The First Day Is Always the Worst Day

I needed a vacation.

I hadn't gone on a real vacation since Disneyland eighteen months ago. I've gone out of town, sure, but always for reasons fraught with family obligation. I've taken days off work, but always for illness or holiday or church reasons or special events. I never get a chance to recharge or relax, and my ability to hold myself together has worn thin.

In January, I was investigating a possible trip back to Europe; I'd been tentatively planning to go in spring of 2018 for a while. So I didn't vacation at all in 2017, and I saved...and I saved...and I saved. I had plenty of money to go on a trip! My plan was book and pay for the trip in January...go in the spring...and buy a new car in the summer. I couldn't find anyone to go with, but I wasn't giving up; there was still time.

I ended up buying a new car in January instead, and I was hesitant to dip any more into my savings for an expensive trip. I felt like Heavenly Father was saying, "DON'T GO TO EUROPE THIS SPRING" because nothing was coming together. So I didn't book anything, though I was still toying with the idea of going later in the year. Then my appendix had to come out, and I had to pay the people who took it out, and it quickly became apparent that this year was just not going to be my year.

Little Sister and her husband went back to NYC around the same time I bought my new car, and she could only gush about the awesome Jim Henson exhibit that I'd wanted to see in New York City three years before. So when I was weighing the idea of going on vacation, I decided: what the heck? Why not go back to New York City so that I could finally see the dang exhibit, eat whatever I wanted, and spend time with Older Sister? The idea appealed to me, particularly because Older Sister would be working, so I could do whatever amused me. The subway system is easy to use; I could get around with no trouble and generally have a good time. And I could stay with Older Sister, which would be very inexpensive.

So (after several weeks of hemming and hawing), I finally committed to Older Sister to come and visit. However, after I'd done so, my mother cornered me and said that I should take Little Brother with me.

That kind of killed the point of the vacation, especially since Mom wanted me to take him to the Statue of Liberty and to Trinity Church and to her favorite restaurants and generally do a bunch of things that I had no intention of doing. So I laid it out straight for Little Brother: this was my trip, and while he could come, he would more or less have to do whatever I wanted.

He said okay, and the plans commenced.

Now, before you think I'm a mean older sister, let it be known that I made sure to include Little Brother in the plans. I made room for the things that were non-negotiable for him: going to the Times Square Disney store, going to the 9/11 Memorial, getting dim sum in Chinatown, a museum called the Museum of Jewish Heritage. He also wanted to go to the Jim Henson exhibit as much as I did.

The flight was booked and the musical tickets were purchased, and in what seemed like no time at all, the day of the trip had arrived and Little Brother and I were waiting at the airport late, late at night.

A few things to know about Little Brother:

• He loves Disney and knows the most about it. Of anyone. On earth. Probably.
• He loves theming.
• He loves beautiful things.
• He loves our Jewish heritage and taught himself to make delicious challah bread. Unlike me, he looks like a full-blooded Jew.
• He loves most of the things I love, except for Harry Potter, and his appreciation for Jim Henson has turned him into an accomplished amateur puppeteer.
• He secretly kind of wants to be YouTube famous.
• He has about a million original stories, musicals, and TV shows hiding inside his brain. They come out if you listen to him talk long enough.
• After our sibling date where I introduced him to sushi, sushi became his most-favorite food.

While we were waiting, he showed me a bunch of his Snaps from Snapchat, something I've never used. It would appear that Little Brother mostly uses it to send droll pictures to his friends.

As usual, we were red eyeing it out to New York. The flight was uneventful, but...odd. First of all, when we were loading onto the plane, a man with an accent I couldn't identify asked me (I think) to check one of his items in my name. He said (I think) that he and his wife and his two kids had too many items to check even though the flight had just announced complimentary checking since there was plenty of room.

They were a cute family, but they were strangers, so I refused. I felt bad, but it's basic airline safety not to accept things from people you don't know! Luckily, we saw later that the flight had checked their extra items with no fuss.

The other odd things about the flight were as follows: 1) The plane was abnormally loud. Little Brother was sitting next to me, but I could barely hear him all night. 2) The flight attendants were weirdly sneaky. I was half-asleep the whole flight, so I barely remember, but I seem to remember that they...didn't really talk? They just communicated with a series of gestures mostly, so that they didn't wake up passengers, I guess. But it was really hard for me to see said gestures since I was trying to sleep and wore no glasses or contacts! 3) The girl sitting next to us promptly fell asleep about as soon as the plane took off and barely moved all night. I even climbed over her to reach the restroom, yet she didn't stir. (Note: I went to the restroom barefoot. That was a mistake. The floor was gross.) Then, just moments before we landed, she woke up like clockwork. ???!

Neither Little Brother nor I slept well. I don't know about Little Brother, but I'd gotten up pretty early the morning of the day we'd left, and I was miserable and exhausted. I do know that at one point I accidentally squirted hand sanitizer in his eye, and he screamed at me. But it was a controlled scream. No one heard it but me. Not even the sleeping girl; she didn't move an inch.

I was adamant that we book our flight to JFK so that we could utilize the air train. Once we'd disembarked and gathered our luggage, we took the train, no problem, to Jamaica Station. Then we took the E Train to Times Square, walked a very long time through the subway to get to a connecting station, and took a 1 Train uptown.

Finally, we made it to the Upper West Side, where Older Sister lives in a beautiful 100-year-old building with 11 roommates. Yup, count 'em—11.

A few things to know about Older Sister:

• She's crazy ambitious. She took a double courseload and finished her six-semester graduate school program in three semesters, something that had never been done before.
• She's always wanted to live in New York City.
• She's always claimed to hate "Asian" food, saying it all tastes the same and is gross.
• She works for a non-profit that teaches underprivileged kids to dance.
• She, too, looks like she could be full-blooded Jewish. When she first moved to the city, she did some babysitting for a Jewish family and would sometimes be mistaken for a relative. On Saturdays, she wears her Sunday clothes to the Manhattan temple for a shift as a temple worker, and on the streets she's often mistaken for a Jew from a more conservative sect.
• She, too, secretly wants to be famous, but not YouTube famous.
• She loves the finer things in life and has never cared much for discomfort.

So even though I knew that she was living in a crowded apartment with no space to herself, it still amazed me. It's a testament to how much she loves New York City, because she's always been the kind of person who's always wanted to live somewhere that was nice and cutely decorated and very much her own.

Not that the apartment wasn't not nice, it just barely had room to exist at all. The whole thing, square-foot-wise, surely didn't exceed the amount of space I share with my two roommates. And her bedroom, which sleeps two people, is about the same size as my bedroom minus the closet. My bedroom is okay, but on the small side, for a single person; for two people, it would be pretty cramped!

