Busy First Month of School

SCREAM. UGH.

World, with my busy Sundays and schoolwork and distractions throughout the rest of the week, I don't know if I'll ever be able to catch back up. Oh my freakin' gosh.

Man, I've still got stuff to talk about from all the way back to Sept. 8th (and I only know that because I backtracked to the past couple posts and matched up my list of stuff that's happened to dates), so it's almost exactly 2 months of stuff to cover, and who knows how that's going to go.

Today, at least, there's Stake Conference, so there's more time to write before (and, hopefully, after). There's also no ward choir practice (and I had been trying to go to stake choir practices, but it's looking like I'm not gonna make it early enough to actually perform today- I didn't yesterday), so that's in my favor today.

Okay, take your mind back to Sept. 8, a Friday, one of the first Fridays of the school year. What happens at colleges during the first few weeks of the year? That's right: a whole lotta opening socials. (That also means a lot of free dessert. I got spoiled.) I actually went to three different events that day, which was a little exhausting. There was Japan Club, which wasn't that bad (and I saw two Fiction Writing classmates this time- one I'm gonna nickname No-Ghost for reasons mentioned later, since we're actual friends now) but I haven't gone to anything for them since then; there was the Institute, whose social was huuuuuuge, and I ended up spending most of my time there hiding away in the corner of the building watching people play Mario Kart and talk to this one guy who turns out to be in my ward; there was the 80's dance, which is my favorite dance I've been to so far. My outfit pretty much got put together by my mom and sis, since I didn't really have anything with me that would work for such an event. I was given some black/white vertical-stripe leggings (which we already owned), my swimsuit shorts, a lime green top, and some brightly colored makeup. My mom gave me the options of turquoise eyeliner, blue eyeshadow, pink lipstick, and pink blush, and I just settled for the eyeliner and lipstick because that seemed like a decent enough compromise between me and the 80's. I also pulled my hair up into a high side ponytail, which I had to constantly adjust throughout the dance, so that was a little annoying, but at least I looked good.

A little over halfway into my time at the dance, I checked on my phone, and realized Weston had texted me that he was there. With a little more texting, we found each other and hung out together for a little longer before we couldn't take it anymore and left. He offered to buy some ice cream, and since it was super close and still open, I suggested the restaurant I live right by, the one I went to with Terra the week(?) before. We ended up staying there chatting for over an hour, and had to go because they were closing at midnight. It was really nice to talk while cooling down with yummy ice cream. (I feel like I should mention this, that while walking me home, he asked me out to go on a real date, and I declined. I told him about how I'd already decided that I was going to wait a while to date so I could focus on school and keeping my scholarship, and he understood. Unfortunately, we've never hung out after that day outside of class. And that class only met 3 or 4 times after, so...)

This is a little pointless to add, but I ended up binging a little on Dodie Clark again once I made it to my room instead of sleeping. I was already dead tired, but nope. I think I just tend to have the craving to go onto Youtube and such when I'd dead tired until I'm even more dead tired, and it's a little stupid, yet I do it anyway. Thanks, me.

The next day, I watched some From the New World (part of the time with Terra) since we were apparently going to discuss it in Anime Club. Just... don't.

That Sunday was super, super scary, because it was the first time I've given a lesson in church... ever. Like, I think I helped my sister once to give a lesson in YW? And I almost gave a short lesson in YW last year (which ended up canceled). Now, it was happening for real. So, this definitely falls under one of those things where I had to be super, exhaustingly brave.

I did a lot of praying and doing my best to prepare (and I went the "prepare too much" route my dad has always preferred), and it was such a relief when, the moment I was standing in front of the room, I didn't feel that scared anymore. I still faltered and done-goofed every once in a while, but in general it seemed the lesson went pretty smoothly, and there's still women from the ward that, when they talk to me, will mention that they liked my lesson. Like, what?? Did I seriously do that good that people are still bringing it up?? Or do they just not know what else to say to me??

There was a devotional after that, and then at ward prayer I was invited to go to a game night at someone's house, which has really fun! I played Racetrack (and just about pwned everyone else who played it, whoops) and Egyptian Rat (that's the name of that card game, right?), and also got to eat a yummy, warm cinnamon roll. (There was another game night a while later at someone else's house, but it wasn't quite as fun, unfortunately.)

Let's skip to the next Wednesday. There was a guy that spoke about the neuroscience of being happy. Two of the things that I appreciated were that he explained that the part of the brain that is signaled to be joyful was literally right next to the part that is signaled to be terrified, which is why those emotions tend to get really mixed up (like laughing and screaming on a roller-coaster), and that there was a formula in songwriting that makes songs so catchy and make us happy, that they stay mostly consistent and then occasionally surprise us with something that breaks the pattern (and, funny enough, he used the chorus of Taylor Swift's "Look What You Made Me Do" to demonstrate it). I also got to go get a smoothie and cookie with my roommates Terra and Ash at a place that's like Swig (pro-tip: don't eat the cookie and smoothie together).

The next day, I got to do a pretty cool project in Anime Club! We were bleaching T-shirts with anime designs! I figured I'd use one of my black shirts (which isn't a T-shirt, but it seemed to work well enough), and was told that it'd bleach to red or orange. I thought on that a little, and ended up deciding to do a fiery FMA design, and that turned into putting the "Flame Alchemist Rap" on it.

Starting from drawing the template onto wax paper, the whole thing took about four hours. It was, evidently, quite late by the time I left with finished shirt in hand (though one girl was there even longer because hers required more drawing). WORTH IT.

People who got it thought it was genius.

Unfortunately, the last time I've gone to Anime Club was the Thursday after this, in which I ended up seeing the first episode of Kill la Kill (which was way worse with fan-service than I'd been expected, so never again) and a wee bit of Spice & Wolf. After that, other things have kept taking priority over going to club. Hopefully, I'll be able to go again at least a couple more times this semester. ...Eventually. (Agh, it's crazy to think we have just about a month left of fall semester!!!)

The Saturday after, I'd ventured out of my house to go to a ward service activity... only to show up and find nobody at the designated house. When I gave up on seeing any other people, I started to make my way home- but first, I decided to stop by the little park that house was by. Turns out it's basically the elementary school's territory, playground and all, but grassier and parkier. I swung on the swings for a full half-hour, enjoying the nice weather and just feeling calm and peacefully alone. It was a welcome change to suddenly trying to be relatively social at a huge school.

I ended up working on QQ later that day, and... to be honest, I've only gone to work on it with Liz once or twice since then. Poor thing is probably really frustrated with me.

Something I ended up kinda doing on my own starting that day was write little "scripts" for Sanders Sides. I think it'd be really cool to finish one and send it to him and see if Thomas and his friends actually find something in there they like and use it in a video! I haven't finished one, though, but maybe that's still something I can work on while his series still exists (which, according to one of his Q&A videos, sounds like it'll last a long time!).

Though I don't have it in my diary notes, a couple days ago, I finally started finding how I could possibly be split into the different parts of me like Thomas. It took me this long because I always felt like I was too complicated to define like that (not to say Thomas isn't a complicated person, but I just couldn't see how I could be split up in a way similar to him). I watched a couple people who had made videos inspired by him, which maybe have helped a little, but ultimately I thought that two conflicting parts of me are the kid and the adult, and I realized that's where I could branch off. I know that an entire person can't be neatly fit into 4 personas (even Thomas and his friends hinted at more Sides appearing in the future), but I did my best because it seems like a good number to fit major parts of me into (and include smaller parts like hobbies within them, as well). Here's what I've got so far (which doesn't seem perfect, but it's getting there):

• Adult/Mestiza - reasoning, centered on knowledge and wisdom, thinks about future consequences, global perspective, passionate about Chicano/Latino issues, proofreader
• Kid/Creep - naive, easy to excite, switches between oblivious and observant, blunt, loves to scare and laugh, focuses on present, loves to dress up
• Love/Fangirl - love (for family, friends, hobbies, fandoms, etc.), nostalgic, what the heart wants, creative, reader and writer
• Insecurity/Tomboy - drummer, likes Spider-Man, loves food, worries (over failure, being judged, lacking independence and balance, etc.), wide-awake and tired at the same time

I don't know, that seems to compile a lot of different parts of me. And I wanted to exemplify how there's a lot of contrastive stuff going on and everything in my personality is connected in seemingly random ways. Most importantly, I didn't want to resort to making Insecurity similar to Thomas's Anxiety, that (s)he's seen like a "bad guy" for a while, and seem to be the only one that isn't happy for a while, if you get what I mean. I suppose trying to pair up Insecurity with my more boy-ish aspects still lands me a little closer to Anxiety than I'm comfortable with, but I think Insecurity's still got enough non-negative aspects to balance her out a little more and make her happy, too.

