Wedding stuff!

I'm not a very consistent blogger anymore, but that's okay.

We've been busy like crazy!

1. We had our engagement session with

our photographer! It was a lot of fun. We loved it. My future in-laws are having Greg from Photography by McKenzie shoot J and I's wedding. And bridals/groomals. And engagement pictures. (J and I met McKenzie and Greg at the Grand America Bridal Fair*, and we just thought they were fantastic. And then they had great specials for March. And then it turned out that Roger & Anne had McKenzie do their wedding, too. Small world.)

We did our engagement pictures in Lehi, Utah. Our gallery has hundreds of pretty pictures, which we just love, but several good ones are posted on McKenzie's blog, right here. We ended up deciding to send one of the ones on her blog, but I won't say which one so that it will still sort of be a surprise when people get their invitations.

2. We also got our invitations! Erin helped me design them, and I love them! I had Mercurio Brothers letterpress print them, and I couldn't be happier with how they turned out. They're gorgeous. To save money, I had them printed on smaller paper ("A2") instead of 5 x 7 paper, which I had planned to use. I also bought (smaller "A2") envelopes locally (at xpedx) instead of paying to have them shipped, and paying even more to have them rushed so that I could start addressing them. I did want the envelopes to be thick, though, so they are. We had inserts digitally printed (much cheaper) by Alphagraphics; they point people toward our wedding website. I wanted to line the invitation envelopes, but envelope liners get kind of (okay, very) expensive, so instead I lined the envelopes myself. I used 3 1/2 rolls of wrapping paper that I bought at the dollar store, and it just happened to be the perfect shade of blue! Partway through the envelope-lining project, I had some (much appreciated!) surprise help from J's mom and J's niece.

3. We've been assembling invitations. I wanted to write the addresses in calligraphy, but paying $2-3/ envelope was totally out of the question so I decided to do them myself. So I started addressing envelopes v e r y s l o w l y a while ago. I got a lot of them done, but we're still collecting some addresses. (My calligraphy is getting better and better! Now that I'm about done writing addresses, I'm getting pretty good at it. So. If your address looks a little, uh, messed up, know that it was written by hand, with so much love.) We sent one big batch of invitations out on Friday, more invitations out this Monday, and we have another batch of invitations ready to go out tomorrow.

We ordered our pictures from Ritzpix.com, and since the invitations were smaller, 3 1/2 x 5" was the size we wanted! We picked Ritzpix.com because they have a deal every Tuesday and Wednesday where you can get 3 1/2 x 5" prints, same-day, for 6 cents per picture. (Instead of 19 cents per 3 1/2 x 5" picture from them on other days, or 12 cents per 4 x 6" from Costco, which we would have needed to be trim.) That was our kind of price!

4. J ordered and received his tux. He was going to rent a tux, because we're not just so fancy that he needs to keep one. But, he was going to have to rent it for bridals/groomals (this Saturday), and then for a whole week from our wedding (20 March) to our California reception (27 March), and it was going to cost more to rent it for the three events than it would cost to just buy a brand new one online (at Buy4LessTuxedo.com). So instead of paying to rent a tux, J has his very own, brand new tuxedo, tuxedo shirt, man jewelry (= cuff links and button covers), and shiny man shoes, and he gets to keep all of them. He didn't try on the tuxedo shirt, man jewelry, or shoes, but he did try on the actual tux, and it looks really snazzy. As his future wife, I know that it will be my obligation to seek every opportunity for him to wear his tuxedo, and it's a duty I'm prepared to accept.

5. I picked up J's ring! It's... Hm. Well. I don't remember what it is, I guess. I think it's Tungsten with a band of silver around the middle? (Maybe?) I don't know. It looks very nice. And we got a very good deal on it, which was one thing that we wanted. (Although, not as good of a deal as Jess and Mitch got, unfortunately.) It looks very manly, but also pretty enough to look like a wedding ring. We both really liked it.*****

6. We got our marriage license! On Friday! We were really excited about it, actually. I asked the lady if we could take a picture inside the building, in front of the Marriage License bulletin board, and not only did she let us, she offered to take the picture for us!**

7. We had our Bishop's interviews! This Sunday! Tomorrow we get to meet with our Stake President. (Since we are choosing to be married in an LDS temple, we need to have interviews to obtain special temple recommends.)

