Trouble with a Capital T and That Rhymes with C and That Stands for Car‏

I basically got my Honda through an arranged marriage.

When I reached a certain age, my parents came to me and said, "It's time for you to get a car. We're going to find a decent car for you, and then you're going to pay for it."

And I said, "Okay." And then they found me a white Honda, and I got some money out of my account and I bought it. Like I said, an arranged marriage. But with a car.

Say what you like about arranged marriages, but this one has been a smashing success. I named my car Bernard after a lesser known Disney character, and we've gotten along swimmingly ever since. Although Bernard is an older model with many miles, he's run very well for me and hasn't had many problems...until last year.

It all started with the inexplicably locked driver's door, and it all went downhill from there. In October, Bernard began experiencing engine trouble that included but was not limited to blown fuses, ruined wiring, and misfires.

I took him back to my mechanic time and time again. Each time, they said they'd fixed the problem. And each time, Bernard would within days experience the same or a related problem.

You may be wondering, "Awkward Mormon Girl, why didn't you just try taking Bernard to a different mechanic?" That does seem the sensible thing to do, doesn't it? Well, there are a few reasons for this: a) since this mechanic had already been mucking about in Bernard's engine, he at least had an idea of what was going on under there, b) my mechanic is usually quite good; it's only this past year that he hasn't been on his game, and c) I tend to believe in possibilities.

By that I mean that I believe that things can change. So this boy isn't interested in me today? He might feel differently tomorrow. I didn't have a very good improv show this week, but I can do better next week. It's snowing right now, but in a few hours, it could be clear. You know, things like that. Often I'm pleasantly surprised at what happens when I believe in someone. I'm also often profoundly disappointed.

The first time the mechanic and his employees didn't fix my car properly, I said, "I'm sure that they'll get it this time."

The second time: "Third time's a charm!"

The fifth time: "They're bound to figure it out this time!"

Who-knows-what time: "Eventually, they'll exhaust all other possibilities and then they'll have to get it right!"

Obviously, this has been very frustrating. Older Sister innocently suggested a solution.

What she said: "Why don't you just buy a new car?"

What I heard: "Why don't you just get a new best friend?"

Needless to say, I did not take this suggestion well. I could definitely buy a new car if I absolutely needed to, but I don't want to.

I have full confidence that God is looking out for me and Bernard and that one way or another, things will be A-okay. But, in the meantime, the money that I keep having to throw at car repairs is the money that I was planning to use to buy a new laptop to replace Quits. (Quits is quite beautifully living up to his name.) Then there's my smartphone, which sometimes mysteriously shuts down at 30% battery. And while I'm airing grievances, the soles of my boots keep coming off, despite the enormous quantities of hot glue I have used on them.

I feel like this is an appropriate time to quote Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire:

"Why is everything I own rubbish?" Ron said furiously, striding across the room to unstick Pigwidgeon's beak.

The Rant

Today I was fifth-book Harry.

I love the fifth Harry Potter book. It's so fun. But I don't love fifth-book Harry, because fifth-book Harry is some rough times.

Today, I was rough times.

It all started when La Petite and Madam President came over for a while. We were supposed to talk about the first Harry Potter book. (La Petite and Madam President are not acquainted with the joys of Harry Potter and I have convinced them to try it.) We did talk about Harry for a while, but then we talked about some personal stuff.

When it was my turn, I exploded.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL AS FIFTH-BOOK HARRY: My life is so hard! I do so much difficult stuff that Dumbledore doesn't even trust me!

FRIENDS: Um, are you sure you're not making this harder than it needs to be-

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: You don't know me! You don't know my life! YOU WEREN'T EVEN THERE WHEN VOLDEMORT RETURNED!

Then I went for dinner with Pepper and another member of our improv troupe. Basically, I ranted the whole time and they listened to my rant.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: You don't know how hard it is to be the Chosen One and have the fate of the entire wizarding world resting on my shoulders.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: And midi-chlorians are a terrible father.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Wait. I'm turning into Hayden Christensen Anakin Skywalker. That's worse!

Luckily, everyone was very patient and supportive of me, and things didn't escalate to a point where I tried to kill my Jedi master and melted my face off in some lava.

Fighting Back Against Hitler

Older Sister, Little Sister, and I are all attending an institute class dedicated to family history.

At the first class, Little Sister and I perused our family tree on familysearch.org.

"Did you find any royalty?" this other girl asked us. It's not uncommon for a well-researched line to turn up some cool stuff. In the past, we've learned, among other things, that we're not-so-distant cousins of FDR and that we're direct descendants of Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of history's most powerful and fascinating women.