Kid/Creep is the one that I think is the least likely to change, because it feels right. I mean, I was a kid for a long time, and still end up acting like a kid, and I know my kid-ish traits pretty well, and I think they would be in the same persona as the part that likes Halloween and Tim Burton. I always loved Halloween (besides when I was a year old and apparently cried upon seeing my makeup-ed reflection), despite taking a long time to be able to handle more "scary" stuff, and I have, evidently, had a long tradition of dressing up for holidays, which has only grown, and have slowly been more creative with my wardrobe inside and outside of holidays because the kid inside me loves it. I don't know if any of this makes sense, but... yeah, it feels right.

Love/Fangirl seems pretty spot-on, too (though I just barely added that "nostalgic" part, which seems accurate- and, I mean, if Adult/Mestiza is thinking about the future and Kid/Creep about the present, then Love/Fangirl and Insecurity/Tomboy are probably often thinking about the past), but I think she needs a little more depth and contrast to fit in better with the others.

So... yeah. Hopefully, I can hone this idea, and think it worth it to figure this out instead of continue to be in that ambiguous cloud of "Who even am I?".

Back to the timeline- on Sunday, Terra said that she wanted to make tacos with me to celebrate Mexican Independence Day. (It'd actually been the day before- and, of course, I'd tried to wear red, green, and white to school and wear some of the patriotic jewelry Abuelita gave me and my sis a couple years ago. I invited my roommates to wear some to celebrate as well, but I'm pretty sure only Terra had taken up the offer.) I'm pretty proud of how they came out, even though it was nothing like typical street tacos. She put me in charge of the ground beef, which we ended up adding my salt, dried onion, and garlic salt to, and her steak seasoning, crushed red pepper flakes, and oregano. It actually ended up being a decent amount of seasoning, as it wasn't overpowering nor too little (which I was worried would happen, since I thought I wasn't putting in enough). Once done, we put the beef on some tortillas (which Terra had made, but they were made with her flatbread recipe, so thicker and doughier than typical tortillas- they certainly did their job, though) with lime juice and some baby spinach. Not exactly authentic, but it was delicious, and I was happy to know that I helped to make it.

For whatever reason, Terra kept wanting to make food, so just a little later, she started making soft pretzels and let us other roommates partake of them. She complained about how they came out, but we loved them. Unfortunately, we had to rush out the door the moment they were done because we were going to go to a devotional by President Russell M. Nelson!

Dude. DUDE. I'm pretty dang sure that that's the closest I've ever been to one of the general authorities since I was a toddler. I seriously teared up a little when he came in, because this felt pretty unreal and the Spirit around him was so strong. I was freaking out for quite a while. Eventually, though, I was good, and just focused on what he and his wife were speaking to us about.

Okay, I just gotta talk about this. One of the things Sister Nelson talked about was that her husband had felt prompted to learn Chinese even though he was super busy being a heart surgeon, and because he listened to that and started learning Chinese, when the time came, he was able to connect with Chinese doctors and improve the relationship between the countries and even operated on some very important people in China. I found that really, really cool. The thing, though, is that, since near the beginning of the semester when I started seriously considering doing a study abroad (which I told my adviser when I met with her, so hopefully next year we can start planning that a little more and I can go somewhere my junior year), I've been really thinking about the Middle East. I think part of it is because I ended up watching a couple things with my parents about those areas earlier in the year, and I felt a little more of the kinship with them because some of the things they did reminded me of Latinos. (My chem lab partner totally denied that there's anything similar between the two groups, but I'm not gonna listen to him.) And, I dunno, maybe interacting with a couple people from there last school year has something to do with it. Even the fact that I look pretty Middle-Eastern as is might have something to do with it! With looking up study abroad locations and talking to a couple Saudi students at an international event on campus, I'm just... feeling like that's not random. Like maybe I'm supposed to learn a little Arabic, go to one of the Middle Eastern countries, something like that. The thing with the first is that it'd be hard to learn Arabic while it's not my major focus of study, and I wouldn't be able to fit 2 years of Arabic into my schedule without lengthening my stay at the university (I'd prefer to keep this within the 4 years my scholarship covers, thank you very much), and it'd be hard to devote time outside of school to properly learn it. Even worse, most of those countries are pretty dangerous, and the safest one offered for study abroad was Jordan (and one of the Saudis had suggested going there, too)- but, as of yet, there isn't a program there that would fit my major. *facedesk* So, right now, I figured I could probably start with learning it during Winter and Summer Breaks, but... if I am really feeling like I'm supposed to learn Arabic, that doesn't seem like enough. What do I do?

With that giant paragraph out of the way, let's continue?

What Pres. Nelson talked about in the devotional was the truth about the Book of Mormon. Of course, what he said was important, and there were definitely things I wanted to remember, but what I was really thinking about was why he decided to devote the devotional to that topic. If you saw General Conference last month, you'd know that that was what he talked about there, too! Is that something a lot of people need to hear right now?

The weather was super nice starting from there, I say sarcastically. It was suddenly really cold and windy and rainy that whole week (which especially sucked on Monday, because I hadn't anticipated precipitation and had to walk all the way from the campus library to my apartment in the dark and freezing in the rain). The weird thing is that it righted itself again right after that week and pretty much stayed consistent until this week. Considering the time between that rainy Monday and this week, that was almost two whole months where everything was dry and pretty stagnant. Most days were 30-40 degrees (Fahrenheit) in the early morning and evening and 60-70 in the middle of the day. That's a whole lot more predictable (and warmer) than I expected things to be in this area, from what everyone was saying before I moved. Good things had to come to an end, though- last Friday, it started raining, and yesterday afternoon, it switched to snow. At least the weather had the decency to wait till after Halloween to make us freeze. (Trust me, it's not fun going trick-or-treating when there's snow outside.)

I had my very first biology exam that Tuesday, which I was terrified for. It was a lot of material for concepts I barely remembered or never really got covered all the way back in 9th grade. I was being such a good studier, though, and went to most of the SIs and everything, and got 37/40. Be proud of me. (I was also quite nervous about the second exam, and studied a pretty decent amount and got the same score. Last week, I had my third- I ended up with a lot on my plate for other classes and outside of school, though, so thank goodness it was inheritance and genetics, which I find much easier than the previous material, and didn't have to study as much. I got 39/40! And the professors have added extra points to everyone's scores to boost up the average, so my grade's really good in the class!)

Next day was the day that I think I actually became friends with No-Ghost. We'd gone to a lecture by a folktale scholar, suggested by our Fiction Writing teacher (though everyone ended up kinda disappointed that the topic wasn't exactly what was advertised, and he wasn't all that good at lecturing...) Afterwards, there were refreshments (I love the refreshments offered at campus events, oh my gosh), and No-Ghost and I ended up staying together chatting. We talked about writing and fandoms (and I had to bring up my bleached shirt, because c'mon) and stuff, and it was really nice. I ended up missing something else I'd planned to go to to keep talking with her for an hour, but I don't regret it.

Later that day, I was about to go to bed when my sis sent me a text about if I could help her polish up her school paper, so I did that with her for a while over text and Google Docs. It was nice to proofread and suggest some things to her and be able to know that I was actually helping my older sister! I'm really hoping she got a good grade on that, and remembers a couple of the suggestions I'd given for future assignments.

I think this is a good place to mention that I've been doing the occasional beta-ing lately (which I really shouldn't, considering I have plenty of schoolwork to worry about, but I can't help myself). One is BTK (pretty sure she was mentioned sometime last spring), who I did a little more proofreading for, and recently am gonna try to translate one of her stories from Spanish to English! I did the first draft of the first chapter, which she's given back comments on, and there's... six more chapters to go on that, I think. One of the newest girls added to the Hangouts chat with Scaehime and Liz also has a really long story that Liz and I are going to work at a little at a time to proofread. Lastly, I tried translating a formal school document from English to Spanish for the Translators Club a couple days ago (which I'm actually going to talk a little more about in a future post), and I think that went okay? I don't have a very formal Spanish vocabulary, to be honest, so I had to use Google Translate for some of the words (but, of course, did my best to make sure that the word made sense, since a lot of these words I recognized but couldn't remember on my own)...

That Friday, they did a pretty cool campus event called Human Library, where people (I think all of them alumni of this college) with pretty interesting backgrounds and experiences made themselves available to talk to students. They called choosing one of those people to talk "checking out a Human Book" and talking to them "reading". The Book I checked out was this woman who had traveled around the world on the college's behalf with her husband and kids to work on bettering the food and nutrition of other countries. She had some pretty cool stories, and awesome advice. One of the best things was that she helped me feel a little better about going on a study abroad.

I also ended up watching the live-action Beauty and the Beast yet again this year, this time with a couple of the other women in the Relief Society. It was supposed to be a movie night with quite a few women, I imagine, but barely anyone came, which was a little sad (and awkward). It was still fun, though (oh, and before the movie, one of the girls had put on The Happy Place, a Netflix show that I'd never seen but it was quite funny, and I hope to see more of it- actually, I'd mentioned it to my dad and sister, and now they've both watched all the way through and love it).