The roommate had kindly stayed elsewhere so that Older Sister could have us in her room with her. I got the top bunk of the bunk bed. Little Brother got a cot-type bed on the floor. We could hang out in the apartment, but we couldn't wear shoes while we did so. We could shower in one of two bathrooms (except if it was after 11:00 p.m., in which case we had to shower in a tiny little bathroom—more on that later). Before she left for work, Older Sister presented us with a brassy-looking set of keys. One for the apartment building; one for the apartment. We were cautioned to be very careful not to break the lock, which had apparently happened before.

We crashed for an hour or so. Then...the city.

I gave Little Brother a first day similar to my first day on my first trip. First, the Disney store, which was everything Little Brother had dreamed of. Then lunch at Junior's. I'd heard that the food was better if you ordered something Jewish-style.

Sadly, it was still kind of meh. However, it pleased Little Brother to order a brisket sandwich with a latke and applesauce.

After, we took a subway downtown. At this point, we discovered that while the subway was easy to use (seriously—this was the first trip where I was the subway navigator, and there were hardly any bumps), our smartphones didn't seem to operate properly on the streets. (Over-saturation of people sucking up data?) It took us approximately six million years to find the Museum of Jewish Heritage.

The museum was not what we were expecting. The lady at the front desk asked us how we'd heard of it, and I breezily said, "We were just looking for a good Jewish museum!" But whether it was a good Jewish museum is...up for debate. There was some good stuff, but it wasn't very well-presented, and they kind of brushed over the Holocaust, mostly focusing on Jewish culture before it and how said culture recovered after. There were some cool artifacts, but I didn't learn very many new things. The most interesting tidbit was the fact that in some countries during Hitler's regime, Jews who didn't have "Jewish" names were required to take on the name or middle name of Israel or Sara.

Following the museum, we crashed. I was incredibly exhausted: dead on my feet and barely aware. I had no idea how I was going to stay up to watch Anastasia that night. But after lazing in Older Sister's apartment for a bit, I summoned the energy to arise, dress, and lead Little Brother to Tonn Ramen.

Older Sister, she who hates all Asian food, picked Tonn Ramen for dinner. She'd tried it and actually liked it! However, she ended up staying at work late and then babysitting afterward, so she didn't join us for our first taste of restaurant ramen.

Tonn Ramen is one of the more eccentric places I've been in New York City! Little Brother described the restaurant as "in a garage." It was below street level, tiny, and crowded. Everything about it seemed to be designed to make diners as uncomfortable as possible so that they would order, eat, and leave. The whole front of the restaurant was open, so we could feel the breeze from the street. The bar stools were difficult to keep a seat on, and I could never quite get myself into a position where I didn't feel I was about to fall off. The waiters whisked from place to place, quickly collecting orders which were then assembled in a matter or minutes. Not that anyone was rude or made us feel unwanted—but there was a slight feeling of, "Oh, we're very busy, so you should be glad we could squeeze you in!" Coupled with the fact that the restaurant was open during limited hours, the general air was one of exclusivity.

In any case, we quickly ate our ramen and paid. Mine is pictured below. It was tasty, although it was still ramen.

The vegetables and spices woke me up a bit. By the time we got to the Broadhurst Theatre, I was feeling much more excited about taking Little Brother to his first Broadway musical!

However. While Anastasia was delightful, it was rough. They completely rewrote the plot and dialogue, losing a lot of what made the animated movie so good. There also was a nice opportunity for them to tie up one character's philosophical qualms (his father was one of the guards who shot the royal family to death, so he is committed to making sure Anastasia is actually dead; his turn of heart would have been more realistic had it been revealed that his father actually helped Anastasia escape), but they passed that over for some unconvincing mumbo-jumbo. Overall, the movie, with its magic and demons and sold souls, actually seemed a lot more realistic than this historically accurate version. The special effects were dope, though, and the performers did do a good job with what they had.

We briefly stage-doored so that Little Brother could get a quick video of Christy Altomare for his friends. Then we took the subway home, utterly exhausted. (Confession: I'd fallen asleep for several seconds during the show.) As I showered (in the big shower) and hauled myself up the bunk bed ladder, I was wondering if this trip was a good idea or if I would regret it.

My Life, the Shakespearean Comedy

I've been researching Verona for a personal writing project. Actually, I've been to Verona. It's cute but very touristy. They picked an old house with a balcony, seemingly at random, and dubbed it "Juliet's House" (or rather "la Casa di Giulietta"). I say "seemingly at random" because there's no way Romeo could have climbed that balcony. It's super high up and above the main entrance of the house. Even if he had dared to climb the ivy-covered wall several feet away and leap, someone would have seen him, I tell you.

That doesn't matter to the 10,000 tourists who come to the house and stand on Juliet's balcony (and yes, I was one of them). But I'm just pointing it out.

Moving on. While doing my research, I came upon a website with a quiz: "Is Your Life a Shakespearean Comedy or a Tragedy?"

I took the quiz. Here are my results: "Congrats! Your life is a happy ending just waiting to happen. You will likely get married to a noble Duke alongside four of your closest friends. Now, there’s a chance you’ll have to undergo some trials and tribulations to get to this point—like, say, a shipwreck, or a pirate attack, or some domineering woodland fairies who chuckle at the folly of humans—but all in all, you’ll survive these whimsical capers and be better for it. You’ll end up with the love of your life, as will every other decent human being in your social circle."

Good news for me and every other decent human being in my social circle! Huzzah!

My Migraine

I've been planning to write this post...with this title...for literally three years.

WELL HERE I AM.

During my first year of college, I started getting dizzy on occasion. I would become disoriented, and I'd see rainbow splotches on my vision. The splotches were beautiful, but also scary, because human vision isn't supposed to rainbow splotch.

But nothing ever came of it. It would last for an hour or so, and then it would go away. No big deal.

You might remember that throughout most of college, I worked in fast food. Just typing those words makes me recall the smells of French fry grease and bleach water; the weight of the long, perky ponytail dangling down my back; the way I would sob into the soapy water with which I was deck-scrubbing the dining room floor at one a.m. when I still had to finish a paper before going to bed. (Actually, I don't remember now if I actually physically sobbed. Probably not, since the assistant manager was right there. But I was sobbing imaginary tears, I promise.)

We got free kid-sized drinks every day at work. I almost always got water. One day, though, I filled my little cup with Dr. Pepper, because I had a headache.

It started off small, that headache. Instead of going away, it got worse. Then it slowly wrapped around my head and bore down into my brain.

My mom often has migraines. I suspected that this was one.

I felt terrible. My head hurt so bad, and I was a little nauseated. Then I started getting dizzy. You'd think that might be a big cause for concern, but I figured I just needed to make it to the end of my shift, and then I could go home and rest.

I tell you, I almost made it. I had less than an hour left. A man walked up to my register and ordered a chicken basket. I started punching things on the register and suddenly realized that I could barely talk, barely stand, and that I had no idea how to get this man's chicken basket rung up. I smiled at him and told him I needed to step away for a moment. I walked into the back office and declared that someone needed to help the man at the counter because I was going to pass out.