8. Jess threw me an excellent Bridal Shower! I don't have any of the pictures from it yet, but we had a great time. She had printed up some of my favorite engagement pictures and she made cute decorations, and we had little chicken salad sandwiches, cream puffs and lots of fruit and vegetables, and a bunch of my favorite people came. Highlights included: a mad-libs game about how J and I met; a game where everyone wrote down a problem in marriage on one paper and a solution to the problem on another paper, and the papers were jumbled up and read so that problems had funny solutions; and fresh strawberries and pineapple. I loved being with friends from Provo that I hadn't seen in a while.

9. Also this weekend, J and I celebrated our one year anniversary, of when we first met***. For Valentine's Day we went to Rubio's (on 13 Feb, actually), which is where we met up for our first date, but I don't really care for their food all that much, so instead we went to JC Penney to spend my $10 free JC Penney money (which randomly came in the mail) on red shoes to go with my wedding dress, and then we made**** little chocolate cakes (which I had been craving) and worked on invitations (of course). We did talk about some of the neat things from the first year of our relationship, though, and we expressed our love for each other, and hopes and excitement for this next year together. It was really nice.

I really need to get back to homework, so I think I will.

* (More stories about the bridal fair to follow, probably.)

** Getting our marriage license was the best government experience J and I have ever had, I think. The ladies in the office were super efficient and friendly, and didn't make us wait much at all. When we went over to pay, one of the other ladies raced over to swipe my card before our main lady could get to it. It really was a race. When would people race to help you at the DMV, you know? (They smiled and told us we were a nice couple. Which, you know, they probably tell most couples, but that's fine.) Also, our marriage license cost $50. J and I agreed that our marriage license was a much better value than vehicle registration fees.

*** J is much better than I am at remembering these--we have anniversaries for when we first talked, when we first actually went out on our first date, when we first became a couple, when we had our first kiss, etc.

**** J doesn't have an oven, since we're cheap and we don't want to spend money to replace his, so we used his toaster oven. It actually worked all right.

***** It has no diamonds. J kind of liked man-rings with diamonds, and we've had an ongoing joke about how he wants one that matches mine. I think I sometimes embarrassed store-people when I would suggest rings for J that were thick bands that were clearly still bride rings. We knew it was a joke, though.

Halloween!

While J and I were apart, I heard about Halloween at Chipotle. A guy from Jessica's student ward told us about it. Basically, if you dress as a burrito, Chipotle will give you a free burrito. The guy said that you don't actually have to dress as a burrito, you just need to wear some aluminum foil (because Chipotle wraps their burritos in foil). ANY foil. He said that last year he went as an Indian. He made a headband with a feather out of foil, and went in and got his free burrito.

I decided that if J and I were dating again by then, we would definitely need to go. J and I used to eat at Chipotle all the time!

So, when J and I started dating again, I told him we should go.

And then, we went to Chipotle together and they had little papers advertising it. And we decided we would for sure go. I told J we could wrap him in foil and he could be a burrito, and we could take a box and cut it in half, and add green tissue paper and pieces of red and brown paper (tomatoes and steak), and I could be a taco.


But as we talked more about it, J was worried that our costumes would suck. He wanted us to Google it to see past Halloween costumes for Chipotle. BEST IDEA EVER.

We did not find many pictures, but we did find a few that we used to inspire our costumes.

We decided to both be burritos. Foil was going to be a disaster (it would tear if we put it on ahead, and it would be difficult to assemble at Chipotle), but online people were using emergency blankets instead. Brilliant!

For our tortillas, I used duck cloth, which I already had. We bought thick yellow yarn for cheese. We used green tissue paper and red and brown paper for steak and tomatoes. J constructed them while I got ready to go.