Saturday was the Women's Session of General Conference, which I watched with Ash in the living room. That was a fantastic session, so I'd seriously recommend watching it online if you haven't yet.

Next day was Fast Sunday, which I actually remembered to do (though I probably should've started it earlier...). It was also the day I was put into my new callings- member of the ward Activities Committee (basically, we're supposed to help out with activities and maybe suggest new ones every once in a while) and Relief Society chorister. I'm just grateful I'm not a teacher, because I don't think I can handle all that stress from a couple weeks prior happening again and again yet.

Okay, it's probably not smart to stop at talking about only two weeks when there's still six weeks to cover, but I don't think I can handle sitting in front of the laptop any longer. I'm just gonna end with a picture of the Bendaroo blood seal mentioned in the last post. Isn't it beautiful?

Bye!

"Let Your Light So Shine" Like an Athlete Talk

​Hello, brothers and sisters. I’m going to talk about "Let your light so shine". This comes from the scripture Matthew 5:16, which reads: "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." You may recall that, two years ago, President Thomas S. Monson had given a talk in General Conference about this, and linked it with another scripture, which is actually one of my favorites: 1 Timothy 4:12. This says, "...be an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity." Both of these make it pretty clear how to let this light shine: by doing service and being an example. But what, exactly, is this light?

For this answer, I decided I actually wanted to try reading a different talk, as well, and found one by Robert D. Hales from back in 2002, called "Out of Darkness Into His Marvelous Light". Here, he explains that the light we should be letting shine is one that "each of us brings ... to the earth, the Light of Christ." We know this by these scriptures in D&C 93:2--"And that I am the true light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world" and D&C 88:11-13--"And the light which shineth, which giveth you light, is through him who enlighteneth your eyes ... Which light proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space—The light which is in all things, which giveth life to all things..." I don't know about you, but that sounds pretty incredible to me. This light of Christ is literally from Him and is a piece of everyone and everything. It is what gives us life.

So that’s cool, but let’s go back to how we’re supposed to make the light of Christ within us shine. I think we hear a lot about being an example in church, but it's hard to think of the right way to go about it sometimes. Hopefully, by the end of this, what we're really being asked to do is a little clearer.

However, to do that, I'm going to talk about something totally random: the Olympics.

See, this talk that Hales gave was just a couple months after the Winter Olympics were held in Salt Lake City, so back then, it was the right year and time of year to talk about them, which he did a little bit of at the very beginning. I'll just read that for you: "Throughout the Olympics there have been many expressions of light, such as the Olympic flame; the child of light; and the theme, ‘Light the Fire Within.’ Perhaps the most memorable light was found in the eyes of the competitors themselves. But what moved us most was not the competition or the spectacle. It was the deeper truth these things symbolized—the source of the light within each of us." Okay, I'll be honest, I didn't really know what he was talking about at the beginning because I've pretty much never watched the Olympics, but I had a feeling of where he was going with it. The light within the competitors, the light within all of us--​ "Oh, maybe he'll continue with saying something like we need to exercise our faith like a dedicated athlete practices their sport!" Turns out the Olympics thing ended there... But what he said later still goes along a similar line as my train of thought, so I was getting close.

​Hales really​ continued on with saying this: "Light and darkness cannot occupy the same space at the same time. ... When light is present, darkness is vanquished and must depart. More importantly, darkness cannot conquer light unless the light is diminished or departs.​"​ What this translates to is that the light of Christ and the Holy Ghost, when present, can and will make Satan and all his different influences leave. What this is contingent on, though, is how strong the light is. The way to make darkness depart is to "learn to generate that light each day by believing on Jesus Christ and following His commandments". By doing this, you are also "learn[ing] to claim the protective light of the gospel as your own". On the flip side, Hales also said, “​Unless you are fully engaged in living the gospel—living it with all of your ‘heart, might, mind and strength’—you cannot generate enough spiritual light to push back the darkness.”

Alright, now let's pretend we all love the Olympics, we all love sports, and we don't hate working out. Not just that, let's pretend we're all Olympic athletes for a moment. The sport we've all chosen to work at, whether skiing, swimming, gymnastics, running--is very, very important to us. It is not just our career, but our life. Being a world-class athlete takes a lot of determination and dedication, and you've got to work at that sport daily if you want to compete. There's no "Nah, I'll skip out on practice on the weekends", because you can very quickly lose your progress the moment you take too much of a break. If you do, before long, you'll realize your endurance has dropped, you're forgetting what you're supposed to do next and how to do it, and you've stuck yourself in a rut. If your practice is infrequent, and you are not taking care of yourself, you are not at your prime. Without enough work, you can't be in the Olympics anymore. Without making sure you are doing your very best, always, the light within the competitors' eyes that Hales talked about fades away.

That felt like a thoroughly depressing thing I just made all of you Olympic athletes imagine, but it really does happen, in sports and in our spirituality. When we are feeding and exercising our faith and trying to do our best, we can maintain our testimony and make it stronger. We are making the light within us shine brightest when we live and breathe the gospel and strive to keep the commandments and covenants we have made with the dedication of an Olympic athlete. That also means we can easily dim or even shut off that light when we stop.

Notice, though, that people still aim for being part of the Olympics, despite the challenge that puts on their body, their skills, and their self-discipline. Why would they do that? Because they love what they do. Going through all the training an athlete of any caliber does, but especially theirs, requires a lot of love for the sport and participating in it. Being a spiritual athlete is a lot like that--praying, reading the scriptures, keeping the commandments, and overall worshiping God is meant to be how we show Him we love Him, and that we love showing Him we love Him. We don’t mind that it can be difficult to do what He asks of us because our love triumphs over giving up. Serving others and showing them how to love God and show that love, too, is worth a lot to people who have very bright lights.

​

I think that is the real key to understanding how you can be an example and let your light shine. It’s not that you're trying to look like a good person. Rather, you're doing things that show your love for God and that make you happy, and you're ​not ​afraid to let other people see that.

I remember at FSY last summer that Elder Salinas, an Area Seventy, had told us something that really stuck with me- if you want to be as happy as you were while on your mission, or going to a church camp, or whatever, then those things that you did so much of back then, reading scriptures and praying and serving, keep doing that. I find it true that realizing what habits make your day a little better and let the Spirit stick to you a little stronger, are what make you happy, and you're consistently happier when you do those things than when you stop, no matter what's going on in life. So, just like an athlete would hopefully practice their hearts out enough to show their light because they love their sport and it makes them happy, we should practice keeping ​the commandments and praying and strengthening our testimony wholeheartedly because we love Him and His gospel and we are happier when we do these things. We'll really let our light shine then.

I've known a couple spiritual athletes who shined their light bright to me. Like my mom- she wanted to baptize within days of meeting the missionaries when she was 19, and has held strong to the gospel since then. She later served a mission, wanting to go even though she was the breadmaker in her home, and even though she was essentially engaged to my dad. Luckily, he was willing to wait for her to finish the 18 months before getting hitched. She and my dad also strived to teach my sister and I the gospel and follow the prophets' mandates, like reading scriptures as a family and keeping the Sabbath day holy and keeping food storage. She already has so much faith and trust, but still strives to maintain it and grow.

I also had a Baptist friend in high school who was an example to me. She was fun and hilarious, and she strived to uplift rather than hurt people, and I was amazed when I saw her sit down at the lunch table, pull out her packed food, then do a silent prayer, right there in the cafeteria. She didn't feel embarrassed or try to hide that she was praying. I mean, that was back in Alabama, where people like to be more flashy about being Christians than Mormons typically like to be, so I guess that didn't throw other people off much, but I never had the guts to do that- I never even thought to do a prayer before lunch while at school. I really appreciated and respected her for that, and decided to follow her example. I became more determined to do prayers more often throughout the day, even in places where usually we'd say we shouldn't. I still do that because she showed me it's okay, and I’m glad she did.

I’d like to end with just saying that the light of Christ is real and letting it shine by truly loving Heavenly Father and His Son and letting your actions speak for that, you can really reach your potential to not just be happy yourself, but inspire others to do what makes them happy, too. It’ll also make it so much easier to fight off the darkness when you are firm in practicing and living the gospel like an athlete. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

(October 22, 2017)

Trying to Be Brave, Hanging with Middle Schoolers

Hello world!

For once, I thought I might actually get my diary done in a timely manner... then 5 weeks passed by. That's the worst I've done ever. I'm sad to say that's probably not gonna change in a long time.