I didn't pass out, but that wasn't much comfort to me. My face was numb. I could barely talk, barely remember words. La Petite, who worked with me at the time, said she thought I was having a stroke.

BOSS: You need to eat something.

I found enough words to tell her that I didn't have any money. I was probably exaggerating, but not much. The price of food at my place of employment was far too much considering how much money I allotted myself to spend each paycheck.(That amount was 20%, though I would cap my funds at lower amounts on the rare occasions I made a paycheck that was, say, $150-plus. During the school year my two-week paycheck was often around $60, meaning I had $12 to spend on entertainment for the next two weeks. I know that sounds terribly tightfisted, and it was, but I managed to fund my own trip to Europe that way so don't sneer.)

My boss bought me a chicken sandwich and watched me eat it, which was a struggle. Then she made me call my mom, which was also a struggle. I went home, took a nap, threw up, ate a bunch of ice cream, and watched Fraggle Rock with the Fearless One.

And that, my friends, is how I found out that I am one of the rare humans who get basilar migraines, which is a fancy name for migraines that come with a whole slew of debilitating symptoms.

Yay.

During my last year of college, I left the fast food business and accepted a job tutoring kids in a tourist-trap city half an hour from College City and an hour from Hometown. To reach my workplace, I had to drive through a twisty, snowstorm-ridden canyon, sometimes in the dark.

One day, I was scheduled to go to work right after my afternoon class. During my morning class, I came down with one of my lovely basilar migraines.

I happened to bring my journal to school that day. Here's what I wrote: Geez. I'm having a crazy dizzy spell. I get these sometimes, and it's scarey because I have to drive to wWork cCity in two and a healf hours. Hopefelly it will clear up fore before I han head out.

Migraines are not conducive to flawless spelling.

By that point, I had learned ways to help mitigate the symptoms. I took headache medicine, drank a lot of fluids, and ate a copious amount of food. The dizziness abated enough for me to drive safely. However, my head pounded like someone was knocking on the inside, trying to get out.

When I arrived at the picturesque, expensive building where my workplace was situated, I was informed that my first appointment had been canceled (that would happen sometimes, but I still got paid). I knew what I had to do! I stuffed Quits inside my already-bulging backpack and headed towards the picturesque, expensive Italian restaurant next door.

Like the town, the restaurant was a tourist trap. It was such a tourist trap that the prices were posted on a glass-encased parchment-y piece of paper displayed outside, like in European vacation spots and at Disneyland, but the restaurant was still relatively nice. It was the kind of place you would bring a business client whom you were hoping to mildly impress.

Mind you, I didn't make a habit of dressing nice for school. Even if I had, I was exhausted, I hadn't been home in about ten hours, and I felt terrible. I must have looked a sight. Yet I lugged my fat backpack into the relatively nice, picturesque, expensive restaurant where a few people were meeting with business clients they hoped to mildly impress, and I asked to be seated.

The waiter obliged. He treated me most civilly, though he could easily have chosen to disdain me. I sat heavily at the highly polished table and unceremoniously dumped my backpack on the seat opposite. Then I proceeded to spend almost all the money I was earning from my canceled tutored session on a Dr. Pepper and an order of focaccia.

I was expecting a small plate of focaccia. Instead I received an entire focaccia pizza. Eight pieces. Plus my frosty, delicious Dr. Pepper.

In the two hours before my next tutoring session, I ate all eight slices of focaccia and drank all the Dr. Pepper. I do not normally do such things. I couldn't do it now. I wouldn't advise trying it at home. But I stuck my head in one of the Chronicle of Prydain books and, using a slow and measured pace, I worked my way through the entire focaccia pizza and the entire soda.

That, my friends, is the kind of aplomb with which I handle my basilar migraines.

A Map in Central Park

Context: This post is about the fourth day (and third day in the city) of my second New York City trip.

It seems like a disproportionate of my blog posts about New York talk about how we couldn't find one place or another.

Well, let me tell you. Finding addresses in that town can be a little difficult sometime. The problem is that while the street-and-avenue grid system is not so hard, the numbers on the actual buildings don't work the way they do in Utah. Here, the buildings between, say, 6th and 7th West are labeled as such: 602 West, 628 West, 656 West, etcetera, with the lower numbers being closer to 6th West and the higher numbers being closer to 7th West. But in New York City, if you were looking for 250 43rd Street, 250 wouldn't necessarily indicate that the building was between 2nd and 3rd Avenue. The building numbers are essentially useless.

...or are they? I actually researched the NYC numbering system for this blog post, just to be sure that I wasn't missing something. It turns out, according to multiple websites, that if you take a New York City building number, drop the last digit, divide the remainder by 2, and add or subtract a number from a special chart that some genius developed, you will get the number of the nearest cross street.

So, yeah, essentially useless.

On Friday morning, Little Sister, Baby Sister, and I set out for Chinatown. Well, actually, that wasn't the first thing we did. First we went to the Barnes and Noble on Union Square.

I think I know what you're thinking: You spent your vacation at Barnes and Noble, a place that you can visit not only at home but at literally almost any halfway decent town in the country?

I stand by my decision because a) books and b) you ain't never seen a Barnes and Noble like this before. There are rolling ladders attached to the shelves everywhere. Sadly, customers aren't supposed to climb on them, but I swear that one of these times that I'm in New York I'm going to get my sisters to distract the employees so that I can sail around on the ladder like Belle does in the bookshop in Beauty and the Beast.

After our Barnes and Noble break, we took the subway, got off on Canal Street, and began to roam the nearby area in our search for Chinatown.

Not even dropping digits and dividing by two would save us, because we weren't trying to get to any particular building. Where were we going? We didn't know. Just to some of the open-air shops for souvenirs and then to a restaurant for lunch. As neither "open-air shops" nor "restaurant for lunch" are viable locations for iPhones, we sort of wandered helplessly as we tried to figure out the best way to find this particular section of the city.

Finally, we found it. We almost got run over by a truck (okay, not exactly, but I tell you that this truck looked like it was going to hit us and my life flashed before my very eyes and it was okay but I've seen better movies), but we found it. We did a little shopping, and then we got dim sum: shrimp dumplings, sweet pork buns, potstickers, and crispy, juicy roasted duck! Delicious.

These are shrimp dumplings. My favorite dim sum dishes are these dumplings, sweet pork buns, and egg custard tarts. So if you ever have a hankering to bring me dim sum, you know what I like.

Then we faced the uncertainty of New York City navigation again so that we could go to Little Italy so that we could buy cannolis and gelato. Baby Sister tried a cannoli for the first time. I had my first cannoli in Italy, but if you can't have your first cannoli in Italy, have it in Little Italy in NYC.

Chocolate-covered cannoli!

But the very worst place to navigate in New York City is Central Park.

Some of you may remember the day we spent in Central Park last year. Little Sister and I really, really, really wanted to see the carousel. I don't know why, but we did. We spent an hour or more trying to find it. Spoiler alert: we did not find it. And, to paraphrase the words of Anne Shirley, it was one of the most tragical disappointments of my life.