Everyone loved our costumes. It was fantastic! In the parking lot we put our costumes on, and people pointed and grinned at us. These people near us who were wrapping themselves in foil told us we each deserved five burritos.


In line inside, everyone commented on our costumes. We were the coolest people in the restaurant. People took cellphone pictures of us on the sly. We loved it!


While we were eating our burritos, a girl who was working at Chipotle came out and told us we had the best costumes of the evening, and asked if it would be all right for her to take our picture. (Sure!) They also gave us chips and guacamole for free, since it was closing time.

Very short update

It's been almost a month since I last blogged. I've tried to write blog posts a few different times, but things are complicated. I start writing, and then I have to explain things, and in no time at all I have six pages, and I'm still not done, and it all seems wayyy too detailed and personal to post online. So, instead I'll be very brief:

J broke up with me earlier this month. I wanted to fix things and felt like a lot of our problems were really just stress from non-relationship things. J was done. I was really sad about it. A lot happened. He started asking me on dates, but he was also dating other girls. More happened. The non-relationship things settled, and the relationship things were fixed. He began to wonder whether he had made a mistake in breaking up with me. (He had.) This past Friday he canceled his date with another girl, and brought me roses and a card, and he apologized and asked me to be his girlfriend again.

So things are back to normal, except that our time apart actually strengthened our relationship.

*-cRaFt NiGhT!!!-*

J and I keep having SO SO many cRaFt NiGhTs, it's hard to even keep up with my blogging!

SO!

We've had this problem lately, which is, the roof leaks. J was thinking he needed to have the roof re-$loped, but we ended up deciding that the real problem is not actually the valley between the front and back of the house. [Actually, it's that the flashing (metal stuff) around the chimney is totally not up against the chimney right, so water can get in. (SOLUTION: put tar inside and use a special drill bit and special screws and uh, I forget what else, to reattach it better.) It's kind of confusing, but it will be wayyyy cheaper than having the roof re-sloped. We can do it.]

And then we had ANOTHER problem, which was, part of the skylight over J's part of the house flew off the roof a few days ago. (Whoops!) It's just the extra covering, but the actual skylight is cracked, so it is important.

So, it's not that big of a deal unless it rains.

And it's September, so no problem, right? Right?

We were on our way to church yesterday (on time!) and it started sprinkling. Like, sprinkling

big drops, though. So I said a prayer while J drove us back to his house so that we could put painter's plastic up. (Faith promoting story: It stopped raining right after I prayed for time to protect the roof! Neat. After we had the plastic up we went to church for the last two hours, and sometime during church it started raining again.)

We put plastic over the skylight and plastic around the chimney. We thought the whole thing was pretty funny. It looked pretty bad.

And then later in the afternoon, we replaced the skylight cover (because it's supposed to rain more today.) J mostly did that. I re-tarred the roof. I'm going to go back and finish it up, but I got a good start. There were a few cracks in the sealant they had used before.

We were up there for a little while, so Paley came up on the roof to check things out and see what we were doing.

Sometime later I'll blog about our FeNcE ~~~cRaFt NiGhTs!!!~~~

Life Update

School

School is starting again today. I had two classes this morning, and I have one more tonight, and two more tomorrow. This semester I am taking:

- English 5730: Studies Early American Literature - This class seems like it will be a lot of work. The professor seems very demanding, but seems to be a pretty nice guy. I've heard good things about him. When I went in to see a counselor for my graduation papers, she told me that if I go in for his office hours he'll love me to death, and I think that's probably true. This class will be a lot of reading early American documents (like the Constitution, or Pioneers, and Rip Van Winkle, which he says is the most under-read important novel). It's about new Americans defining Americanness. Cool.

