Now, I understand that it was acceptable for me to weep while reading The Book Theif and really any other novel for that matter. But when I got the lump in my throat when Carlos boarded the plane, I just couldn't justify it. I had to mentally tell myself to cut it out, I would not allow myself to cry over a Spanish lesson. I could not. I have to admit that I am very sad to see Carlos's story come to an end. He has been such a major part of my life for the past two semesters. But cry over him, I could not. But because Carlos doesn't continue on to 105, neither can I. My Spanish career is quickly coming to a close; it's been a good ride. Adios Carlos. Adios Espanol. I promise to continue practicing with mi hermano.

A Classic Thanksgiving

A couple years ago we had Thanksgiving dinner with my mom's side of the family. Because there were over thirty people present, we had to split up into different tables. One table was for the kids under 10, another table was for the adults and one special table was for the teenagers. The nine cousins that I shared the table with are some of my best friends; we have the ability to laugh together for hours on end and this occurs nearly every time we are together; we were thrilled to find out we had our very own table. We were the first to take our seats, all physically and mentally prepared to inhale the pounds of delicious food that stood only an arm length away, tempting us mercilessly. As soon as the prayer had been offered and the amens were uttered we began to indulge. Our plates were piled high and succulent food covered every square inch of the plate in front of us. We were tremendously focused on the goal at hand: clear the plate and load up again. The table was silent; the only sound that could be heard was the clinking of the gold fork against the porcelain plate and an occasional blunt and panicked, "Pass the potatoes" (or rolls, turkey, stuffing, gravy, yams, green bean casserole, etc.) as if the mentioned food would be spoiled shortly and we had a set time limit to get the food safely stored in our stomachs. The laughter and quality conversation that usually exists when we are in each others presence was absent, instead we stuffed our faces. After we each had seconds, thirds, even fourths for some we began unbuttoning our pants to allow room for our stomachs to expand. We glanced over at the adult's table just to the right of ours: they were all fully engaged in conversation and still only beginning to make a dent in their first helping of the feast. While they had been focused on enjoying the company of family, the food had been the focal point at our table. And the fact that we had cleared our plates three times before everyone else even filled their plates for the second time confirmed that fact. We soon made our way into the family room where we collapsed from overeating. Some fell onto the couches, others lay spread eagle on the carpeted floor. Then we stared at each other. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to talk. It hurt to laugh. So we lay in silence, doing our best to avoid breathing any more than absolutely necessary to remain alive. Every now and then, someone would begin to laugh at the situation at hand, after all we had just eaten enough food to feed an entire third-world country and were now laying like a colony of dead logs on our grandparents floor. One laugh caused everyone else to start laughing which quickly turned into moaning. If it didn't hurt so bad to shift positions we would have thrown a pillow at the first laugher that inflicted so much pain on the rest of us. Instead we uttered a, "Stop laughing, it hurts!" and went back to laying in silence. Three hours later our parents informed us that it was time to leave, ushered us into the car, drove the 20 minutes home and watched "Miracle on 34th Street," our annual Thanksgiving night movie.

When I think Thanksgiving, my mind is flooded with this memory, it's a classic. I hope I experience a little déjà vu tomorrow and have another excellent Thanksgiving Day. I kind of can't wait.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Strike a Pose

Today as I was walking home from campus I passed in front of the HRCB just as a group of six professionals were exiting the building. They must have been involved in some important meeting or conference because they were all dressed in formal business attire: well tailored suits and panty hoes with high heels. Each one of the six people were of a different nationality each with their own unique accent. One woman appeared to be a Scandinavian, one man had an English accent, one man was from an African nation, another woman represented Russia, they referred to one man as "Mexico" and another one seemed to be of Asian descent. Just as I was passing by, the Scandinavian woman asked me if I would mind taking a picture for them. I readily agreed and she gave me her iPhone to snap the picture with. Seconds later I was handed two more iPhones from the English and African men. As I snapped three photos in a row and began returning the expensive devices, the six very professional looking and businesslike men and women asked me if I could take just one more. This time a "funny picture." I said that I didn't mind and snapped one more photo as four men in shirts and ties and two women in business suits and high heels pulled faces and stroke (striked? struck?) poses similar to the ones that are made in the high school dance group pictures at Viewmont High. As soon as the camera clicked they each offered me a sincere thank you and I continued on my way. Walking home I thought about this event that had just occurred and tried to imagine my father and uncles and a few more of their associates leaving a meeting and asking a passerby to take a "funny picture." And I just couldn't imagine it happening.

It is comforting to know, however, that adults from various parts of the world, no matter how distinguished still feel a need and desire to be silly sometimes.