I wrote this:

I'm going to make a quick observation, which is that Central Park needs some map kiosks with paper maps, like they have at Disneyland or the zoo. And if Central Park already has maps somewhere within its expansive borders, then there needs to be some other maps leading to those maps.

This time, things went considerably better.

First of all, apparently Central Park heard the words that my fingers typed (mixed metaphor, whatever, go with it), because they had a few banners with maps hanging around the park. And there were people who were selling expensive, unofficial paper maps at the entrance. But we didn't buy them because we felt like we could probably manage with our secret weapons: the smartphone!

Last May, Older Sister was afraid to leave her data on when we were roaming Central Park, so it was difficult to know if we were staying on course. This year, we all had smartphones, and we'd anticipated using a goodly portion of our data on the trip.

So this time, we left the smartphones on as we walked. Smartphone maps are easily confused, so it was still a little difficult, but within half an hour or so we found...

Ta-da!

...THE CAROUSEL!

They charged $3 a ride, which was not asking too much for a ride on a MAGICAL CAROUSEL OF JOY AND GLADNESS. I'm serious. It was wonderful. Don't ask me why. It just was.

We also hit the Chess & Checkers House and Strawberry Fields. Then, as we were heading towards the Alice in Wonderland statue, something wonderful happened.

A Central Park Conservancy ranger stopped us. 

"Do you want a map?" he asked.

We said no thanks.

"It's free."

We changed our minds.

He asked us where we were going. He drew a route for us on a paper map and then gave the map into our keeping.

Central Park!!! Good job. You have surpassed all of my wildest map dreams.

At the Alice in Wonderland statue we met up with Older Sister. Then, alas, it started to rain.

To get out of the rain, we hastened to The Plaza. Little Sister and I, when planning the trip, had decided it would be fun to take Baby Sister to eat there...in the food court below the hotel. So it sounds a lot fancier than it was. It was still good, though. I had a delicious smoked salmon-cream cheese-caper crepe and a classic Nutella crepe for dessert. (Yes, I had three desserts that day! We had multiple desserts every day, actually, but you can't blame us. New York City is the Land of Many Desserts.)

After the rain, we wondered the streets of the city. We went into several fancy stores, such as Tiffany's. The employees there were very nice and called us "ladies." At Tiffany's, we were told we could take pictures of whatever we wanted...since I guess it was obvious that we weren't there to shop.

Finally, it was time for us to go to School of Rock.

The ladders at Barnes and Noble were a high point of the day.

So was dim sum, cannolis, and gelato.

So was the carousel.

But School of Rock was the best.

I have to say, I had my doubts going into it. First of all, it's Andrew Lloyd Webber. My perception is that Andrew Lloyd Webber is Broadway's M. Night Shyamalan. Everyone used to love everything he did, but then he made something so terrible (coughTheLastAirbendercoughLoveNeverDiescough) that now he's kind of a joke. Second of all, after seeing Finding Neverland, I was worried that this musical would have the same problem. I was worried it would lose what was great about the movie while simultaneously not bringing anything new to the table. Still, the Tony performance of "You're in the Band" was good; Alex Brightman looked like he was matching Jack Black's energy, so maybe there was hope.

So on Friday night we got to the Winter Garden Theatre, took our seats, opened our programs, and looked at the list of replacements.

And Alex Brightman was not there.

His understudy was playing that night.

Another of life's tragical disappointments!

Also, Luca Padovan, who played Les in Newsies, has a leading role in School of Rock, and I was looking forward to seeing him because I've only heard good things about him. But his understudy was playing that night, too.

So it was with considerable reluctance that we waited for the show to begin.

Then the lights dimmed, and they played a recording of Andrew Lloyd Webber. I know it was Andrew Lloyd Webber, because he said, "This is Andrew Lloyd Webber," in his prissy accent. He then informed us that people always asked whether the kids were, in fact, really playing their instruments live. The answer to that question was yes, Andrew Lloyd Webber said.

Thanks, Andrew Lloyd Webber. Thanks for sharing.

Then the show began. And...oh my goodness...it was awesome. It hit all the right notes. It kept almost every line from the movie, verbatim, which you'd think would be boring but totally wasn't. The kid actors? So good! And the understudy, Will Klum? A-freaking-mazing! I forgot he was the understudy!

During the Battle of the Bands, we, the audience, became the Battle of the Bands audience, so suddenly we were basically at a rock concert and an important part of the show. That was fun, but awkward, because we were chanting the "School of Rock! School of Rock!" before Dewey and company were supposed to hear the audience calling them for an encore. They basically had to wait for us to stop chanting so that they could deliver their lines.

All around, a perfect adaptation and a super fun musical. We loved it so much that we stage doored afterward.

Stage dooring, for you non-theatre people, is when you wait by theatre's exit for the cast members to come out. We'd already been planning to stage door, but if we hadn't loved the show so much we probably would have just gone back to the dorm. It was still raining hard. Like, parts of the sidewalk were actually flooded with a few inches of water. In spite of that, Little Sister and I shoved my crumpled, wet playbill into the actors' faces so that they could sign it with silver marker. I later posted some of the signatures on Instagram and tagged the actors. Other actors in the show liked the photo, and the official School of Rock Instagram actually commented on it! *swoons*

On the way home, we grabbed a bite (Wendy's for my sisters, Halal for me) and headed home, full of excitement and hopped up on a show well done. It was a long time before I got to bed.

Pictures of Food I Ate in Europe

There's no trickety-trick to this post. This month marks my anniversary of that time in college that I went to Europe, and I decided to celebrate by writing a post that literally is just pictures of food that I ate when I was there.

This is spaetzle, also known as the first food I ate in Europe. This plate of spaetzle (on the right) with the meaty gravy saucy thing (on the left) was consumed at Hofbrauhaus, Munich's famous 400+-year-old beer house/restaurant.

Non-food bonus picture: When the Nazis were in power, they painted swastikas all over the ceiling at Hofbrauhaus. But instead of repainting the ceiling after the war, the management just turned the swastikas into friendly picnic blanket-print swastikas. 

This delicious plate of food also came from Munich. I don't remember the German name, but it consisted of lamb, vegetables, and rice.

Here we have sauerkraut and bratwurst, as eaten in the village near Neuschwanstein Castle in the Bavarian region. I did not care for the sauerkraut, the bratwurst, or the mashed potatoes that were clearly not made from real potatoes and had the approximate consistency of buttercream frosting.

Non-food bonus picture: A picture I snapped of Neuschwanstein Castle, better known as the castle from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and one of the inspirations for Cinderella's castle in Disney World. I much preferred the castle to the food near the castle.

I'd heard the term schnitzel before, but I had no idea that schnitzel was veal. This poorly lit picture is of a plate of schnitzel, mushrooms, and a sort of potato pancake eaten at the outdoor seating of a restaurant in Innsbruck.

