My Grand Return, Dedicated to Vilja Johnson

Yesterday I was chatting with the abovementioned college friend about the fact that I have not blogged in a while. Yes, there has been the odd post, but I actually wrote those over six months ago and scheduled their release ahead of time. Haha tricked you. Anyway.

I was explaining to her that I feel it’s very important for me to keep blogging while I student teach (starting in a few short weeks WTF), because the memories and experiences of my first “real” year of teaching will be invaluable in the future. On the other hand, I articulated to Vilja, I do so much writing in grad school it’s the last thing I feel like doing for fun. I already express myself so thoroughly in my schoolwork that I don’t feel much of a need for self-expression outside of it.

Then Vilja said, quote, “Nooooo!!! Funny stories!!!!”

Dammit, she’s right. This blog is for the funny stories! So I dedicate any funny stories I write in the next few weeks to you, V. Luckily for her and maybe you as well, my recent "summer vacation" was excellent fodder for the same.

Funny Story Number 1: I am upstaged by a natural disaster

Some/a few of you may know that over the weekend, I went to New York City for a friend’s wedding. It was a beautiful weekend filled with friends, puppets (I saw Avenue Q AND the Jim Henson exhibit at the MOTMI … amazing) and visiting the ancestral island of the Wu Tang Clan. Overall, a wonderful five-day break from school. However, if I could do it all again, I probably would come home two days early instead of midnight the night before. I’m boarding the plane on the plane to Seattle right now, and something tells me that I am going to be very, very tired at my 9AM class tomorrow.

The only two things that you need to know for this story, however, is that I was staying with my cousin in Brooklyn and that the Brooklyn Bridge is currently undergoing some maintenance construction.

Oh! One other thing that is important to know for this story is that I have a thing for being hydrated, and love my water bottle as if it were my own dear child. I left it at a friend’s house last weekend and it was like a part of me was gone.

Okay, exposition over. Here we go.

Scene: Sunday. My cousin and I were walking across the Brooklyn Bridge (which is gorgeous, by the way). The construction obstructed certain parts of the view, but it was a lovely walk nonetheless.

While we were walking, I asked my cousin, “So, why are they doing construction on the bridge? Are they earthquake proofing it or something?”

“Oh no,” she said, with ironic foreshadowing. “New York doesn’t have earthquakes.”

Scene: Monday night. Said cousin and I walk to a tortilla factory/restaurant in Brooklyn and get tacos. It is a super authentic, hole-in-the-wall, INCREDIBLY delicious, cash-only taco extravaganza. Every taco I eat in the future will be compared to those. Then we went home, ate ice cream and watched The Daily Show. Crazy New York party time.

Scene: Tuesday afternoon. I am packing and realize with a minor amount of panic that my water bottle is missing. I look in all the usual places, to no avail. Then I remember I had it at the table with me at the taco place the previous evening, and concluded I must have left it there.

Walking around Brooklyn is awesome, by the way. Reminds me of Sesame Street (or maybe Sesame Street reminds me of Brooklyn?). I get to the taco place, stand in line for a minute and ask if anyone found a pink water bottle on the tables last night. Then I remember that one of the charming, authentic aspects of this taco place is: nobody speaks English. We even wrote our orders in Spanish the previous evening.

I really, REALLY need to learn Spanish, you guys.

Anyway, using hand gestures and repeating the word “water” a lot, I ask if anybody turned in a water bottle the previous night. The woman there said something about a little boy, pointed at her eye a couple of times, and we both looked at each other totally confused.

Just then, the East Coast Earthquake hit.

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, so earthquakes don’t particularly faze me. But for all the proprietors and patrons of this establishment, who had presumably never been in an earthquake before, a 5.8 was legitimate cause for FREAKING THE HELL OUT. Everybody there started yelling, calling friends and relatives on their cell phones, asking if everybody else had felt it, etc. It was then that I realized I had lost the room. I was probably not getting my water bottle back, even if they did have it.