A lot of the noteworthy things that happened this first week was meeting people, which is a great accomplishment for an introvert like me. First new person was on Tuesday- I was reading by the room for the Bio SI (supplemental instruction, given by TAs to help people review and understand anything they hadn't understood in the actual class; I already knew everything in these first couple chapters, but I went anyway in case there was something I'd missed after all), and another girl came by looking for the room, and we ended up chatting. Chrystal (I don't know yet how her name's spelled, so I feel less bad about using it) and I continued until we realized it was almost time for the SI to start and there was no one else waiting by the door too... and that's how we figured out we were waiting by the wrong door. So, ironically, it was a very similar situation to how I met Jacky in the last post. (I found out the next day that we not only shared the same biology class, but the same chemistry class too!)

Wednesday, I went to a talk/lecture by a scientist. Turns out this college is his alma mater, but now he works at Harvard, which says quite a bit about his credibility. He had some interesting stuff to say, so of course I took notes on the things that stood out to me. Afterward, I kinda wanted to ask him something, since he was here, but I just didn't quite know what. Nonetheless, I somehow got myself to join the line that had formed of people who wanted to talk to him, and ruminated on what question(s) I could ask. Meanwhile, one of the faculty who had attended started talking to me and the guy in front of me, who turned out to also be a freshman, and the faculty guy said he was really happy and impressed that we had attended, and asked about our interests and such. We soon made it to the front of the line, and the other freshman asked the scientist, "How do you know what you really want to study?" which was actually very close to one of the two questions I had come up with myself, so I just snuck into the conversation to hear the answer. He told us it was A-OK that we didn't quite know the specific field we want yet, and it was actually probably for the better since that meant we'd need to explore while here, and encouraged us to take a variety of classes and try to get in on research early. I then asked my own second question, based on remembering how he had told us about being in undergrad research himself: "Was it hard for you to talk to your professors to do that kind of thing?" because I really wanted to try to do something like that myself- probably next semester or next year, since as of now I'm still not really all that knowledgeable and useful for a lab or whatever- but had a hard time imagining myself actually doing it... How the heck do you do that?

He agreed that it was very hard, but he needed to be brave, remember that all the faculty are there to help the students succeed/achieve their goals, and just ask, and encouraged me to do the same. He'd pointed out I was able to get myself to talk to him, but that really did take quite a bit of courage for me, and I'd already started to feel exhausted by making myself be brave a lot lately, and knew this definitely wasn't the end of that feeling. Admittedly, I had the suspicion that's all he'd come up with advice-wise on the subject, but then he did two things I never expected- one, he challenged me to speak to one of the main faculty for biology, one of the major people he himself worked with as an undergrad here, and said he'd give me $5 if I did so. (Yeah, it sounded so bizarre to me, too.) Second, he pulled out one of his business cards and handed it to me- he didn't do that for anyone else, as far as I know- and told me to be unafraid to call him if there was anything he could do for me. Considering I was- well, still am- just a little freshman, and he lived on the other end of the country, yet decided he would want to hear from me (and give me $5) was... I dunno how to describe it. I remained a little suspended in disbelief the rest of the night, to be honest. I am kinda hoping I can take him up on both offers sometime in the future, though, and so have put up his business card and things he said on my bedroom door so I have that reminder. Since I was already doing that, I also finally put up my FMA and The Lego Movie posters, and formed Al's blood seal with red Bendaroos, a feat I am very much proud of. (P.S.- I've chatted with the fellow freshman, Nicholas, a couple times since then, since we tend to catch each other at Bio SIs.)

I met a couple more girls at that week's Anime Club (and found a fellow Fiction Writing classmate there, as well; I'd had the feeling since the first day of class that I'd like hanging out with her), and later went to a service club's opening social for a bit. I'm pretty sure I've already mentioned how I was hoping to get involved in service while in college, and this was the first step. This club, which I guess I'll call Tutoring Club, is where we can volunteer to tutor at K-12 schools after classes. I was nervous to try to do it, seeing as I haven't really had much experience with something like that, but I still wanted to try, so I got brave- look at that, had to do it again- and signed up for the middle school. Unfortunately, it really didn't work for any days but Tuesday because of the times of some of my classes... but I figured it was better than just not going at all.

I've gone every Tuesday since then, and I'm happy I did. I haven't really gotten to do much actual tutoring, actually, but I've been doing my best to help, and I've also been hanging out for the second half of Boys & Girls Club after the normal homework help time is over. As of yet, I still wonder if I'm acting more like an adult (AKA someone useful) or just like one of the kids, but I'm pretty sure I definitely haven't got the "adult" part down yet. I feel guilty about that, but the girls who work there apparently still like me, and I feel like I'm warming up a little at a time to the kids and how to talk to them. Something hilarious that happened the first couple times, actually, is that everyone thought I was just one of the middle-schoolers! (One kid there, after hearing the revelation that I was 18, actually went as far as to say, "No offense, but you look like you're nine.") Ah, how refreshing it is for people to still do that. (I recounted that to a couple different people, like roommates and my new lab group, and they all thought I was offended, even though I was laughing while telling them. They also tried saying stuff like, "Well, at least they said you look like an 8th grader and not a 6th..." I guess that's true, but do you not see the delight on my face? I'm used to this, and I love this, and I think it's the funniest thing ever.)

I'll mention the girls that work there (not volunteer) now, since I think I'll be talking more about them in the future. The first is in charge of the homework help, and I met her on my very first day. I think I'll call her Mak. She's planning to become an LA teacher, so I'm hoping we can help each other out with our English-related assignments every once in a while. She's really nice and chill, and was actually willing to take me home after everything (and to Smith's, once, when I admitted I needed a couple things, like quarters for the clothes washers and dryers in my apartment complex). The second is in charge of Boys & Girls Club activities, if I got that right, and... okay, I'm sorry, but I don't quite remember her name. I don't know why, but barely anyone refers to her by name at the school, and it's killing me. (Now that I think about it, it's probably because all the kids refer to all the adults as "Teacher".) She brought me home a couple times, too, and we even spent some time together last Tuesday going to her dog-sitting job and getting a couple free veggies at this thing they were doing at the college. Something we talked about during that time was the nonprofit organization she said she was planning to start up with a friend this December to help people who live in refugee camps in Greece (because she'd volunteered there a couple summers ago and was disgusted by the conditions). I'm gonna call her Frourá (according to Google Translate, the Greek word for "guard", since I was kinda thinking along the lines of how she wants to guard the refugees from further trauma, abuse, etc. when they just escaped from such a terrible situation). There's also the school principal, and the woman who is in charge of after-school activities in general, but I haven't really talked to them as much.

Since I've pretty much unloaded everything about Tutor Tuesdays thus far, I'll just finish with a couple other memories from them that stood out to me. One is that, a little before my second time boarding the bus to go to the middle school, my mom sent a text that they just felt a big earthquake, but everyone was fine. (As you may recall, she'd gone down to Mexico for the month to take care of her mom.) She called me when Mak was bringing me home the second time to assure me a little more that, yes, they were okay, though the text had been enough to assuage me. I knew earthquakes were relatively common in Mexico, so I hadn't been all that worried, though I imagined it was kinda scary at first for her and Abuelita, since she'd said it was strong. I'd had a reality check later, though, when I saw my sister post on Facebook about the earthquake and how she'd been really shaky for the rest of the day upon hearing about it, and it turns out that earthquake really was bad. Bad. The worst in years, and people died in it. Then there was the second quake, which my mom and Abuelita felt, too, and I'm so grateful that they and everyone else in my family were far enough away from the center of both to not be in real danger, because things would be so different now if they hadn't been. They could've died in the earthquake (oh my gosh, and it was the anniversary of the earthquake in the 80's my mom told me about, and I'm wondering why she and everyone else had to go through these), or at least been severely injured, like so many other people in all the natural disasters that happened over this month. Seriously, giant hurricanes and earthquakes and forest fires one after the other, boom boom boom, and it felt a little like the Earth was falling apart while I was over here just trying to figure out how to do college. Unfortunately, the string of bad stuff just keeps going, and I don't know what to do about it besides pray and donate a bit of money to the Church's humanitarian fund.

Last Tuesday, the middle school's book fair was going on, and (for once, since I'd never bothered at my own schools, from what I remember) I decided to buy something there. Though I was interested by a lot of books there (and took pics of those), the only one I was willing to sacrifice my wallet to was Wonder by RJ Palacio, the only book there I've already read. I raved about it a good long while in 11th grade (and got me to love "Space Oddity" by David Bowie), and I was so sure I could never not love that book. It was about $18, much like the other books (dangnabbit, why'd everything have to be a hard-cover, guys?!), but as long as I still love Auggie to bits, I'm pretty sure it's an $18 pretty well-spent. While hanging out with the kids later, Frourá had set up a painting project, and a couple of the girls ended up using remaining acrylic paint to doodle on their arms and other kids' faces, and I ended up joining them, too... Oops. I promise I tried to avoid the temptation, especially considering how I was wearing a whole lotta black and FMA for October 3rd (which I'm totally going to talk about later, trust me), but it was too strong for me.

I also painted a couple blue dots under Frourá's eyes and a blue arrow on her forehead (because Aang for the win).