- Philosophy 1250: Reasoning & Rational Decision Making - I'm not just crazy about this class. It meets my QB math requirement, so it is basically a class instead of "Statistics". It also seemed like a good idea because I'm about to take the LSAT. Here's the only problem: It's taught by a grad student. Why are 80% of all grad students so pompous?! Seriously, my impression of this guy so far is that he thinks he is a god and everyone should bend to his whims. DO NOT BE LATE. It is reasonable to expect people to be on time, but SRSLY, if I have another class that ends 15 minutes before, which I do, and that class goes over, which it does, you're really going to count all of my assignments late if I am not in my seat when the class officially starts? Give me a break. He is also a brat about e-mail. He will not e-mail about grades unless you are using your official university e-mail address. Does anyone even know their password for that? [No.] And what, are my parents going to pretend they're me and find his e-mail address to e-mail him or something? Really?

- English 3702: Intro to Literary History 2 - I think this is going to be a lame class, because the Literary History classes are all miserable and used to be required but are not any more. (But they still double count for requirements.) HOWEVER! It is taught by an amazing professor who knows her stuff and prepares like crazy and makes classes awesome. It will probably become my favorite class this semester, just like the Darwin class that I thought I would hate and actually loved, which she taught last semester.
- English 5885: Adolescent Literature - Very highly recommended professor. At graduation counseling, the lady said this class would be a riot. THANKFULLY, this class is not about the Holocaust like my Children's Lit class was, and includes Catcher in the Rye, which I haven't read since high school but remember liking back then.

- English 5110: Folklore Genres - This class has a big project attached to it, which is writing the life story of an old person. I am really looking forward to it. I can either interview a grandparent or other relative, or the professor will match us up with hospice care people. NEAT.

So that's what I have going on. I am also still preparing for the LSAT, so I have prep classes for that on Monday and Thursday nights.

Work

I quit my job so that I will have time to actually do my homework this semester. And so that I will have much more time to study for the LSAT. (It was really weird. My boss said they had 65 applications for my job. Holy smokes! And they even lowered the pay rate with budget cuts... She interviewed seven applicants and hired a guy last Thursday. I'm going to miss my coworkers since they were sort of my only friends.) I think I am also going to quit volunteering in Preservations, because: 1) I just feel too busy. 2) It doesn't feel very altruistic, so it isn't as rewarding as I had hoped. 3) They treat me like an actual employee and kind of glare when I announce that I will be missing days, but really, who has time to volunteer 10 hours every week? 4) The block of time that I was volunteering before is not free time for me anymore.

So I feel kind of like a quitter, but it's okay because it's really just a re-balancing of my schedule and life and priorities, and all that. And that's good and healthy.

Speaking of good and healthy, I am not. I'm sick today. And yesterday. I have a cold. The grad student said that the University is making accommodations for people with the H1N1 virus (he called it the "piggy sniffles"), which made me wonder if I have that. All of the symptoms are normal being-sick symptoms, so who knows, but I doubt that I do because I'm not vomiting or having diarrhea or anything like that, and I'm not enough of a hypochondriac to actually be concerned about that.

The Race

I am also sore, sore, sore, because my body is broken from running a half marathon this weekend. I ran the Hobble Creek 1/2 Marathon on Saturday. It was an adventure for a lot of reasons. The first reason is, even though I have been driving for a few months now, I have never driven anywhere near Provo. I one-time drove to J's new house in South Jordan, but I insisted upon taking State Street. Sooo, when J decided his move would be the same day as my 1/2 marathon, I realized I would have to drive to Mapleton alone. So far! I decided I would take State Street, since I had heard it goes all the way from Salt Lake to Provo.

Uhhh, it doesn't. I got to the end of State Street and took some road to like, Bangerter, to like Alpine Highway, to somewhere. I ended up in Bluffdale and Saratoga Springs, and eventually Lehi, and then I was okay. But I swear, with all the detours I totally went to like, every city between Salt Lake and Provo. I don't know how long it took. I had to change lanes a lot of times, which makes me nervous. I made it to Jessica's house safely, though. And then I had to take the freeway at like 5am on Saturday to get out to Mapleton. And the exit I needed was supposed to be closed, but it wasn't, so I took it. BUT THEN! The streets after the exit were closed! So I drove all around hoping that I would somehow find State Street and going in the direction I thought it was, until the street I was following ended. Uh oh. But I saw a few people who seemed to be going the same way and I followed them, and made a little loop and somehow ended up on State Street. And somehow got there.

