A Year Ago

So a year ago from yesterday, I returned from London. I WANT TO GO BACK!!!! Thankfully, my wonderful London friends have kept me sane this semester with movies, updates, and plans to one day return to London. I can't believe it's been a year. I feel like I've known these girls much longer, but I'm so grateful we shared London together. I know we're all going our own ways (Goodluck to missionary sisters!)but we'll always have London and London nights in Provo. Love ya London friends!

I like Twilight but...

So exploring the web this morning, I found this lovely advertisement.

Really? Do they think Twi-moms are so involved in the saga that they'll actually buy into this?

Being a Senior Again: a Little Different from High School

September 2005, I walked around school with confidence because I was a senior. Four years later and I'm a senior again, except I'm not so cocky. As a freshmen, I thought the seniors had everything together. They lived in real apartments, knew a ton about their major, had friends outside of their ward, and they knew what they wanted to do with their life. Most of my assumptions were true. I do have quite of few friends outside of my ward and I do live in a real apartment, but for knowing what I'm going to do with my life, that's not quite as secure as I imagined.

I'm not stumbling around clueless about where I want to be in the next ten years. I want to be a professor which means grad school and I'm excited to go to grad school, but I couldn't tell you which one I'm excited to go to. I've decided to send my application to 5 schools: the University of Arizona, Arizona State University, Colorado University, Utah University, and BYU. I go back and forth about which one I want to end up at, but the truth is I'll go where I'm accepted and there's a chance I won't get accepted to any this year.

Taking this next step in my life, I realize I could be anywhere in ten years. Plan or no plan, things happen and I'll have to adapt. I'll admit this is a very scary thought. School has been a constant. In high school, I knew I'd go to college and that college would be BYU, but now I don't know where I'll end up, what obstacles I'll meet in getting my masters or doctorate, where I'll work, or if I will still be a professor. I've so many options right now.

Scared isn't my only emotion though. I'm ready to graduate and see what happens. It's like opening up one of those surprise gift bags; I really want to see what's inside, but I'm afraid it will be tacky knick knacks. Obviously, I have more control of my life than opening a gift bag, but still I don't have control over everything. I'm working hard to stay on top of my homework,I'm already thinking about my final papers, and I'm studying to take the GRE. Still, I wonder if it will be enough.

Until I know which school I'm going to, I'll be restless, but I'm also enjoying my senior year. London movie nights are going strong, I've been to so many beginning of the year socials I know almost every ice breaker game that exists, and you can bet I've been watching BYU football (even when it's painful). Right now my weeks are full of books and my weekends full of friends. I'm not the big woman on campus, but it's good to be a senior again.

The Summer of Nerdiness

Two weeks into summer and I think I've gotten into the routine of things. A few people don't like me my calling myself a nerd, but according to a yahoo article, nerd is so in right now. Well, that's good news for me because a good number of my summer hours will be spent doing nerdy things. My summer job is working at the Harold B. Lee Library, shelving books. It is more physically demanding than I thought it would be. I walk all around my floor (2nd Religion) and around of the rest of the library for about 7 hours, only sitting while I'm sorting books or reading the call numbers on bottom shelves. I also time myself while I shelve books with the goal to reach 4 books a minute. I've enjoyed my first two weeks and I've had a chance to scope out some books to read this summer.

In addition to working at the library, I'm interning at the BYU Writing Center which with hopefully turn into a job for Fall semester. So far I've been observing peer tutors helping students with papers and, by the end of the term, I'll be doing the same thing. A pretty academic based summer, but I think it will be great. The best part is that I have no homework, leaving plenty of time to read. I've four books so far and my list is growing.

As far as social activities, it's been movies and bonfires every weekend. My roommates and I made a list of some creative date activities. Hopefully, we'll try them all.

To finish off my blog, I thought I'd leave you with some funny titles I've come across at work:

How to pray and stay awake

Can I have your number: Pick-up lines that don't work and gospel principles that do

Death and Dying A-Z

How to be well liked

Pure & Chased

If I find more, I'll be sure to share them. Since I find them shelving, I wonder who checks these books out.

Semester Wrap-up

I'm sitting here waiting for midnight so I can sign up for Fall classes. Since I've accomplished the work I set aside for tonight,(quite the feat because I rarely do all the work I plan to do)I thought I'd share some photos from this semester. Certainly not as exciting as last semester, but I've had a few good times. These pictures are from my birthday, my trip to Denver to see my family, and from the Festival of Colors at the Hindu temple in Spanish Fork. They were all really good times. There really is nothing that can take the place of friends and family, even London.

Is Feminist a bad word?

I've been surprised lately at my reaction to being called a feminist. My knee jerk reaction is "No I'm not!" but two years ago I would have said "Yeah, is that a problem?" with attitude. I have always been and will continue to be an advocate for strong women. Then why was I embarrassed when my roommate said my feminism is rubbing off on her or when she told a room full of people that I'd chose a feminist answer?

I've been mulling over the feminist label I've been given. For a bit I thought I had sold out my views. I thought I didn't want her blabbing to boys that I was a feminist and then there went any chance of dates this semester, but that was a stupid fear. Who wants a guy that's afraid of a feminist? Ridiculous. Then I realized it wasn't because I'd changed my views, but that I considered my views to be moderate. I just spent a semester in London learning about the "woman question" and realized that I owe the rights I enjoy now to some very intelligent and brave women. I owe it to them to consider my education, chance as a career, and respect from men as an intellectual equal as a right. No one, man or woman, can make me feel ashamed to expect that. If that makes me a feminist, than so be it.

So to in light of my revitalized image, I thought I'd let you in on a pattern that I've found in my Young Adult Lit. class. Remember J.K. Rowling? Of course you do. Well female writers who, like Rowling, write about male protagonist tend to use their initials instead of their first name. Why? Because then readers cannot make an automatic assumption on the sex of the author. As we've discussed in class, girls will read whatever they can,(perhaps because for the longest time we were only allowed novels) but boys have a harder time finding books they like and rarely pick up a book with a female protagonist. Boys are more likely to voluntarily read a male author than female author, so to make more money why not use initials so you gain male readers without alienating your female readers. Just a tidbit for you to think about the next time you pick up a book.

Readjusting to Normality

A little over a month since my last post--the last post from London. Today it has been exactly a month since I left London. It cannot be true, but so my calendar tells me. I still feel like I'm adjusting to life in the States, particularly to life in one very special state, Utah. Colorado will always be home, so I felt comfortable as soon as I saw the sunset reflected on the snow. However, now that I'm back in school, I feel like a freshman again. I'm getting used to new roommates and classes. I'm taking French again and my Humanities 250 class feels a lot like my freshman English class (including the analysis of a Shakespeare sonnet).

In a way, I feel like I'm making a new start. I'm paying better attention in class and being more persistent in my readings, but most importantly, I'm finally looking at my classes with a goal in mind--getting into graduate school. I've found the purpose I've been lacking.True the goal for my education is to be able to go to more school, but it's still something to work towards. Still, I'm not repeating freshman year. My classes certainly demand more from me than my gen eds. For instance, I've a fourth of two text books, one of them being art philosophy. You know, Aristotle, Plato, and Kant, I've had a crash course in their philosophy every other day. I sit in class confused half the time, but then there are the moments of clarity that open up not only art, but human thought. This will be a tough semester, but I have a feeling that it will mold me into a real scholar.