In a very George Costanza-like moment, while all this was going down, I asked if the woman wouldn’t mind, pretty pretty please, checking to see if they had my water bottle. She walked next door and came back a few minutes later, empty-handed, but I am positive it was to talk with the neighbors about the earthquake, and not for any other reason.

So this week I am going to buy a new water bottle. The end.

A post about Dating or, allow me to bitch at you for a few hundred words.

Today is February 18th. For those of you who really live in the moment, four days ago was Valentine's Day. I have never been a huge fan of said holiday, even as a kid, especially not since Spencer Bolton put a Valentine in my fourth grade mailbox that said, "You're stupid." I tattled on him, so I got my vengeance. But still. Not cool.

Don't worry, this post isn't about that overwrought fictional holiday. It's about what I did that night. And a decision I've made that I may or may not stick to.

So seeing as V-Day (or VD for even shorter) fell on a Monday eve this year, church folks put together a massive all-Seattle-metro Family Home Evening, so that all the sad single Mormons between 18 and 35ish could get together and flirt and potentially heal themselves of their tragic, crippling loneliness. It was to be a potluck/open mike night, which is a totally awesome idea. And the food, to get my positive thoughts out of the way from the start, was delicious.

Although large-scale activities are not always my thing, I was excited about this one. Lots and lots of people, and because Seattle attracts awesome people, a majority of them were bound to be cool, right?

If you are attempting to predict what I am about to say, you're probably wrong. I'm not going to complain that I felt too old to be there (silly you, that was the Sweet Meet). I am not going to complain that there were no cute guys there (there were lots). And I am not going to complain that there were lots of cute guys there but none of them paid attention to me (eh, not really applicable).

So what was my problem, then? It was threefold. All of them fall under the general umbrella of "actually, even in Seattle, a lot of Mormons my age are assholes."

Grievance the first. The first act at the open mike was a sweet girl from my ward who dressed up and did a monologue. It was ADORABLE. And she was GOOD. Also, she has balls the size of watermelons (figuratively) because doing a monologue in front of a couple hundred people is SCARY. Unfortunately, the thing about insecure people is that they like to undermine people who do things they are too puss to do. So, not only did approximately three quarters of the people keep talking while this girl was performing, a whole lot of them made snarky comments about it.

What's worse, for the rest of the open mike event, hardly anyone shut their damn mouth-hole. That pissed me off, maybe more than it should have. But seriously, if someone took the time to prepare something for an FHE, the least you can do is shut up and listen to it. That is literally the least you can do. Anything else is dehumanizing and disrespectful.

Grievance the second, and yeah, they are all this petty. After this extremely well-attended event was over, there were still lots of people milling around. There was also a TON of trash everywhere. Lots and lots of disposable dishes and empty soda cans and spilled food etc. My poor friend Erin was spinning off her rocker with stress, so a couple of other girls and maybe two guys started helping her clean up. There was lots and lots to stuff to do and it was pouring rain outside. Meanwhile, there were easily fifty or sixty dudes just hanging out, hands in pockets, talking to each other, not doing anything.

They kept standing there for another hour. Nobody offered to help clean up, nobody offered to take out some of the overflowing garbage bags outside to the dumpster. I could say something about chivalry being dead, but we all know that it's been dead for decades. Helping to clean up is just basic human decency. By this point, I was livid.

The last grievance is that when another friend cut her finger and got a little sick to her stomach at the sight of blood, none of the guys who noticed offered to help with that, either.

Seriously? SERIOUSLY? Anyone who knows my history of relationships knows that my standards are not exactly sky-high, but I could not believe what insensitive jerks those boys were. I was so upset I may or may nor have walked by one group of them and hissed "I can't believe nobody is helping. No wonder no woman wants you." Sadly, I think only one of them heard me, and he had the class to actually look guilty.

I would rather be alone for the rest of my life than bother with any boy who would be that rude and inconsiderate. Even thinking about it right now makes me want to punch someone. Because what I just complained about is NOT too much to ask. It's not like I'm upset because nobody played the guitar for me outside my window. Really, it has nothing to do with me. Nobody helped me, which is fine because I am not that cute, but nobody helped any of the cute girls who were cleaning up, either. Except for Laird. And some tall Asian guy.