And the race was fine. EXCEPT! Know how after I hiked the Grand Canyon in one day in May my left knee hurt for like 3 weeks? And then it finally got better but I could only use elliptical machines for awhile and then finally I could use the treadmill again? At mile eight, my left knee started hurting again. Badly. I found a way to kind of run by swinging my left leg instead of running on it, but it was lame. (hah. Literally.) I mostly walked the last five miles. So instead of improving my time this race, I was a few minutes slower than I was in the SLC 1/2 marathon. Too bad! At the end a few people (separately!) thanked me and told me I had been their pace girl and that I had kept them going. I told them they were mine, too, which was true. When you run, a lot of times you're running with the same people, so you push yourself to get ahead of whoever you keep passing, or to get ahead of the next person in front of you. Everyone inspires everyone else. And when people pass you they call out, "Good job! You're doing great, just keep going!" and they encourage you. It's pretty neat.

I was not last, but there were not a lot of people to finish after me. The race registration closed in two days, and who registers within the first two days of registration for a race?! Hard core people. So I was for sure one of the least-fit, least-trained, least-slim, least-fast people. But that was okay, because I was there. And I finished. And running 13.1 miles on a Saturday morning is much more awesome and healthy than not running. So I feel good about it. I don't think I will be ready for my full marathon next month, though. My cardiovascular system was fine, but my knee had a lot of problems, and if it's been 3 months since the hike, I don't know that 1 more month will make a big enough difference. We'll see.

Relationship

J and I have been dating for about six months now. It's still going really well. I am very happy. After we were dating exclusively, he asked that I please drive his other car, because he was driving a lot. And since he is quite allergic to Paley, and since my house is tiny, and since I don't have air conditioning, it made sense for us to spend more time at his house than mine, but that meant he would drive from his house to my house to his house, and then drive from his house to my house to his house again to take me home. And he was already paying to insure the other car, he told me, so me not driving it was costing him.

I didn't mind taking TRAX and was really afraid of driving because of my accident in...2002? So I was not crazy about driving at all. Plus driving is expensive. He said he would pay for my gas and insurance, and any repairs, etc. So I started driving when we would go places. Sometimes. And he was patient and confident in me. I was really nervous. But I became comfortable driving between our houses, which made dating me more pleasant, I think. I started driving his white car every day. And then one day I Stopped for Gas! Which was an exciting new challenge. And another day I Switched Lanes! And one day I Went to Walmart! And now I've been driving every day for a few months and I am pleased, because I knew I needed to start driving again eventually, and I can't think of a more ideal set of circumstances for re-learning to drive than the ones that I've had. So that's been good. I took the freeway back from my race this weekend. Go, me!

J moved this weekend. He bought a house in South Jordan, which I absolutely love. It's kind of ugly. Actually, it's the ugliest house in the neighborhood. But he got a smashing deal on it (he paid $30k less than it appraised for!) and it really is in a great area. It's a neat house. It's divided into two separate living areas (with a shared laundry room in between), so he's renting out the front (which is bigger and nicer), and he will live in the back. It is on half an acre, ag-zoned. It has a pasture that is already fenced off [perfect for goats!], and barns [we put the chickens in part of one!], and a big open backyard [perfect for gardening!], and mature fruit trees, which delight me. It has apricots (we ate like a billion of them and fed like a billion soft ones to our birds), plums (they're next), pears (!!!!!), and apples. The trees need to be pruned so so badly. There is also a ton of storage space. The garage is huge (it has a basketball court in it), it has two storage rooms built into it, plus an above space that is almost like another living area except that it has no water to it, and another area above that that is like a little secret clubhouse for kids, or something. It is an attic area, where the ceiling slants, but it has hardwood floors, and a desk built in, and windows that overlook the yard. It has a bed up there, which I don't know how they got it up there because the hole to climb up to the room is tiny. The neighbor kids said they used to spend the night up there. Fun!