Before this trip, I said that I didn't like spaghetti. But what I actually meant was that I don't like American spaghetti, because, as I discovered, real European spaghetti is delicious. Here we have a plateful of spaghetti: spaghetti Bolognese (with the red sauce), spaghetti carbonara (with the white sauce), and spaghetti with Gorgonzola cheese (whose Italian name I don't remember). If memory serves, this repast was eaten in Steinach am Brenner near the Austrian-Italian border.

I do believe this is the last meal I ate in Austria. 'Twas a most excellent mushroom ravioli.

Here's a pizza that I ate somewhere in Italy. I tried to order a normal pepperoni pizza. I did not realize that in Italian, "pepperoni" means "peppers." In any case, I didn't find the pizza to be terribly impressive, and I stuck to pasta the rest of the trip.

Salmon risotto!

Just looking at this picture practically makes my face break out. This is cheese ravioli covered in nothing but more cheese, bacon, and butter. It was delicious/disgusting.

This baby actually came from an Italian McDonald's. The trip to Mickey D's was actually worth it simply because they had such different items on the menu. This hamburger included a focaccia bun, mozzarella, and a creamy tomato sauce.

This is my favorite kind of spaghetti by far, spaghetti al cartoccio. It's spaghetti that's baked in tin foil with a little oil and seafood. The seafood in this spaghetti was nice and fresh, as I purchased it in Rio Maggiore on the coast of Italy.

Non-food bonus picture: This is Rio Maggiore, one of the five towns collectively known as the Cinque Terre. It's what I think of whenever someone says, "paradise."

Non-food bonus picture: The cross isn't really an emblem in my branch of Christianity, but I still really liked this cliffside bench and cross in Rio Maggiore. It seemed like a quiet place to commune with God.

This picture was taken in a trendy restaurant with odd lighting in Genoa. This entree consisted of noodles and cheese squished into a tiny ball that was then breaded, fried, and garnished with some kind of green leaf and a side of pesto sauce. It was tasty, but not terribly filling.

Also, when I was in Europe I ate gelato every day. I've never been sorry.

My Second Stitch Fix Experience

The V in Jessica V must stand for "Voldemort," because she's definitely a wizard.

In case you missed this post, Jessica V is my Stitch Fix stylist. When I signed up for my second Fix, I requested her to be my stylist again. I also decided to test her ability to find me clothing for a special event. So I scheduled my Fix right before a high school reunion and, in my stylist note, asked for a bright dress or fun top to wear to said reunion.

Then, of course, I did my part by pinning lots of dresses that I liked on my Pinterest board.

When my Fix arrived, I once again received a cheerful note.

Hi Awkward Mormon Girl! Thanks for requesting me for your next Fix, I am glad that you loved your last one! For your upcoming reunion I wanted to send some fun options. I love the Analia Tab Roll Blouse paired with the Francesca Pencil Skirt that you can easily dress up with a pair of heels and a statement necklace. The other two options are the Maeby Geo Print Dress which would go great with the Caroline Crystal Link Bracelet and a waist belt for a more fitted look. Or the Fran Scallop Edge Dress paired with a basic cardigan or fitted blazer. I hope you have a great time at your reunion! Xo Jessica V

I still don't get the Xo thing. Probably the only person that I consistently hug and kiss is Baby Brother. Jessica would have to find me some pretty spectacular clothes before I would be willing to hug and/or kiss her.

But the matter of Jessica's overly familiar sign-off diminished in the face of the fun of trying on clothes.

Here's what my box of clothes looked like from the side:



Immediately, I noticed how beautiful the colors were. Please note that I have pins like this:

And this: 

that specifically talk about colors I like. Well, Jessica V nailed it, color wise.

Everly Fran Scallop Edge Dress: As I pulled this dress out of the box, I literally said out loud, "Yes. Yes. Oh my goodness, yes." I loved this orchid color; I actually had my mom make me a dress in the same color once. I tried this dress on and saw that it was long enough for my garments. Good job, Jessica V! I had a few reservations about the fit of the dress on my figure and whether the style worked with the cardigans I already have. However, my mom came over to look at it and advised me to keep it. Getting a second opinion settled the matter. Verdict: Keep.

Market & Spruce Maeby Geo Print Dress: I probably would never have tried this dress on in a store. When I was in Italy, I romped around in a long flowered skirt and a t-shirt that said, "True Love" on it, which worked in Italy, but after I came home I felt like I couldn't wear the outfit around Hometown. This Geo Print dress gave me a similar sort of feeling, like it just wasn't everyday me. However, when I tried it on with my trusty brown belt, I found I really loved the look. Verdict: Keep.

Bay to Baubles Caroline Crystal Link Bracelet: The stones are very pretty, but honestly what I liked most about this bracelet was how good it looked with the Geo Print dress. Verdict: Keep.

41Hawthorn Analia Tab Roll Blouse: By the time I tried on this blouse and the pencil skirt, I was wondering if I might have a 5/5 Fix on my hands. At first look, I didn't like the blouse as much as the other items, but if I ended up buying the pencil skirt it would be cheaper to get all five items. I tried the blouse on to make sure my first look wasn't wrong. It wasn't. The blouse was made of a weird plasticky material, like a tarp. And it kept sliding off my shoulders, like I was Esmerelda. Verdict: Send back.

Margaret M Francesca Pencil Skirt: The tag on this skirt said it was "cobalt." I love cobalt blue with all my heart. It's one of the more perfect shades of blue. Upon further examination, though, the skirt did not have a zipper. I had to slide it on over my legs and let it sort of meld with my body. Well, this melding was not successful. The skirt was markedly too big for me. Verdict: Send back.

Overall thoughts about my second fix? I was rather impressed. I wore the Geo Print dress and the bracelet to the reunion and then to a wedding reception after. I got lots of compliments, and I felt really pretty.

If you're intrigued and want to try Stitch Fix for yourself, here's my referral link.

Famiglia

Context: This post is about the last day of our New York City trip.

A word before we begin.

I like to travel. I want to see the world. But I will never be one of those true adventurers who can leave home for weeks at a time or who can go away to someplace where you can't call or email or write.

I discovered this when I left home all by myself, no family or friends, for the first time. I took my life savings and went to Europe for two and a half weeks. I loved it; oh, how I loved it. But the whole time, with each experience that I had, I couldn't help but think things like, "Little Sister would love this," and "I wish Mom were here," and "I want to show this to Baby Brother." I became my family's eyes; I wrote them long, detailed emails about Europe so that they could experience it, too. I got souvenirs and chocolate for everybody. When I bought a scarf in Italy, one of the other girls on the trip asked me whom it was for. "It's for me," I said.

"Good," she said, "because I don't think you've bought anything for yourself this entire trip. It seems like everything you've bought is for someone else."

The point is, I've discovered that I like my family too much to ever leave them for long or go too far away. And while New York City was different--part of my family was there, and I called and FaceTimed the rest of them often--I still thought of my siblings and parents often and saw so much of the city through their eyes. And as our trip drew to a close, I found that I was ready to go home.