It blows my mind sometimes how unsympathetic Mormons can be. No empathy for others, only boo-hoo I'm twenty-eight and I've never been laid woe-is-me. It's psychopathic. It's immoral.

In short, Mormon guys can suck it until they learn how to be kind, because they suck. Did you see how I used suck in one sentence, but with two difference meanings? That means I'm too mad to care about potential semantic confusion. That's really mad.

Also, if anyone wants to protest that THEIR super classy Mormon husband is the exception to the rule, or you, yourself, are the exception to the rule: save it. I don't believe you. It's a numbers game, and everyone in this city is a loser.

THE END

Note: after reading this through, I get how ironic is it that I am responding with such unsympathetic vitriol to people I see as unsympathetic. It's like how I judge people for being judgmental. I get that I'm a hypocrite. But you wanted to know why I was pissed off on Monday, and now you do. Purged. XOXO

From the archives: Jan 26, 2004

Presented without comment, with names changed to protect some of them from seeing this when they Google themselves.

(Hi Lori! Remember this paper? Miss you.)

NOTE: In case you are bad at math, I wrote this when I was 19.

"On the morning of August 14th, 2003, I logged onto my parents’ computer with a mix of excitement and trepidation. Being the unbelievably patient person I am, I had to restrain myself from grabbing the ancient purple iMac by the neck (if it had a neck, try to picture it) as it sloooooowwwwlllly chugged its way to the BYU homepage, then to the on-campus housing, than to my name, which provided a link to the name of my future roommate and her address.

My first reaction was to laugh out loud. My next was a timorous moan, followed by a surge of fear so powerful I can still recall the way my fists clenched, digging my fingernails into my palms.

“Loralee Barratt. Allen, Texas.”

Loralee. Texas. I don’t cuss, but the closest phrase that I can think to describe my feelings right at that moment is “Oh, s***.”

The next morning I went out for drinks with my best friend, her boyfriend and our World Literature teacher, mentor and former Texan Rich Sandford. He asked about my imminent departure for Utah, and I told him my roommate’s name and origin.

“Allen, eh?” Rich commented. “That’s a small town near Dallas. Near the University of Texas.”

“The University of what now?”

Rich chuckled. “Also known as the home of the George W. Bush Memorial Library. Allen’s a small town, too. She’ll probably be really conservative. Have fun.” Burt, Cori and Rich all laughed and again, a stream of panicked expletives ran through my head.

Coming to BYU was hands-down one of the scariest experiences of my life, and I have been in three car wrecks and woken up in the middle of a generally anesthetized surgery. My fears about BYU can be summed up as follows: I am politically liberal, and thus, Utah scares me. I came to BYU sight unseen, without so much as a campus visit under my belt. The stories my ward members told me did nothing to abate my fear that Utah would be isolated and narrow-minded, that my professors would be misogynistic Reaganites, and most of all, that everyone would hate me. Still, I could not deny that somebody upstairs wanted me at BYU. My other college prospects had refused to pan out for myriad financial and logistical reasons. Despite my love for all things Seattle, I had to leave the state. So Utah it was, to live with a Texan whose name sounded to me like a bastardization of an archaic Greek siren. And a Texan, no less. What would become of my political cartoon collection? My constant barrage of snide remarks about the Bush administration? For the next three weeks I bit my proverbial nails and pondered what sort of ordeal Heavenly Father had in store for me.

Loralee Barratt. Loralee Barratt. It sounded so high-maintenance. I knew that we would not get along. Well, I knew in the sense that I know that a food is disgusting before I try it. I figured our relationship would work in one of two ways: either we would completely despise each other and never speak, or we would tolerate each other’s presence and … never speak. Never did it occur to me that we might actually get along.

I took to, whenever referring to my elusive roommate, saying her name in my worst Southern drawl, My friends picked it up too, and until I left for Utah, our source of entertainment when we ran out of other material was my BYU Texan Republican roommate.