So far we have painted the front kitchen (which was hot pink) and we've done a bunch of yard work. (Actually, J's dad has done a TON of yard work.) We've been getting the front unit ready to rent. I lowered the price on our ad yesterday and J has gotten 4 more calls about it in the past day, so I think it's probably about the right price now and I think it will probably rent soon. (I want to paint the barn, because it looks way run-down, which I think makes the whole property look more run-down, but whatever. We'll get to it.) I think so far we've shown the house to like...4 or 5? people? We had one applicant, but they were just way too risky, so it didn't work out. So this should be good.

Since J and I spend every day together and South Jordan = a lot of driving for me, his wonderful parents have offered to let me stay at their house whenever I want. It is 6 blocks away from J's new house, so it's really convenient for, say, Friday and Saturday nights. We are talking about driving up to Salt Lake in the mornings, and then I would stay there even more. I have my own bedroom and bathroom which are new and gorgeous, and I have drawers and a walk-in closet, and my own nice kitchen, as many cherry tomatoes and fresh garden vegetables as I can eat, etc. (Last night they served us fresh watermelon. It was yellow inside! It tasted delicious.)

The only trouble is, poor Paley can't move in with J or his parents, so she will become an outside cat at J's new house. I'm sure she will love, love, love living there, because the CHICKENS! are outside and they are SO MUCH FUN to watch. And there are grasshoppers! And rodents! And other fun things to catch. But I know she will be sad when I am inside and she can't come in. At least for a little while. The barn will keep her dry and warm, though, so she should be okay. For now she's still at my little apartment by the U of U, but she misses me since I only come home to sleep.

My Birthday

Last week was my birthday. I turned 26. Jess and Mitch celebrated with me the weekend before, and Jess wrote me a nice blog post. J and I went to Red Lobster for dinner. He gave me a little hymn book (in English! Which I have wanted forever but never want to spend the money on.) and socks (which I have needed more of forever but never want to spend the money on.) So that was nice. I like useful presents. (Jess also gave me useful presents. She gave me plates, silverware, pans, and kitchen stuff. Plus six Sees Butterscotch Squares, which I ATE, which I had been in the mood for for a long time since no Sees is near me.)

Hm. What else? I don't know. This is a pretty long post and I need to get some LSAT study in before my next class, so I think I'll stop here. (And hopefully update more often so that my posts are not as long.)

The story I mentioned recently, about being followed.

I found my e-mail that I sent my family on the day that the guy followed us. 

This story was way better than I remembered!

I'm just going to share the one paragraph from my letter.  It looks like it was from 27 April, 2005.  

"I've made a list this week, and I have some good things to tell you about. There is a man sitting about a foot and a half away from me looking at the screen of the computer and he's been following us around this morning. AUGH. I met him on the bus or something and gave him a pass along card (one of the ones with church info, but not our phone number) because he seemed interested. Yeah, so since then he came to english class, and I think he's tried to come to church a couple times since then (one week we had district conf. and it was at a different place). But we saw him at english class last night, and then he saw us from the bus when we were on our way to do grocery shopping. Got off the bus and met up with us and said hi when we were in line at the grocery store. Well, of course we say hi. And he keeps following us after that. We were going to go home but decided to go to do e-mail directly instead. (sounded safer) And as we're walking he's asking about soccer (we all go play soccer on Saturday mornings), and we told him about that, but he also wants to go with us and play the game that has the little ball and you hit it with the paddles that has the same name in Italian as in English and he would recognize if I typed it, and the other game with all the balls with numbers on them and a green table, and he wanted us to go tonight. And we said no. And so what about tomorrow? No. Maybe we could do something as a district. And he said he didn't care if they came. And he asks if we're hungry and I said no, already ate (true anyway), and thirsty (no), because he was willing to pay. So we get to e-mail, and we figure hopefully he'll go...but he offered to pay for e-mail (no.) and then left for half an hour. And now he's back (augh!). SO I don't know how we'll get home without him seeing where we live. The Anziani invited us to do something with them, so we may do that. With our groceries though? I don't know how it'll work. The interesting problems that sister missionaries have...."