So. Our last 24 hours in New York City started with a Broadway tour. We saw a ton of theaters. We learned about the history of West Side Story, one of my favorite musicals. Apparently, when it first opened, the kind of gangsters on which the characters were based came to the show. They were offended by the rhythmic, imitation gang speak that the creators of the show developed in lieu of using curses and real slang. "We don't talk like that!" they said. "We don't dance!" And to prove that they were tough, they broke into a costume shop and killed some people. These murders were then also turned into a musical, according to our tour guide. Pretty interesting stuff. My only question is how poor, first- and second-generation immigrant teenagers could afford tickets to a Broadway show in the first place.

We also learned about the brewing possibility of Wicked someday being turned into an animated film, an idea that I strongly approve of. Of course, on modern Broadway, you can't avoid talking about the musical The Book of Mormon. And of course, once our tour guide started, it came up that the four of us were Mormons. Surprise, fellow tour group people! Our tour guide gave us one of the more unusual compliments I've ever received, which is that the people of Broadway really respect the LDS Church because of the way we've handled the existence of a musical that is pretty offensive. The Church has taken advantage of the negative publicity and found ways to make it positive publicity, including taking out an ad in the program and sending missionaries to the theatre with copies of the actual Book of Mormon.

After the tour, dinner at Carmine's. Dr. Godfather recommended this place to us. They serve Italian food there, family-style. So for the second night in a row, we sat down to delicious Italian food: a big plate of angel hair pasta in oil and garlic and a platter of chicken piccata.

Our servers were friendly and funny. One of them, when we told him we were from Utah, made a joke that he could marry all four of us. He told us when we ordered the garlic pasta that it would discourage us from kissing, but made an additional joke that he would give each of us a kiss before we left. If he was our age, this would have been creepy, but he was more of a grandfather age and delivered these jokes in a way that just made us laugh.

As we got ready to leave, he said, "I told you I'd give you each a kiss!" and handed us some Hershey kisses.

What was there to do after dinner? Why, a show, of course.

We'd originally planned to go to only three shows. But as we narrowed down our choices, Older Sister cried, "I just want to see more!"

So we chose four shows. Then we bumped that number up to five. But after the tickets were bought, Older Sister said, "I really wish we could see another one."

That was one of the reasons why she was so loathe to go to Queens; she wanted enough time on Wednesday to stand in line at TKTS to get discount tickets. But on Tuesday, at the end of our SoHo, Chinatown, and Little Italy tour, our tour guide mentioned that she knew an app called TodayTix that lets you purchase discounted tickets without waiting in line.

Older Sister fell in love. Madly, deeply in love. And so it was that her new love, the TodayTix app, got us rather inexpensive tickets to Something Rotten! As in, in the state of Denmark.

Something Rotten! is a brand-new musical, and it's great. Great actors, including Christian Borle and Brian D'arcy James. Great costumes, great set, great music. Great concept. And it was wildly, incredibly, almost unbearably clever. My one complaint is that the show goes out of its way to make inappropriate jokes. What I mean by that is that if I go see a show about, say, two people having an affair, then that show is obviously going to be inappropriate. I should know what I'm getting myself into, and vulgarity is to be expected. It's another thing entirely when I go see a show about subject matter that isn't necessarily inappropriate and the writers feel the need to riddle it with dirty jokes. Does vulgarity have to be introduced into everything?

Either way, Something Rotten! was our last big hurrah in New York. The next morning, we packed up, checked out, and did one last round of leisurely sightseeing.

Our last real stop was Carlo's Bakery. Carlo's Bakery is run by a man named Buddy Valastro and his family. You may otherwise recognize him as the star of Cake Boss. His original bakery is in New Jersey, but they have a second location on Times Square.

We'd passed the bakery a million times over the week we were in New York. "Stop in," the sign read. "You're famiglia!"

That sign had two effects on me. First, I was obviously thrilled that Buddy Valastro would consider me to be part of his family, because the Valastro family seems to be even more obnoxiously wonderful than the Obnoxiouses. The second effect was to make me think about mia famiglia and how much they love Cake Boss and how they would all give, like, their left hands and probably their earlobes or something to join us eating cannoli in Carlo's Bakery.

After Carlo's, it was time to bid farewell to New York City. We reversed our trip from our first day in the city: took our luggage to the subway, selected the train that would take us to Jamaica Station, took an air train to the airport, and boarded our flight back to Salt Lake City. By this time, we were experts in the public transportation system, and nothing untoward happened except that one of security people at the airport grew suspicious of my ankle and pulled me out of line so that she could pat it down. All she found was my polka dot sock.

And so we said goodbye to New York City. There's nothing like it. But then we headed home, and there's nothing like home, either.

We arrived before midnight. Glory left with her boyfriend; our dad picked us and our suitcases up in the family Mormon Assault Vehicle. We burst into the house. Mom was waiting up; so were the children. There were souvenirs all around, almost a hundred dollars' worth of birthday presents for Baby Sister, and a box of cookies from Carlo's bakery for everyone. There were hugs. There was excited chatter. There was laughter.

And so ends our trip to New York. P.S. Older Sister is already talking about when she's going back.

I Had My Tray Table Up and My Seat Back in the Full Upright Position

The last time I was on a red eye flight, it was a Lufthansa flight from Chicago to Munich. I wrote an email to my parents (which I later repurposed as a blog post), ate a delicious dinner, and slept.

I wanted to have a similar experience on the flight to New York. I wanted to write a blog post so that I could brag to you, "This blog post was written at tens of thousands of feet in the sky. I bet you've never read a blog post written tens of thousands of feet in the sky before." It also would have been nice to eat a delicious dinner, and to have a relaxing sleep. Alas, it was not to be.

The week that I left, there was quite a bit of work that needed to be done in my place of employment. Instead of being a sensible person and taking my coworkers' offers to finish my work for me when I was gone, I determined to do it ALL before I left town.

I got up early. Each day, I went to my place of employment, did a heap of work, then spent the rest of the day jumping from obligation to obligation--social, familial, religious, and necessary for my trip. Did I mention that I also had a very bad cold? Well, I did, and sometimes I felt feverish and only half-aware of what I was doing. It was not ideal, but I was going to get all the things done, dangit!

The day I left, I went straight from work to finish packing and straight from packing to the airport. I arrived at the airport satisfied that I could leave for New York City with peace of mind but also exhausted, mentally spent, and not quite over the vestiges of my cold.

At the airport, we met up with Glory, a family friend who went to high school with Older Sister and me and the fourth member of our New York City party. We sat around waiting for our red eye flight: Glory talking animatedly to Older Sister about her (Glory’s) boyfriend, Little Sister braiding my hair and doing homework for her online class, and me having my hair braided and watching a Youtube video for the Weird Al song “Albuquerque.” This is a song where, among other things, the protagonist survives an airplane crash by having his tray table up and his seat back in the full upright position. Little Sister and I have referenced this song every time we’ve boarded an airplane for the last five years. We are quite fond of it.