(Side-note: Seeing these middle-schoolers with their dark humor and sass are reminding me that I was a whole lot like them at that age... Not as extroverted, obviously, but it's embarrassing to realize that even I was subject to the eccentricities of a 13-year-old mind. I can't decide if I should show them some of the stuff I used to watch when I was in middle school, since they'd surely like them as well, but I also feel like I shouldn't encourage that kind of thing at the same time? Ugh.)

I have sooo much more to say, but I'm gonna be going to ward prayer in a bit and just wanna get this post out because I don't want to put off putting anything up any longer. I'm gonna work on telling about all these past few weeks a little at a time, and hopefully I can eventually catch up and stop doing this to myself.

Beginning College After Birthday and Memories

Hi-o, world!

K, I didn't post on Sunday, as we spent quite a bit of the day at my grandma and grandpa's house, celebrating one of my cousin's birthdays (and I found out J's is next week, too!). His dad made steak tacos (which were quite good, so good job, Uncle) and later there was cake and ice cream. I also hung out with Elenita in my room for a while once home (we played Battleship, mope.io, and a wee bit of Electric Man 2, and we were meanwhile petting and annoying PB! A grand ol' time!). (Oh, and Flower said something at church about how she learned in her other ward something about Heavenly Father being just like us before? She didn't entirely explain, but that resonated a lot with that God Cycle story concept I'd mentioned earlier this year... or is it now a conspiracy?!?! ILLUMINATI CONFIR-

Anyway, there... honestly wasn't much that's happened, thank goodness, so I'll just get that over with, as there's something I'd like to try at the end!

So, besides the birthday plans I already said, there was a little more. For one, I was gifted this necklace in church that has a pendant with all the Young Women Values colors. I like it a lot, but I'm wondering if I'll find a good opportunity to wear it... Also, while hanging with Broranges, when we reached the obligatory guitaring and singing, he played for me a little song he'd written a long time ago, and that got me like "Oh my gosh, should I return the favor???" So, I got the courage to go to my blog's Songs label and ended up showing him the lyrics to "Chained" (since that seemed like one of the least embarrassing), and he ended up saying it wasn't that bad for someone starting out, which sounded like it was barely a compliment... But I'll take it!

And, at the end, he said my present could just be that I keep his DS, and gave me a few more games for it! I was like "Woah!" and he was like "Whatever". I'm hoping I'll make the most out of this little device, even as I... mostly ignore it... But I tried some Scribblenauts, and plan to try the other games and finish Pokémon: Emerald eventually, so I guess that's good enough.

Monday, I updated my Blogger profile, as is the birthday tradition. Like, I don't even know what to put for favorite music anymore... For the longest time, I'd just had my childhood favorites and a couple artists I always name off the top of my head from more recent years, but I honestly listen to a gazillion different things and feel like those things alone aren't enough to describe my taste, but I can't just name every single artist I've got a song from... Agh! At least everything else in the profile is a little easier to contain in a proper description/list and feel accurate.

Also, I found a Vocaloid song called "Rugrats Theory" that I'm honestly a little surprised I hadn't heard before...

Next day had a nearby Vietnamese restaurant. Yum. (Aaand no one cares.)

I did some QQ with Liz on Wednesday, after waaaaay too long not working on that story with her! Good thing it's pretty easy to catch back up on what the heck we'd been doing there, cuz otherwise I'd so be in trouble. (I feel bad that, ever since the beginning of the year, I've been a lot less present/available on Hangouts, and she gets frustrated that I'm never there, and it's extremely possible that'll get worse once I start college NEXT FREAKIN' WEEK, AAAAAHHH!!!)

Yesterday and last Wednesday, I did these short online courses now required for incoming students to the university to do this month before school starts about sexual abuse and alcohol (more specifically, how to prevent bad things from happening and what to do when bad things end up happening), which sometimes felt a bit... cheesy, somehow, or repetitive, but in general I'm pretty glad they told me to do those.

Thursday, I ended up going to wash dishes- this time, for real, not ending up preparing food and serving instead- and I stayed there for 11 hours. That was exhausting in a way I don't remember ever feeling before, because I was standing that entire time besides my lunch break and a short break I took near the end because my hands and feet seriously needed it. Man, my hands suffered. But one of the most frustrating things about the job were my fellow coworkers. They were all teenagers that basically never talked to each other unless necessary. Some of them had also brought earbuds and listened to music the entire time (which seemed terrible to me because it was already loud down there with the fans and whatever, and now you're gonna mask it by blaring who knows what straight into your eardrums?). The job could've been so much funner (and I doubt would've gone any slower than we were already going) if they bothered to socialize a little, but no. (Also, one of those guys was one of those people who always do their work in a really angry way? Like, he didn't seem like an angry kid in general, though I imagine he hardly enjoyed his job, but I couldn't help but flinch when he washed dishes and such so aggressively, like taking out his anger at the world on them. Also, pretty sure he couldn't stand how slow I was working in comparison, no matter how straight-faced he was the whole time.) At least I had my mental radio to keep me company... And during the later half of the day, when the boys ended up leaving me alone to do some stuff upstairs (like put away what we'd already washed), I found the freedom to sing and dance (mostly sing) to myself for quite some time, which was fun. I think I almost got caught a couple times, but I managed to restrain myself more when the other kids were around.

Also, I got rewarded with a little bit of my mom's cheesecake a while (and not standing, thank goodness) after I'd finally gone home... and I'll get about $100 to add to my bank account when my paycheck arrives. It's looking like I'll pretty much be paying for my food and whatever else while my parents pay for my housing and textbooks, so the more money I've got in my own pocket, the more likely I won't starve. *thumbs-up*

Next day, we went for some school supplies at Walmart, and brought some boxes from the storage unit home so I can start packing up for college (for real, this time, though I used the little boxes I already had some clothes reserved for college in for some of my stuff). As of now, I've pretty much got all my clothes done, so now to focus on everything I need/want to bring... I hope I don't end up bringing way too many stuffed animals/trinkets to display, considering that's one of the things I have a hard time living in a room without.

Saturday was also super exhausting, because we were helping move CapSis's stuff out of their apartment to Cap's parents' guesthouse, seeing as they, yanno, are gonna live in this area now (though an official place hasn't been found yet). The Dream Team included CapSis themselves, plus me, my mom, and two of my sister's old friends (so it was quite, quite awkward in the car, since we don't know them as much as she does). It was really hot outside, and also I'm more used to taking my time with packing up everything to move (though this was definitely a lot less than what we usually have to deal with, that's still a lot of items, sir), so it took a huge toll on me and everyone else. I felt a little bad that I seemed to be the one that got out of it sooner than everyone else, and couldn't figure out if I had a legitimate reason or was just being a whiny wimp. Regardless, we got most of it out of there and into the guesthouse, and man were we happy when it was over. (Today, though, we went to go properly clean the apartment and get anything else we'd left behind the first time, and... yeah. Not too fun. A little better than the other day, though, with conditions a bit nicer and no awkwardness since her friends weren't with us this time.)

Also, completely unrelated, Sis and I ended up making flash cards for the toki pona words we've got written down so far. I know it wouldn't necessarily be as useful as other languages I've kinda wanted to learn, but I'm still hoping I gain at least an amateur level of fluency in it and can speak with my sis in toki pona! No one else will know what we're saying to each other! Muahaha!

I might've mentioned something about how my phone turns out to have a pitiful amount of space available, and it's been getting worse, and pretty much reached its peak in terribleness last week. I'd already been thinking about transcribing texts (mostly Carter's because he's given me tons of DoH info over text that I hadn't written down somewhere else), but it was now urgent. And turns out there's not really a good way to do that yet. It took a lot of battling, but I eventually got the SMSs on my laptop in a readable format (though the best one is the one saved as a webpage, which would be unfortunate if I wanted to access it without wifi), and... I'm really unsure if I want to go through that whole thing again with texts from other friends. Of course I love my other friends, but I haven't texted most of them as much as I've texted Carter, and I think it's not really necessary to preserve texts when usually my favorite interactions with them were in person, not via text. And, I mean, I ended up not getting to keep my texts from my old phone number when I switched, but I've survived without those (though once I kinda wished I could go look through the ones with my sister's first boyfriend and reassure her that I definitely gave him all the sass he deserved from a justifiably unhappy preteen little sister), so...

(Okay, up to here was what I'd written Aug. 16th... Yeah, I didn't get to finish after all. So, that's frustrating. I think I have a decent amount of time today, though, so hopefully I can really catch up to the present.)

Thursday, I went to hang out with Diamond (I think that's the codename I gave her) at the mall, so she could return my book (The Ties that Bind, a light novel from the FMA franchise) and we could just talk and hang out one last time before I left. We actually spent most of that time just chatting in the cafeteria, long before and after we got some food from Panda Express. We also visited Justice for a bit, and lamented about how we didn't fit in this kind of stuff anymore. (The emoji trend is super annoying to me, and there's still stuff that has too much in that store, but I think it isn't as bad as a couple years ago.)