Isn't that a terrific story?  And that's just the first part.  The other part I mentioned before (he ended up following us downtown).

Another Bus Friend

On Friday I volunteered at the Symphony.

I got all dressed up (but with flat shoes; volunteers will be standing for most of their shift) and caught a train.

I picked a spot near the middle of the train, where I had a normal bench, and then there was a seat facing the middle of the bus right in front of my bench.

A guy got on the train and sat in the seat right by my bench (instead of choosing a seat facing forward). Although I was reading something on my phone, I noticed that he was staring at me. He was a guy from somewhere in the middle east, and he looked about 40.

"Hello," he said.

"Hello," I replied.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Emily," I said. "Yours?"

"David." He held his hand out, and I shook it. Because that's the polite thing to do.

"I liking you verymuch." He told me. He grinned. He grinned a lot while we talked.

"Oh, thanks," I said. [Because what do you say when someone tells you they liking you verymuch?]

I went back to reading on my phone, and he kept watching me.

"I like verymuch."

"Thanks."

And then he put his hand on my thigh, like right above my knee, and left it there.

"I like verymuch."

I removed his hand. "Thanks."

Now that he had my attention, he started talking to me: "How old are you?"

"Twenty-five." I told him. "You?"

And while I waited for him to respond, I evaluated. He could be forty. Maybe 35. Maybe 32 and just looks older.

"Twenty-six!" [Of course.]

I didn't really say anything, so he reminded me, "I like verymuch." And he kind of pointed at me.

But I thought maybe he was pointing at my skirt because it was sparkly, so I told him I was volunteering at the symphony.

"Ah," he said, as though he understood.

I started looking outside the train to see where we were, because I needed to get off at the grocery store to get new stockings, since they seem appropriate for the symphony.

My stop was coming up so I gathered my stuff. He noticed that I was gathering my stuff, and he got up. He stood in front of the exit, waiting to get off before me.

"I like verymuch," he said, as we were getting off the train.

"Yeah," I said, not really impressed or surprised. "Like her very much!" I suggested, and I pointed to another girl who was getting on the train as we were getting off.

He smiled. "Ah." It was an affirmative noise, and I knew that he didn't understand but was pretending to, probably to impress me.

"You working?" he asked.

"No." Because I was going to the grocery store, not to work. And then I realized that probably wasn't what he was asking. "I'm a student," I added.

I avoided too much eye contact and focused on my phone, and on going to the grocery store.

I hoped he wouldn't keep following me.

We crossed the street and as we did, I remembered something funny:

[NOTE: I don't really remember the order of this story, or the details; I'll have to see if I can find something about it in one of my journals. This is basically what happened, though.]

When I was on my mission, we had problems with a guy following us. It all started because I thought we should give pass-along cards to everyone, because everyone needed the gospel in their lives. (Right?) So I invited this Albanian (I think?) guy to church. And he showed up at church during the week, and someone just happened to be there, and he said he was looking for the missionaries. And they mentioned our English lessons which were the next day.

I don't remember why we weren't there, but I think we weren't, and the Elders taught English that week. But he came for English class, completely drunk. Great.

And then, the next morning we were grocery shopping and he saw us as we were about to leave the grocery store. He said hi to me, and started talking, and kept talking and kept talking. And all of us had finished buying our groceries, and he started following us as we were walking home.

And he kept following us. And we kept, like, concluding the conversation and like saying goodbye, and he kept following us.

And we didn't want to bring him home with us, but we had a ton of groceries, so we weren't really sure what to do.

We ended up taking a bus from our little suburb to downtown Genova. We carried all of our groceries to the church. AND! He came with us on the bus. One of my companions asked him what he was doing that day, and he had nothing he was doing. Great.

When we got downtown, he stopped following us, and we waited at the church for a couple hours to be sure that he was gone, and then we went home.

After that, my companions would only let me give pass-along cards with the Elders' phone number to questionable people.