By the time we boarded our flight around 11:00 pm, I was too tired to write anything coherent. I was too tired to eat much, and so all that was left to do was sleep. I put on my complimentary sleep mask and snuggled up against the window.

I slept fitfully for about forty-five minutes, woke, repositioned myself, and went back to sleep. I then slept equally fitfully for another hour and fifteen minutes, only to wake to find Little Sister’s head resting on my shoulder.

“Time to wake up!” my body said.

“What gives, man?” I said to my body. "We’ve barely slept in a week. Please let me sleep. I really want to sleep.”

But you don’t always get what you want.

I looked around inside the dark airplane. Earlier, the flight attendants had walked up and down the aisles, offering drinks and snacks and rapidly turning their heads to see which passengers were going to take them up on these offers. (They seemed to have very flexible necks.) However, at this point they weren’t walking around very much, because most of the passengers were asleep. As they slept, most had their arms folded tight against their bodies. It made them look like a contingent of super grumpy people.

I looked at my iPod. There was actual Wi-Fi inside the flight, sorcery the likes of which I’d never experienced before. I watched a few videos and did some random internet surfing.

I looked straight outside the window. There were bands of gold on a blue horizon as we flew eastward into the dawn.

I looked down outside the window. There was a lot of water and fog below us. “Ah,” I thought. “The…famous New York State marshes?” It wasn’t until later that I realized we were probably over the Great Lakes.

I looked at Little Sister’s legs, which had found their way onto my lap.

I felt quiet inside. I was heading into a city with tons of people and buildings and vehicles all packed into a relatively small space, and it would not be quiet there, but I was quiet inside. I was taking a deep breath before plunging into the unknown.

The Miracle Vitamin C Binge

There are a few times in my life where I've gotten sick at extremely inconvenient times.

I got sick the day before the seventh Harry Potter book came out. Like, this was a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence, and Viola was facilitating a costumed get-together to go to the midnight release, and it was going to be really awesome, and I had a cold. In July. Who gets a cold in July?!

It was a real humdinger, too. I was feverish, tired, and slightly delusional. My nose was alternately stuffy and runny, and I had no motivation to do anything but lie in bed.

At first, I tried to ignore this cold. Surprisingly, this approach did not make the ailment disappear, so I decided I was going to flush it out with Vitamin C!

Now, some people like citrus tastes. I'm not one of those people. I don't like oranges and especially I don't like orange juice. But that didn't stop me from drinking two pitchers of orange juice and one pitcher of grape juice over a period of ten hours.

No joke. I probably had enough Vitamin C coursing through my body to fight off scurvy.

The next day, I was sniffly, but feeling well enough to hang out at Barnes and Noble until after midnight and then stay up reading until 5:00 am.

And thus I was convinced of the effectiveness of the Miracle Vitamin C Binge. I was convinced so much, in fact, that when I came down with a cold in Italy, I decided to replicate the treatment in true European fashion.

The European equivalent of orange juice, I determined, is carrot-orange juice, which is the only kind of orange juice I find appealing. And the European equivalent of grape juice is wine, which I do not drink. So I consumed vast quantities of carrot-orange juice and hoped that would do the trick.

"Does that really work?" one of my trip roommates asked.

"Sure," I said. My roommate offered to obtain some straight Vitamin C to supplement the carrot-orange juice. I dissolved said Vitamin C in water. It tasted like minerals and carbonation.

Within a matter of hours, I went from almost passing out in Milan to walking up and down six flights of stairs several times a day in Rio Maggiore. I did wind up with a sinus infection that accompanied me back to the States, but by and large my health vastly improved.

Yesterday, I woke up and realized I was ill.

"Nope, no can do," I said to myself. "I have too much stuff happening this weekend to be sick!"

I grabbed a can of frozen orange juice and dumped it in a mug with an inch or two of water. An hour or so later, I took my first sip.

News flash: Thawing, almost-pure orange juice concentrate is not a delicacy.

"Well," I said, "this is more disgusting than most things."

I did drink the entire mug. But after that, I decided I wanted to drink egg drop soup instead.

Said egg drop soup had to be bought from a Chinese food establishment. Leaving the house was something I had zero percent desire to do. So I decided to order the egg drop soup in. But I had to order at least $20 worth of food. So I bought three dishes plus egg drop soup and then when the food came instead of just drinking the soup well I ended up drinking the soup plus eating a plateful of rice, shrimp, and chicken.

"Oh," I realized after eating. "This was not a good idea." If anything, I felt quite a bit sicker. I went to bed with the expectation that I'd likely be worse in the morning.

But when I woke up, I was almost completely better.

Miracle Chinese Food Binge? I'm a fan.

Of All the Things I've Lost, I Miss My Mind the Most

I'd lost my phone.

This is most inconvenient I thought. I was sitting at the bus stop, already exhausted from school without any complications being added to my life, thank you very much. Yet complications were being added anyways.

Methodically, I began to pat down my pockets. No phone.

I rummaged in the outer section of my backpack where I kept the phone during classes. Nope.

I likewise rummaged in the inner portions of my backpack, shifting pencil cases, binders, notebooks, readable books, and the €5 umbrella I bought from a hocker in Milan and which had since become slightly squashed. No phone there.

I looked on the bench beside me and at the ground around my feet, just in case the phone had fallen without me noticing. There was not a phone in sight.

At this point, I started to worry in earnest. I'd had a cell phone for almost six years. I could barely remember what it was like to be without one--although I seemed to remember that I hadn't been able to make calls whenever I wanted or wherever I wanted and that I'd actually had to memorize people's numbers or something ridiculous like that.

The thought of having to revert to such medieval methods of telephone usage caused me to break into a cold sweat. I rummaged through the small backpack section again. This time I took care to move each individual coin, key, Band-Aid, student ID, hand sanitizer container, and random pieces of paper to be certain my coin wasn't behind it.

You know I thought this rummaging would be a lot easier with two hands.

In fact, I realized the whole time I'd been searching for my phone I'd been using only my right hand...

"And why are you canceling this dentist's appointment?" said the receptionist.

"Oh, I don't need it anymore," I said distractedly. My one-handed search had yielded nothing. Where was my phone?

"All right. Have a nice day."

"You too." I pressed the OFF button, ending the five-minute conversation.

I looked down at the phone in my left hand.

Wait a minute...

Nutella

When I got to Germany, the Germans were all, "Oh btw, Europeans eat Nutella every day for breakfast. Also, carrot-orange juice."

And I was all, "I love Nutella. I have no problem with this cultural idiosyncrasy. What's carrot-orange juice?"

Nectar. I mean Nutella. Pretty much the same thing, amirite?

Except I don't speak German, so this transfer of information actually took place through broken English, gestures, and the presence of a vast jar of Nutella at the place of honor at the breakfast buffet.

I think that was the moment that I decided I loved the European continent.