I guess this is kinda funny, how the fact that I was going to be living on my room truly hit home when I'd come home to find lots of new groceries, and my mom showed me all the stuff she and my dad and sister had picked out for me, and they were talking about stuff that I could cook or how often I should clean... I dunno, it was a serious "Whoa" moment, and I think I almost teared up because not only did I suddenly have to deal with the responsibility of doing things to keep myself alive and healthy, but they went out of their way to get me so much stuff and I knew it was going to be a long time before I could ever begin to repay them for everything they've been doing when they don't need to.

Friday, my family said it was my pick for a restaurant before I moved, and after them naming some suggestions we went to the dim sum place again. This time, though, we mostly got stuff from the normal menu (and our specially-ordered tomato and egg dish, which was super delish, as always). I also got to go to the concert with my sister and one of her old friends (in the place of Captain). The venue was a little... sketchier-looking than we expected, and they took a long time to finally start the events, which was the downside. Once the band was up, though, they did an awesome job! I had a really fun time listening to them do some of the songs from the EP I've put on repeat so many times since I got it, but also some that I hadn't heard (and one that they'd just written earlier that day!). I was practically vibrating from excitement a lot of the time they were up on stage. The only downside to being so close to the stage was also that it was so loud, but that's what happens when you've got a passionate singer, awesome keyboardist/guitarist (dude, his guitar skills were so slick and impressive), and a recently-recruited drummer. Later, we bought a couple pins with their band name, and my sister introduced me to the band and I took a couple pictures with them (that I think I looked super awkward in, oops). They were so happy about how I came here for my birthday and wanted to find out stuff about me and I was a bit of a nervous wreck because it isn't very often a normal person gets to meet one of their favorite bands. But yeah, overall I'm glad I got to go (and have my sister there, too).

The next day I went to work once again, most of the day washing dishes. Flower and Lala were there, though, (along with a radio,) so it wasn't as bad as the sometimes-overwhelming silence of the week before until they left for a catering. Then, the rest of the dishes were done with that angry guy and a girl who I'd helped with prepping a couple times (and she'd put on the music on her phone). I was then asked if I was up for a small catering, and I actually did. Turns out it was just me and Ramos, a guy who was once my branch president, going to a small high school reunion at the park. These folks graduated in '62! Honestly, both of us were impressed by how most of them were in pretty dang good shape, and they all seemed so happy; I hope I'll be like them at that age. It was also nice to hang out with him for real, since I just hadn't really talked to him much when we were in the same ward.

(I probably shouldn't be talking about this, but I can't help myself. Late that night, we were finishing up some more packing, and I remembered that my Genie Bras are in absolutely terrible shape and honestly not that useful anymore, and my mom had tried getting me some new stuff but most of it just didn't feel right, and so we went to Walmart together to buy a bunch of new stuff together, hoping there was something I would like more. By then, though, the fitting rooms were closed. I remembered that I had a camisole on underneath my shirt... and so, in an act of desperation, I half-hid and quickly tried on some of the options over my cami. We ended up buying a lot of what we picked out that night, but it's such a bizarre story, and my mom and I were honestly concerned about if we might've been caught by the cameras and then it gets put on Youtube or something in a compilation titled "Only at Walmart" or something. We don't want to be one of those people!)

Monday, I moved into my new apartment! During the solar eclipse! (Yep, that's right. We didn't bother getting eclipse glasses. I can say, though, that at least I saw the little crescents in the shadow of the big tree near my new front door. That was in my physics textbook last year, so I was excited to see it for myself.) I had a tearful goodbye with my sister before coming up to my new residence with my parents in a minivan full of drum set equipment, a few boxes with kitchenware and school supplies, and bags of clothes and food. It was... kinda a weird feeling that day. We rushed to get all the stuff into my room and start unpacking some things- honestly, there's a couple things I haven't fully bothered to do yet, like finish decorating- and then we went out for IHOP (while there, my mom told me what she'd heard about the movie theater in Abuelita's tiny village back in the day- no roof, no floor, lots of scorpions, and everyone was so excited to be watching a movie that they were not shy in the slightest about shouting commentary at the screen), and then to Walmart for a couple things, and then... they had to go, so I hugged them, and then they went out the door, and I was alone in my new place, and I think it still didn't feel 100% real yet. Maybe partly because they helped me so much, a lot more than I think I deserve, honestly, because even though I'm technically an adult they still have to pay for my housing, and my dad bought some of my textbooks himself, and now they're still buying me tons of food and other stuff, and what makes me feel worse is that they probably did have to get me all that after all, because my personal money that I worked 8-11 hour shifts for isn't stretching out as much as I was hoping, and maybe it'll only be enough for this semester... It's things like this that make me wish I was as good as my sister at this whole "independence" thing, because I'm not. At all.

But, I mean, I've survived since then, technically... I walked around to different parts of campus a couple times, tried cooking stuff on my own (everything's come out technically edible and really close to what it should be like, but not perfect), and tried to go to most of the campus events. Some of the events were really cool, actually- there was one where lots of businesses on/around Main Street put up stalls or opened their doors to give us samples, coupons, etc. so freshmen would have a taste of what's available in the area (and all those samples were basically my dinner that day- I also bought an adorable tiny elephant made in Kenya from a store that's a non-profit fair-trade place, which would be nice to buy a little more from if I think my bank account can handle it). Another was where they had all us freshmen go one night to listen to a couple people speak about us starting a new journey, and that we will also end here for our (second) commencement (which really was cool to think about), and then we went with little lanterns to the campus's (non-athletic) field and formed into the school's representative letter, so the overhead picture taken shows tiny lights on the ground that's actually us! People then took the little lights out of their lanterns and threw them up into the air, which was kinda terrifying because some landed really close to me and Weston, but he was having the time of his life and throwing lights too because I guess he's like that.

Yes, Weston is a friend I made here (at the "first commencement" thing, actually)! He's a freshman, too, and is studying... mechanical engineering, if memory serves correctly. He's also into various sports and hiking and wall-climbing and pretty much all that stuff I'm not. I brought him to the Anime Club a few days ago, though, and he seemed to enjoy that, so maybe we can still have something in common in this friendship. *cheesy wink* (Since I'm already mentioning the club, which I already love so far, I met another girl who I think is now a friend, too, while trying to find the meeting place, who I guess I'll dub as Jacky for now because I can't think of any inside jokes to use thus far besides how we have the same Attack on Titan T-shirt. We also watched a bit of Nichijou and Death Parade during club, and I and everyone else found both very interesting [and funny, with the first anime].)

I also made a couple other friends in my freshman-only class... kinda? One guy turned out to have served in the same area I lived in in Alabama (!!!), but it looks like he got there once we'd already bailed on the English ward for the Spanish branch instead. He's pretty cool, but I haven't really talked to him much since the initial meeting. Another guy who I just haven't seen much since I first talked to him actually came to talk with me at the swingset when our teachers brought us to the park. He's into woodwork and metalwork, which I thought was pretty cool (especially cuz he mentioned making wooden swords!). I also met a group of girls (one I went to the Main Street thing with, another actually got shown in the video about our lantern photo!) who I've talked to a little- I mostly hung out with them before the park, when the teachers had us go to their favorite pizzeria, which was really good, to be honest. (I loved my teachers a lot. I really hope I get to talk to them throughout my time here.) I also talked a while with a girl before class whose name I can't remember for the life of me, but she was really peppy and interesting to talk to (and she's a few weeks younger than me!). I actually went with her to a dance that happened after the lantern photo, which was fun but sooo sweaty and exhausting because the room was jam-packed with people to the point where it was hard to breathe the moment you went in.

I believe I'd mentioned that we were supposed to read When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi for the class? His wife actually came for a live interview about the book and Paul and their daughter. Just like Paul, she had a lot of insightful things to say, so I'm glad I was taking notes of things that stood out to me, and also that she was okay with bothering to talk to a bunch of college freshmen, especially with some heavy topics like this.

We also got to see Tim Gabrielson, this hilarious comedian-magician that had us burst out laughing a lot. (I sat by a couple girls I met who had been talking to people in the Humanities/Social Sciences Department, an English major who ranted passionately about the things that bugged her about her favorite shows (so I returned the favor with ranting about the couple things that always irked me about FMA), and an Asian Studies major who wore an FMA shirt, and so got cool points from me even though she admitted she hadn't watched anime in a long time.)

...Both the previous paragraphs happened before the "first commencement". I accidentally got things out of order. Now, we're at my first Saturday at the campus.