One day I checked my email and noticed a new message from a lonishia@hotmail.com. It was my roommate. Her email, which was short and completely devoid of capitalization, asked, among other things, if I was aware that we were on the Honors Floor in Deseret Towers.

“i just signed up for the honors floor as a joke. im so worried that were gonna be with a bunch of nerds.” She wrote. I am a nerd. My panic, which before had seemed slightly judgmental and unfounded, took full and horrid effect.

The car trip to Provo and long and uneventful, and when we finally arrived at the dorms, I went in unto the elevator, rode up to the seventh floor and located my new residence, 704. The room was empty, no sign of the roommate or any of her stuff. Since New Student Orientation didn’t start for two more days, I wasn’t that concerned. I took over the west side of the room, since it had a slightly bigger desk, unpacked, and slept that night at my friend’s house in American Fork. The next few days were filled with the mundane and middle school-esque goings-on of New Student Orientation, and still no roommate. I talked about her with the members of my Y Group, and we wondered if Loralee Barratt would ever show up at all.

That evening, three green Tupperware cartons, a giant black suitcase, a sewing machine and a gigantic stereo arrived at our abode, accompanied by my tall, blond, and extremely cute roommate. This was a problem heretofore unperceived: that my roommate would be much more attractive than I, that I would feel repulsive in comparison and that boys would be nice to me only in an effort to get an “in” with my hot roommate. Again with the internal monologue of expletives, although since I was now in Utah, these words were more along the lines of “Oh my hecking freak of a shoot gosh darn hot roommate.” Still, I thought a civilized greeting would be the wisest course of action.

“Hello. You must be Loralee,” I smiled my most sincere fake smile, the one I usually reserve for applying for loans or asking favors at the Washington Department of Transportation.

“Oh.” Was her response. “I go by Lori.”

The wave of relief was decidedly physical. At least she had a nickname that wasn’t Loralee. There was still the matter of her hotness, but the fact of the matter was, all my perceptions of her had been based on her name, and now I had learned that it wasn’t even her name. Lori, I figured, would be much easier to deal with than Loralee.

I didn’t see my roommate much for the next few days, since she had friends from back home that took up most of her time, and also went out on dates that lasted until five o’clock in the morning. We proved to have multiple things in common, such as a preference for loud music (although she preferred hers much later than I) and a mutual affection for my belongings. The girl borrowed EVERYTHING, and it would have bothered me except that she was equally generous with her shoes, of which she had many. She even gave me a pair of sandals she didn’t want anymore. I never wear them, but that was nice.

Lori likes to say that our roommate relationship is based on lies and deceit. That is absolutely not true, which is in itself a huge lie, because for the first month or so of our living arrangement, I was scared of Lori. She seemed so cool, and I was intimidated by her, since I am decidedly not cool. Fortunately, I had some things that she didn’t, such a computer, and Dining Plus, and the ability to use the word “good” in proper context, so I was able to be of some use to her. Thus I was able to lull myself into believing that we were on somewhat even grounds, with her social know-how and my inherent knack for owning things.

To make a long story short, Lori and I have reached a Zen-like understanding. She confides in me about boys, and life, and I correct her grammar as she does so. Lori has improved my coolness quotient significantly by helping me in my effort to wear clothes that improve my “game,” as it were. She also plucks my eyebrows and teaches me how to break-dance. It’s strange how our relationship was blossomed into the beautiful entity that it is. We laugh with and at each other, and politics rarely surfaces in our conversations, not that Lori would get upset if it did. In short, my roommate is cool, and I like her, and I’m possibly living with her next year. Who woulda thunk that a Seattle Liberal and a Smokin’ hot Texan would end up getting along so well."

The Seven Deadly Sins, Day 3: Sloth

I know this is a little obvious, but it's too good an opportunity to pass up.

I would much rather watch Man of the House (Tommy Lee Jones' best role, in my humble opinion) than write a fully-developed blog entry right now.

So, there you go.