Skip forward from my trip to Europe to the recent past. In the recent past, I got the flu. I don't mean that I got the thing commonly known as the stomach flu. I mean I got the illness influenza, complete with hot and cold flashes, dizziness, and delirium.

Little Sister also had the flu. We spent the day lying on her bunk bed and softly moaning to each other about how we felt about as lively and well as overcooked noodles.

Our little brothers dropped in to see us. And by "see us," I mean, "be generally obnoxious." Because that is the job description of a younger brother, or so I've gathered from my experience.

The following conversation ensued:

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Baby Brother, I'm so hungry. I haven't eaten for hours. Will you please bring me a graham cracker covered in Nutella?

BABY BROTHER: We don't have any graham crackers!

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: How about a frozen waffle covered in Nutella?

BABY BROTHER: That sounds gross. I'm not going to do that.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Trust me. It's actually really good.

BABY BROTHER: (is skeptical)

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Baby Brother, anything is good if you put enough Nutella on it.

BABY BROTHER: Anything?

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Almost anything.

BABY BROTHER: What about my glasses subscription?

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Don't you mean prescription?

BABY BROTHER: No. I mean subscription.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Yeah, a subscription is something for a magazine.

BABY BROTHER: Nuh-uh.

LITTLE BROTHER: What about a toothpick?

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: I'm sure that if you put enough Nutella on a toothpick, it would be completely edible.

BABY BROTHER: What about Nutella on somebody's arm?

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Oh yeah.

BROTHERS: What about-

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Now will you bring me a graham cracker covered in Nutella?

BROTHERS: But what about-

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Or a frozen waffle. Something!

BROTHERS: But-

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: LOOK HERE. I am extremely sick and hungry. Please put some Nutella on something. Bring it to me. Then go away.

They exited. Cue much rattling in the kitchen.

A few minutes later, they returned with a covered platter.

BROTHERS: Here you go!

With a flourish, Little Brother whipped off the cover, revealing-

-a single toothpick coated in Nutella.

How Not to Live

I've been running around like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to figure out what is holding me back.

For a while now, I've had this strange feeling that I don't know how to explain. It's like... like I'm treading water. Like I'm standing in a bucket of cement. Like I'm stuck in place when I actually want to catapult forward at great speeds. But only metaphorically. Which is why I always wear a seatbelt.

Anyways, after running around trying to figure out what besides seatbelts are holding me back, I finally had the bright idea to check the scriptures. When I did, I found this beauty of a verse:

"Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy." (2 Nephi 2:25)

I've heard this verse a million times or more, but this time it particularly struck me. I was sledgehammered with the realization that our purpose is to have joy. When we aren't being happy--when we aren't having joy--we are literally failing to fulfill the measure of our existence.

I tucked that thought away and went about my business, pulling it out every now and again to examine it. I asked myself, "Am I being held back because I'm unhappy?"

"Perhaps," I responded. I believe that everyone makes their own happiness. And just as sometimes people stop properly producing insulin and get diabetes, I realized that I had stopped properly producing happiness and had gotten the blues.

But the blues weren't the only thing holding me back. Last night, I found this scripture that Runner Bean once shared with me:

"For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." (2 Timothy 1:7)

I reread that verse and remembered how it helped me when I was jittery about going to Europe for the better part of a month with people I didn't know and who I worried wouldn't be supportive of my decision not to drink.

With the help of good old 2 Timothy 1:7, I was able to go to Europe armed with the remembrance that as long as I keep God's commandments, I can go out into the world unafraid, for I know that I will be watched over and guided by Him.

Now I asked myself, "Have I been using this knowledge in my everyday life?"

The answer: Yes. At least, I thought I had. But looking back, I identified several times recently when--even though I had constant reassurance from Heavenly Father that everything would work out--I was too afraid to act. Or I acted differently because I was afraid.

With this realization, I had my answer. I was being held back by unhappiness, yes, but also held back by fear.

Which comes first: unhappiness or fear? I think sometimes the one, sometimes the other. Definitely they are related to one another. Happy people usually aren't afraid. Fearful people usually aren't happy.

In any case, both of them hold people back as effectively as a seatbelt does, but with far fewer benefits.

Neither has a place in my life.

Vehicular Homicide and Other Things I Try to Avoid

I was almost hit by a bike in Verona.

Well, bikes in the plural, really. The bikers would ring these little bells to warn me and my brain would be all, "Oh, a little bell. That's nice" never equating the sound with DANGER. After a couple times of my almost getting hit this girl in the group gave herself the specific assignment of yelling "AWKWARD MORMON GIRL!" every time a bike bore down on me. That got my attention.

Barely.

Then there was the time my family was in a Twenty-Fourth of July parade. We all wore pioneer clothes. Dad pulled a handcart with Little Sister and Baby Sister inside. Mom and Older Sister and I walked.

I was so excited by the experience, waving at the crowds and making my cloth doll wave too, that I wasn't paying attention. I stepped in the handcart's path. Dad pulled it over my foot.
Mom rushed to my aid. She was convinced I was maimed. (I wasn't.) She was swearing up and down and all around. Of course, the stake president was sitting with his family on that particular stretch of street.

Things got awkward.



The Beatles, crossing the street with
grace, speed, and style. A car would
never dare hit them. Not even if they
were jaywalking.

 

In spite of these near-disasters, and in spite of the fact that Mom has always been convinced that I would be hit by a car long before now (she feels that in addition to being highly distractible, I never paid enough attention to the Barney song, "Stop, Look, and Listen"), I haven't even come close. Not even when I jaywalked with the Chess Master after track... by which sentence I mean that I am a law-abiding citizen who has never jaywalked, not even as an impressionable fifteen-year-old who wanted to impress a boy she liked. Capisce?

I definitely wasn't jaywalking the other day when a car simply didn't see me.

I was using a crosswalk near Nameless Utah College. The little stick figure person on the crosswalk light shone brightly. "Place your fate in my stick figure hands," it said. "Step into the street," it said.

"Okay," I said. "I trust you, little stick figure person."

Alas, my trust was misplaced. The stick figure person didn't know that the driver of a car making a right turn wasn't paying attention.

The right-turning car came to an abrupt halt just before the crosswalk. I also halted--luckily I'd seen the car before it saw me. Had I gone any farther I would have stepped straight into its path.

An awkward impasse ensued. The car didn't move. Neither did I. 'Cause, I mean, what are the rules of etiquette in this situation? Nobody taught me the proper way to handle this in Driver's Ed. Or Pedestrian's Ed aka "Stop, Look, and Listen" (which by the way, I did actually pay attention to. Enough attention to appreciate the catchy tune, anyways).

Still no moving.

After a few seconds of this confusion, I moved forward. So did the car.

It didn't hit me...but when it braked its bumper was about to get pretty fresh with my leg. So to speak.

If crosswalks are this dangerous, then maybe I should just go back to jaywalking.

If I had ever jaywalked.

Which I haven't.

Move along, people. Nothing to see here.