For one, this was right around when my roommates finally started moving in, too. (Yeah, I was alone there for most of the week. Sometimes I was cool with it, sometimes I put on music because the silence was weirding me out.) My mom and dad also came to visit (with a second round of Walmart and such). It took a few days to finally get to meet all of my roomies (seriously), but now that I have, I honestly like all of them, which is a big relief. I've actually gotten to do a couple things with them, too. I helped Barbie bring in her stuff (dang, she brought in a lot more than me- and I have a drum set to deal with!), I went up to campus on my first day with Meg (she's actually the only girl that was also here last year, so she knew the girl I bought the contract from), watched Boku no Hero Academia with Terra last Tuesday (and we also found out that you can still send telegrams!) and went to the nearby burger joint last Saturday, and went to church, ward prayer, and bingo (I'll talk about that later) with Ash. They're all juniors and seniors, along with most of the people in this area, so there's a mix of them complaining about college to each other and encouraging me to enjoy college (which I've witnessed a couple times from other upperclassmen, too), which always seems a little odd and ironic to me. Regardless, I hope they can help me out with learning how to navigate this new world as it starts getting to more difficult assignments and I have more responsibilities to worry about. *sneaks a look at my overflowing laundry basket still waiting to be washed*

That night, there was also a freshman pep rally and dance. I found Weston there, so we spent most of the time there chatting and dancing, so that was fun, but I still get a little disappointed by how I keep forgetting that most people don't dance at dances (regardless of culture, as far as I've seen lately). Weston was putting in some effort, which was greatly appreciated, but it feels weirder to be dancing when almost no one else is, you know? And I also tend to forget that most pep rallies are not really all that fun (though now I'm wondering if it's because we were freshmen, because at the bingo game I'll touch on later, it looked like mostly upperclassmen were there, and they knew a whole lot better how to be a fun, rowdy crowd).

The day after was Sunday, my first time at a Young Single Adults ward (AKA YSA), which is certainly different from normal wards. It's also new to feel like I need to talk to a lot more people in a new ward than usual (which is a little intimidating). I mean, I've always had pretty much just the kids and leaders in my Sunday School and Young Women classes to learn to talk to (and maybe a bishop), but now the classes are a lot bigger because now we're all adults and I am in Relief Society! I imagine this is still easier than if I tried to start with a normal ward's RS because they're all mostly two or three years older and most of them're going to college, but it's still a little ahhh! Sometimes I forget just how bad I am at socializing compared to most people because lots of my friends are also bad at socializing!

As if that wasn't bad enough, yesterday... it was the first Sunday of the month, which means we're all supposed to be fasting (oops, totally forgot) and it's testimony meeting, and I ended up feeling like I really needed to go up there, and like what always happens when I'm up at the pulpit without a script (I ran what I wanted to say over and over through my head, but that's usually not enough), I started to cry. The embarrassing part is that I am pretty dang sure I was the one that cried the most up there! Imagine the kind of impression that put on people when it's only my second Sunday there! (I know Ash said they must've felt the Spirit strongly because of me, but I admitted I probably cried because of the Spirit and nerves worse than anyone else who went up. Either way, I felt like women were now going to talk to me out of pity.) More people certainly talked to me, but I always wanted to scream every time they mentioned my testimony.

My mom actually visited again later that day, because she'd hitched a ride with Lia's family, because they were all coming to help her move into her new apartment. They also said they'd feed us, but it turned out they meant going to a restaurant, which never feels very good on Sundays. (Yesterday, Lia's family visited her again, and they invited me over for pizza- I dunno, I thought they'd brought some leftover Little Caesar's pizza from home or something, since they've done something like that when they invited my family for dinner before, back at home, obviously among other food too. But nope, turns out they meant going to a restaurant again, this time the pizzeria I'd gone to with my class a couple weeks earlier. It was still good, and fun, as after eating, me and Lala and Elenita played a really poor version of billiards since we don't know very much about the actual rules. I also showed off a little bit of what I remembered from the long staff form from back when I was in kung fu. I was unsurprised that I didn't remember the whole thing, because there was always a part in the second half I'd forget back then. So yeah, it was fun, but I think I'll accept their offers for food less often because I just feel so bad about eating out on Sundays.)

(Oh, and there's a note about how we ended up listening to Tiny Tim once back in the car to drop me off at my apartment. We'd gotten in a really weird mood due to tiredness...)

Okay, now to my first day. Honestly, I don't think it was my best first day of school... I got to two of my classes late because I got a little lost. I also got the rude awakening that I'd totally forgotten to get the lab for my chemistry class on my schedule, so once home I got on some waitlists because literally every single lab is full beyond belief. I also dropped one of my electives (which was just one credit) since I now had to deal with the lab credit and it was going to be hard to get there on time anyway. (I really hope I can take it another semester, because it was a self-defense class, which sounds fun and useful.) Oh, and I ended up carrying around my chemistry textbook all day because I'd wanted to show my professor my book in case it wouldn't work for the class. (Turns out he couldn't care less about the book.)

It wasn't all bad, though. I had a good feeling about all of my teachers, and I made a friend in my chemistry class! I think I'll call him Jett, for some reason. (It turns out he also has the same biology class as me, but that one's a huuuge lecture hall so I haven't seen him there yet, and he has trig before that class, too, just like me! It's a different teacher, though.) There was also a carnival on the school field later. I got a churro and a bit of Terra's cotton candy, and then went into one of the inflatable games (failed at that, but it was still fun) and this one ride that went around and around and around fast enough that it's hard to keep your head up and it made me giggle drunkenly.

Something really awesome happened later that day. I was supposed to be getting ready for bed, but I ended up going to check on the TAU updates anyways, and it turns out they had a little TAU chat going on on this site called Discord. I was suddenly like "Oh my gosh, would I actually get to talk to some of the writers?!" and "Oh my gosh, could I actually see if anyone would have any advice for the Azul story?!" so, though nervous, I got onto the site. Yep, one of the people who posts often besides the mods was there, along with a couple other people, so they talked to me for a while (by chat at first, then we turned on our mics- it's always a different experience actually hearing someone's voice, isn't it?) about Azul and writing in general, assuring me that the story did sound interesting, but I should worry less about making it "good" and more about making it what I want it to be. I think I was kinda forgetting that, and feeling like I needed to make it a lot more intricate so other people were sure to like it and so that it'd be more on the caliber of my favorite writers, but as long as I'm passionate about it and it's what I really want, then that's when stories are worth reading, and though you shouldn't be all that worried about what other people think, people will like your work when it's done this way. So... yeah, I'm gonna focus less on sub-plots and planning out dramatic twists and all and just see what I really, truly want from this story, and let the characters fill in the rest. That's the plan, anyway. (I hope, regardless, I'll hang out with these peeps again, when I think I can take the time to.)

Tuesday, I began my first Institute class. I'd originally been in a normal class, but when I realized the peer tutor classes (ones that have special ed students) were voluntary and they'd probably need anyone they could get, I felt like I should try it. I mean, I haven't really had much experience with this kind of thing, but I've had a couple friends with autism, at least, some of them very close to me. Maybe that could be the start to getting me ready for this kind of thing, and this could help me build a little experience and confidence for more things that could come later. And the nice thing is, I feel like I am learning about the gospel in this class, too. I'm still nervous as heck about the whole "peer mentor" idea and about if I'll do good enough of a job, but I'm also excited and willing, and that's the most important thing, right?

Thus far, I've been paired with both Joshes in the class (heh), and gonna stay with one of them, who had reminded me a lot of Crazy Insane Person (it'd be rude to call her that if she didn't insist on people calling her that herself) on the first day of class. I think it'll go better with someone like me, pretty shy, paired with someone who's more outgoing and will get me to open up and talk more to them and in the class, a lot like what happened when I first met Crazy in seminary. They both also have a very spiritual aura about them and an eagerness to learn about the gospel, which makes me happy and feel the Spirit myself more, too. So yeah, I'm hoping this goes well.

Later that day, I heard a speech from a man in the Humanities/Social Sciences department who had won an award for his work in Latinx American Studies and advocating initiatives with Latino/a communities in the US. He told us about his life, which was a little heartbreaking but impressive and fascinating. He was from Guerrero (that's where my mom was born!), and crossed the border to California to work and attend high school. When he managed to become a legal resident and go to college, he ended up having a hard time in his master's program. He wanted to do Latino/a American Studies, which didn't exist in that college back then, and so he basically had to create that whole field within the college himself, and he had no one to help him with his thesis. Imagine doing something like that all alone! But he was very determined and did it, and not only was he proud to have accomplished that, it gave him such an impressive resumé that he could basically work anywhere he wanted, and he was doing what he was passionate about (well, and still is, presumably). He urged us to become successful people who don't find a place to fit in, but create their unique space in their field, and pursue whatever big dreams they have.