Deep in a Dream

Last night I had a very bizarre dream. One of those dreams that seem so real and even though I've been awake for some time now, I can't stop thinking about it. Keep in mind it's a dream and it is not a requirement for it to make logical sense:

I was back in high school, but rather than attending Viewmont High I was going to a private school where uniforms were necessary. Although I was in high school I was still living in my apartment that I'm in now but with all different roommates, none of whom I know, but I seemed to be good friends with them all. Well, there was a cute boy that went to my school and he was throwing the biggest party of the year this Friday night. It was the kind of party that if you didn't attend, you would be forever classified as a nerd and no longer socially acceptable to associate with. And on top of that, I had a crush on this particular boy. That Friday at school, while dressed in my school uniform, the principal walked up to me and started screaming at me because my skirt was too short and told me that if I didn't get it fixed I wouldn't be able to go to the party that night. And the cute boy that I was crushing on heard the whole thing. I was so embarrassed and unable to fix my short skirt that the party was out of the question for me. I was perfectly devastated and walked to my apartment with tears streaming down my face.

As I walked into my bedroom, ready to throw myself on my bed and wallow in self pity, my roommate stopped me in my tracks: she was holding a gun and pointing it right at me. My hands flew up in the air and I tried to understand what she was doing but mostly talk her out of killing me. Apparently, the waitress at the restaurant had put hot fudge rather than carmel on her ice cream sundae and she felt justified in killing all of her roommates in a frantic rage because of the inconvenience she had caused her. I couldn't talk her out of pulling the trigger and seconds later I laid writhing in agony over the bullet that was implanted into my stomach. But, didn't you hear? I'm superwoman and it takes more than one bullet to stop me. She went into the other room and pulled the trigger on my other two roommates, but same story with them, one bullet is nothing. She then went into her own room to work on some homework while we sat there bleeding. The three wounded roommates made our way to the stairs and called 911 and when the crazy roommate heard she came out with the gun and tried to put a second bullet in us. Luckily, she had used all of her bullets and ended up throwing the gun down in frustration. When the police arrived, they immediately healed us with the wave of their wands and a little spell. It was very Harry Potter-esque. Then they turned to our violent roommate and told her what she had done was wrong and if she did it again she would have to stand in the "time-out" corner for 30 seconds. Understandably, the three of us were a little nervous to be around her and gathered in a different room than her and decided that the appropriate way to 'get back' at her would be to give her the silent treatment for the rest of our lives. Harsh, I know.

Well, then my brother Alex called to see if I wanted to meet up with him and Allie for dinner. I told him I did and that I had a crazy story to tell them. I recounted to them that just 20 minutes earlier I had been shot and nearly died and they offered a sincere "I'm sorry" but then told me that dinner would have to be cancelled because their friend had a wedding reception that night. The friend's wife had a strange disease that caused her to throw up every 12 minutes which lasts for three days, by the end of the third day, the victim of this disease dies. They had 24 minutes until the end of the third day and they wanted to meet their friend's new wife before she passed away. Hence, dinner had to be rescheduled.

As I walked home, feeling a little down on myself after having been yelled at at school and forced to miss the cool party that night, shot by my roommate, rejected by my brother and sister-in-law, and informed of this heinous disease that someone was knowingly going to die from in 24 minutes, I walked past the house of this cute boy where the party I was forbidden to attend was being held. The principal was the bouncer of the party and under no circumstances would let me in. Unfortunately everyone there came to the windows and started pointing and laughing at me (kind of reminded me of what I picture the great and spacious building to be like in Lehi's dream). And I was known as the social reject for the remainder of my high school career.

And then I woke up and have been a little depressed ever since. I was curious as to why I would dream something so morbid and did a little googling. According to dreammoods.com dreams are an outlet for suppressed feelings and a place for anger and negative emotions to be expressed. Apparently, subconsciously I'm a little nervous about being the social reject in high school, getting a gun pulled on me by my roommate, and having someone die after three days of ralphing. Pretty legitimate fears I would say. It also said that if you die in a dream, you will die in real life. Good thing I'm one tough chick and a single bullet couldn't take me down or I wouldn't be hear to tell the tale. And it said that the average person has 3-5 dreams a night but some have up to 7. It's a good thing I only remember one a night or I would be completely overwhelmed with my crazy dreams.

So Many Options

This afternoon I went to the Provo temple. As I was walking up the hill I noticed a bride in her wedding dress and a groom in his tux getting their wedding pictures taken with the temple behind them. This is the first time I have ever seen a bride and groom at the Provo temple and it kind of caught me off guard. Don't get me wrong, I know that the ordinances are the same and it shouldn't matter what the outside looks like and believe me, if it was the only one close by I would be thrilled to be married in the Provo temple. But why in the world would one choose to get married in the Provo temple when they could drive 20 minutes to the Mt. Timpanogos temple, the Draper temple, the Oquirrh Mountain temple, or the Jordan River temple, 40 minutes to the Salt Lake temple, or even an hour to the Bountiful temple? I hope I'm not going to be eternally punished for saying that. To clarify: I love the Provo temple. So much. I can just think of a few other temples I would choose to get married in before it. The bride and groom I saw today looked terribly happy though and thats all that matters.

Introducing the new Mr. and Mrs. Alex Hymas

Just a few days ago I sat outside the Salt Lake Temple and watched Alex and Allie walk out the doors after having just been sealed. Neither one of them could wipe the smile off their face, take their eyes off each other, and I have never seen either of them happier than they were that day. Congratulations! I'm so happy for you!