"Not today," Little Sister said. "But maybe we'll find some Jewish royalty or something."

"Esther," I suggested.

"Yeah, it will just say 'Esther,'" Little Sister said. "And then we'll be like, 'Oh my gosh! Esther, queen of Persia!'"

Joking aside, we really have no idea what we might find on the Jewish eighth of our family tree. That line is not well-recorded. But I don't think this is because my relatives didn't keep track of their ancestors. If you get anything out of the Bible, it's that the Jews love them some lineages. No, I think that Hitler is the person that we can thank for the lack of documentation. Except I don't want to thank him; I want to slap him in the face. With a glove. Because that seems particularly humiliating.

My grandmother is the link between me and her grandparents. My mom never met them. But I feel like I know them because I've heard stories about them from my grandma.

I can't say the same of the Jewish great-something-great-aunts and great-something-great-uncles and cousins who died in the Holocaust. I hardly know anything about them. I don't know of anybody living who knew them or even anybody who knew anybody who knew them. With these relatives' murders, any information they could have shared about their ancestors is gone. A whole link in my family line has vanished.

This bothers me particularly in that Hitler tried to destroy the Jews. He lost the war, but if by killing a whole generation he wiped our ancestors from living memory, then in a sense he succeeded. Oblivion differs from destruction only for the victim. For everybody else, well, all they know is that there's no trace of the victim. Or, rather, they don't know that there's no trace of the victim, because for them it's like that person never existed.

All I know is that I would like a breakthrough so that I can learn more about the men and women that I came from. I pray that something useful will turn up.

Fun Facts About Me

Now that I've had this blog for almost three years, it seems like a good time to tell you some fun facts about myself! Because better late than never, right?

Fun Fact #1: As longtime readers have probably already gleaned, I have one older sister, two younger sisters, and two younger brothers. Bonus Fun Fact: My siblings and I don't really look alike. There are resemblances between some of us, but for the most part people don't peg the six of us as siblings.

Fun Fact #2: I always tell people that I graduated in creative writing, but it's actually more complicated than that. I actually graduated with two majors, English with an emphasis in creative writing and Honors. Having a degree in Honors basically just means that I'm an overachiever. I also minored in history.

Fun Fact #3: I have the mad skill of typing 100 words a minute without using home row.

Fun Fact #4: I got my driver's license when I was eighteen. I was not anxious to take on the responsibilities of being a driver.

Fun Fact #5: I was named after my uncle.

Holiday Catch-up

Christmas was most excellent.

On Christmas Eve, my extended family had a dinner and a nativity scene. Blondie Cousin, who is usually quite shy, literally leapt into my arms upon her arrival and took me as her designated slave for the evening.

I served her dinner. She insisted on "picking" her own food. "I wanna pick it!" Among the picked was a bunch of carrots.

Her mom said that Blondie Cousin really liked carrots, but I wouldn't have known because the kid would not eat. She was hyper and excited and climbing all over and under the furniture like a little monkey.

Finally, I said, "Blondie Cousin, if you don't eat your carrots, I'm going to eat them!" And I popped one into my mouth for good measure.

Immediately she climbed into her chair. "Otay! I'll eat my carrots!"

And she did. After eating, it was time to do the nativity. Blondie Cousin cut her foot on the stairs, so I put some Band-Aids on the cut. But she was not satisfied and, as I dressed her in her sheep costume, cried, "More Band-Aid! More Band-Aid!"

After the nativity, she plonked herself onto my lap to watch the 2015 family slideshow. Baby Brother cuddled up on my other side, happy and excited that there was now only one more sleep 'til Christmas!

And what a Christmas it was!

I finally got to see everyone open the presents I'd been gathering for almost three months. Of course, I got to open presents, too.

As a gift person, I love thoughtful gifts, especially when they are surprises. I got lots of really great surprises from my parents, my siblings, my friends, and Santa Claus. Either I am becoming boring and predictable or my loved ones stepped up their gift game 500%, because it seemed like everyone knew exactly what I wanted. One of the most exciting of these exciting gifts was a ticket from my little sisters to see Caroll Spinney, the Muppeteer behind Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch, do a Q&A live here in Utah! Expect a fun blog post about that.

For New Year's Eve, I went to a party with my family. I felt kind of sick, so I ended up leaving early and rang in the New Year watching Phineas and Ferb in my apartment.

Before I left, I stopped to speak with my mom, who was helping Blondie Cousin get some treats. Blondie Cousin tried some cheesecake, didn't like it, and motioned to Mom that she wanted to try a different cake.

"How about you eat your cookies first?" Mom said, but Blondie Cousin was headed for the cake.