I talked to him a little later, starting off with having Mexican pride (because I do) and how his message was very inspiring, and he was very excited to tell me personally that I should not be afraid to accomplish whatever it is I really want to do. I didn't have the heart to tell him, though, that... I don't really have a huge, out-there dream I want to do. I mean, I've got a bucket-list, which is probably somewhere in this diary of mine, and there's things I hope my future self will do, but it's more of a "keep doing all those things I love so that I'll be happiest and a unique individual", not something big like becoming president of the United States (which sounds like a horrible job to me, honestly, though I would love to see a Latina become president someday). Maybe that's something I should be pursuing here in college- not just studying to grow intellectually and as a person, and reaching the job I will enjoy the most, whatever that is, but finding the difficult thing(s) I want to do to really make a mark on the world. I'm not much for big dreams, but maybe there'll be one that really matters a lot to me, and I'll find a way to actually reach it.

Next day was the day tons of departments, organizations, clubs, and businesses put up stalls in the school field (yeah, they've been using it a lot lately) to recruit people and such. I ended up putting myself on the email list for some clubs (mostly diversity-related clubs and the Anime Club, because those are a given with me) and some service projects. I don't know how many of those I'll actually have the guts to join in on, because a couple are similar to what I'm doing at the Institute but I'm still super nervous about things like that, evidently, and a couple other ones use time that I'm not sure I'll know how to balance well with my classes yet (I've only been here for a week, give me a break), stuff like that... But one of the things I really wanted to do in college was get myself into a little bit of service, so hopefully soon I'll feel at least somewhat confident to join one or two of them officially, to start, and see where that takes me.

That happened around lunchtime and my fiction writing class, and a couple hours afterwards there was gonna be a small music festival on the field, so I just waited around on the bench by my last class writing. I think I was starting to take some of the advice the TAUers had given me, along with what we'd already talked about so far in class, to heart as I began that first writing assignment. It ended up just being about a kid who couldn't resist the temptation of spinning around in his sister's office chair, only for it to break the moment she catches him. Nothing super grand, but I was passionate about it (because that really is fun, and I've already whirled around a little in the computer lab's chairs when I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be doing that as an 18-year-old) and put my heart into it, and did my best to work on using five senses, like talked about in class, and also to get most of it done in one sitting, also like said in class (which I used to do, when I was just barely starting to write fics, and I agreed that it was a good habit I needed to regain). I also carried around the same small notebook as I listened to the different musical artists, hoping they could inspire a bit for any of my stories or just random lines that could become songs of my own someday. Lia came by near the end, so we hung out during that time, and when we both felt too fatigued and hungry to stay any longer, she brought me to her apartment for food. She also left me half a cantaloupe that I've been slowly finishing off.

Thursday is when that bingo game happened. More specifically, High Stakes Bingo, something that apparently happens once a semester, and sooo many people were trying to get in. Honestly, I only managed to get in because Ash (wait, now I'm wondering if I've already used that codename for someone else... oops) and her friends had stayed outside after the first round of bingo got full, so they were close to the door when the second round was about to open, and they let me cut in. (I usually feel so bad about cutting in lines, but so many people were already doing it, too...) Like mentioned before, it was a really rowdy crowd, because this is apparently one of the funnest events of the year. The thing is, everyone's super excited over the huge prizes. There was an Apple Watch, an Amazon Echo, an iPad, a kayak, a flat-screen TV... yeah, people were super excited to get the prizes. (I personally wasn't actually as ecstatic about winning, because if I did get one of those prizes, I'd most likely sell it. Most of the things available just aren't really my kind of thing.) It was fun, especially with the energy in the room, but next time I won't be as worried about making it into the bingo room, I think.

Oh my gosh, I'm almost done with catching up to the present! *cries tears of joy* Last thing I wanted to mention was that I read some of the book The Book of Duels by Michael Garriga, which is pretty interesting and unique. I'll admit there's a lot more mention of Christian topics than I'm typically comfortable with, but that's what happens when you read adult fiction- you're not gonna be totally comfortable most of the time.

Remember what I said at the very beginning of this weeks-long post? I wanted to try something new? As if I don't already find it difficult to find the time to finish my blog posts lately (thank goodness Labor Day's free, so I could use a couple hours of it to finally end this monstrosity of a post), I also wanted to see if I could occasionally recall old memories that happened before I began this blog, or even something that happened after I began this but I didn't mention it or I feel like I should add a lot more detail to a mentioning of it. Since I really am hoping to do this, it gives me even more reason to cut out small details that I tend to keep in my blog posts regardless of how long these now typically take me. I guess that'll be a relief for Present Me, Future Me, and whoever else happens to be reading this, huh?

I'm really tempted to call this old memories section "Going Back to My Roots", totally in reference to that Imagine Dragons song, even though I have no idea what they're really talking about in that song. I'm gonna go try to get myself to do my laundry and find the donation box for Hurricane Harvey (someone said there was one on-campus for school supplies, which is something I feel more comfortable about donating since I have an excess of that), then come back to tell the tale I hoped to do this time.

*Spongebob French narrator* Hours later...

Okay, got that stuff done, plus made and ate food, among other things. Now I'm ready.

I was reminded yesterday of a temple trip we did in Mexico years ago, which I may have mentioned before but I know nothing beyond that. This was in 2012, the summer before I started writing this. We lived in Mexico at this point- me, my mom, my sister, and Abuelita. We didn't have Dad there, or a car, and we weren't exactly doing so hot financially either, especially since the house we ended up in was a little expensive. What that meant (that is important for this story specifically) is that it wasn't exactly as easy to get to the temple as it was back in Utah. It was about 2 hours away, and I'm pretty sure we would've had a hard time affording the trip by taxi or bus.

If memory serves correctly, we hadn't even thought seriously about going until good fortune came upon us. The people we rented the house from were planning to go to Mexico City for some reason that I think never got disclosed, and agreed to bring us along! I mean, now that I think about it, how bizarre is it for your landlord to be nice enough to do something like that? The family wasn't a part of the same church, and probably didn't really know anything about the temple's significance, and yet they took us to the temple anyway.

Their car was... a station wagon, so just barely enough room for all of us. There was room in the trunk for us to put a suitcase, fortunately, because we had brought one. I think I didn't know until we had to pack that they actually let you stay for free at the temple, which sounded really weird to me. None of the American temples have something like that, after all. The reason why they had such a thing (guest rooms) here, though, was because this temple's also used to be used as Mexico's MTC (Missionary Training Center).

So yeah. After a relatively awkward car ride, we were dropped off right in front of the temple's gates with our luggage, and I was already awed by the sight. The temple and visitor's center (I believe that's what it was) were beautiful, with Aztec-esque designs on the walls (more-so on the visitor's center, but the temple still had a distinct look that made me feel like it was specially-made for Mexico). Honestly, I could've stared at just their exteriors for forever. We had to leave our stuff in a room, though, so I didn't get to.

The building that housed the room we were staying in for the night looked almost like a motel (or like old college campus dorms, now that I've seen some in person and can make that comparison), though cream-colored, I think, and clean, thank goodness. I think, after we'd picked our beds- there were two sets of bunk beds there, so of course my mom and sis took lower bunks and I got a top bunk- and relished the cool air in the room, we'd gone on an adventure to find some dinner near the grounds. (The streets were really wide and packed with cars, so that was rather intimidating.) I also remember, when it was already dark outside, we were looking for snacks and found a vending machine by the parking lot, and I saw it had Pengüinos cupcakes and chose those as my snack, but when I began to munch them I was startled by how cold they were, and I was like "Gah, why'd they do that?!" It still tasted okay, but... yeah, I prefer them room-temp, thanks.

One of the things I really liked about this trip was that I could look around and remember that my mom's been here before. She was here when this was also the MTC, and had gone into this temple and lived in these rooms when she was younger, before she had married my dad. She might've looked at these same palm trees, and surely admired the same buildings, and I am currently inching closer and closer to the age that she did these things. I was still just 12 years old when I got to do them myself. I'm sure I'd asked her about any memories she had of this place, and been fascinated by all of it.

Of course, we did go into the temple itself, though we split up so my mom did the stuff the grown-ups do, and my sister and I did what the youngsters do, baptisms for the dead. How they did the process was a little unfamiliar to us, too. They'd put us into a decently-sized group into the first room, and had us do a hymn and prayer, then took us to another one to talk more about what all of us are about to do and what kind of impact it will have on those we're doing service for, and then they let us go... you know... actually perform the work. Though I suppose it was nice that they did that, I think my sister and I still preferred the normal Utahan approach, that when you're with a small group they just check you know where to go and let you be.

Strangely enough, I don't really remember us leaving the temple. I'm pretty sure we just stayed for one night, and I assume the landlord and his family picked us up again when both parties were done with what they wanted to accomplish in Mexico City and drove us back home. (Seriously, it's mind-boggling that they had done that for us!) Though, if I wanted to be deep, I could turn this into "We should never let our thoughts leave, or stray away from, the temple"... but naw, I think my brain just lost that part. I'm glad I remember this much, though.

Alright, there's a story! And hopefully I can find more, no matter what kind, to share (and not take too much time out of my studies and whatever else to do it)! Bye!