"Blondie Cousin!" I called. "If you don't eat your cookies, I will!"

"Otay!" She ran back to her plate of goodies and bit into a cookie.

"Works like a charm," I said.

I Survived 2015

Have you ever seen Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland?

If you haven't, you're definitely not alone. It's one of the more obscure cartoon movies of my childhood. But you're gonna need to get up to speed for this post, so here's a quick download.

First off, this is Nemo:

Not this:

                                           

Got it?

What basically happens is that Nemo, the lucky little guy, gets an invitation in the middle of the night from the king of Slumberland to become the heir to the Slumberland throne. Also, the princess of Slumberland sends him cookies. Because Nemo can't resist monarchical power or cookies, he and his flying squirrel Icarus board this magical dirigible that takes them to Slumberland.

Yes, dirigible. The comic strip that this movie is based on was written around the turn of the century. And I mean not the recent turn of the century but the other one, the one where dirigibles and other flying craft were all the rage.

So when Nemo gets to Slumberland, he meets all kind of fascinating people. He meets Princess Camille, she who sends cookies. And speaking of Princess Camille, why does the king of Slumberland need an heir to the throne when he has a perfectly good princess? That's never explained, but there seems to be a weirdly implied subtext that because Nemo is the heir, he and Camille are now engaged, even though they're like ten years old. So that's a thing.

Nemo also meets Flip, a ne'er-do-well clown played by Mickey Rooney. And, of course, he meets the king of Slumberland, Morpheus. King Morpheus seems like really nice guy, king, and future father-in-law. He gives Nemo free prince lessons, nice clothes, and a fancy key necklace. After giving Nemo the key, though, the king warns him that he must never unlock the door that has the same symbol as the key on it.

This seems like a bad idea, because probably the first thing anyone would do is unlock the door that matches the key. Even though the king warned him, and even though he's becoming the prince of Slumberland, Nemo's still just a kid. He's not ready for this kind of responsibility! Especially when there's probably something awful behind that door.

Within hours of the king's warning, Flip convinces Nemo to open up the forbidden door. And, yup, there's something awful behind it. Specifically, the Nightmare King. The Nightmare King kidnaps Morpheus and takes him away to Nightmare Land.

Determined to set things right, Nemo and Icarus and Princess Camille and company head out for Nightmare Land to rescue King Morpheus.

Luckily, Morpheus left behind his magical scepter, which Nemo can use to defeat the Nightmare King. Also luckily, they have a copy of the incantation that makes the scepter work. Said incantation goes something like this: "Kazama Kablama Pajama Obama" and so on and so forth. Less luckily, in fact downright unluckily, Nemo has a heck of a time memorizing the incantation. Every time they get into trouble, he amateurishly waves the scepter around and yells something along the lines of, "PAJAMA PAJAMA PAJAMA PAJAMA PAJAMA!" Which isn't super effective, but is a valiant effort.

You're probably wondering where I'm going with this. I'll tell you: it's a metaphor. In this metaphor, I'm Nemo. Nightmare Land is 2015. Icarus the flying squirrel is probably Baby Brother. I don't know who Princess Camille is.

The point is, this metaphor represents the year 2015 for me. 2015 was hard. And every time I found a spot of trouble, I did the only thing I knew how to do: I amateurishly waved a scepter around and yelled, "PAJAMA PAJAMA PAJAMA PAJAMA PAJAMA!" Which wasn't super effective, but was a valiant effort.

I feel you, Nemo. I'm ineffective, too.

There is surely something profound that could be said about this new year, 2016. New chances and all that. I've made some resolutions. There are some things that I hope for, some things I wish would happen to me. But in all honesty, I will be almost satisfied so long as this year is not like last year, where I was constantly thrown into awful situations where I had no control and there was nothing I could do.

But if in 2016 I cannot avoid awful situations where I have no control and there's nothing I can do, I would surely appreciate being made the heir of Slumberland for my trouble.

Also, I would like some cookies.

One More Sleep 'Til Christmas

Baby Brother has eagerly been counting down the days until Christmas. Or, rather, the sleeps until Christmas.

When we were making chocolate truffles, he informed me that there were seven more sleeps until Christmas.

When we were making gingerbread houses, he informed me that there were four more sleeps until Christmas.

When we were in the movie theater watching Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens in IMAX and 3D, he got my attention during the movie. Was he scared? Did he need to go to the bathroom? No; he just wanted to tell me that he was excited for Christmas and that there were "three more sleeps until Christmas!"

But finally, it's here. The day that Baby Brother has been waiting for all along is here. There's only one more sleep until Christmas.

Tomorrow, Christmas will be here! So get excited.

Merry Christmas!