But David didn't follow me. When we got across the street, he said "Goodbye!" and I said "Goodbye," and we walked in opposite directions.

The End.

YSA Summit 1 - 17 Secrets to Male and Female Psychology

[I am writing a series of posts about a YSA Conference that I attended this weekend, called The Summit. It's going to be good. Look forward to other highlights like: "How can I make better decisions?" and photographs of actual speed dating profiles.]

This is the handout that we received in my fourth workshop. The class was called “17 Secrets to Male & Female Psychology” (by Alisa Goodwin Snell). It was scheduled for one of the small classrooms, and the room filled, and the whole hallway was still packed with people who wanted to attend. They switched the room to a gym, which also filled up. Basically, she just went over the handout. The girls agreed with all of the stuff on the girl list, and the guys agreed with all of the stuff on the guy list. Everyone kind of shared examples. It was interesting.

17 secrets to the male psychology

1. Men seek out relationships that make them feel trusted and respected.

2. Men love through sacrifice.

3. Good men are largely logical about their relationships and commitment. Thus they do not commit easily to things they have not invested in over a period of time.

4. Men are driven to succeed, face challenges, compete, and conquer.

5. Men like women who like themselves.

6. Men love to be heroes.

7. Men like being appreciated.

8. Men like femininity.

9. Men like women who have opinions and assert their needs.

10. Good men pursue women who are approachable and appear to be available.

11. Good men want sex with a woman who feels good about having sex with them and will wait until marriage.

12. Men need to be needed.

13. Men are repelled by criticism, nagging, and whining.

14. A man experiences anxiety in every conversation a woman initiates until she tells him what she wants him to do.

15. Men bond through doing activities and talking about things more than they do through talking about people, problems, feelings, or ideas.

16. Good men adore women who give them love, attention, and affection.

17. Good men are often willing to talk openly and honestly when they feel it will help them or another person to do so.

17 secrets to the female psychology

1. Women thrive when they feel safe and secure.

2. Women love through sacrifice. However, women often love and sacrifice in ways that are not good for the male psychology. Thus, a woman needs a man to communicate about his needs. Not only will a woman love him for communicating respectfully with her, but the more she sacrifices to meet his needs, the more deeply her love will grow.

3. Women read into men’s behaviors, get excited, assume commitment, and then get hurt when he pulls away due to the added pressure.

4. Women are critical of their bodies and fear competition from other women.

5. Women are attracted to strength and confidence.

6. Women are turned off by men who are too nice.

7. Women often fall in love with friends.

8. Women like to be pursued and to feel wanted.

9. Women enjoy touch, kissing, and affection but feel vulnerable and prone to shame after sexual contact.

10. Women want men who hold off sexually – it makes a woman feel respected and wanted rather than feeling like an object.

11. Women want immediate relationships but trust and value slow progressing relationships.

12. Women long to feel adored.

13. Women are repelled by moping, brooding, and the silent treatment.

14. Women worry. They need to know they are not alone in dealing with the problems of the relationship.

15. Women who don’t trust and respect their men fall out of love, especially if there is no communication.

16. Women like gifts, surprises, reasonable spontaneity, and excitement. The extra effort makes them feel special.

17. Women would rather have open and honest communication about misdeeds than to be protected from the truth.

Snell, Alisa Goodwin, L.M.F.T. (2008). Dating Game Secrets for Marrying a Good Man. Bonneville Books, Springville, UT.

Askalisa.org, Alisa Goodwin Snell, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, phone: (801) 447-6000 or e-mail: alisa@askalisa.org

I’m [less] sad.

Lately I haven’t blogged much. At first I wasn’t blogging much because I was spending a lot of time with a guy, and lately I haven’t blogged at all because I’ve been sad about how things ended. (I don’t really like blogging about sad things or really personal things, but this has kind of permeated my life lately, and when I told Jess I was thinking of writing this she said I should do.)

Basically, when things really ended, I still liked the guy a lot. My heart hurt. A lot. I wanted to cut it out. I felt sick to my stomach. I wanted to change his mind. I texted him like nothing had changed. But it had. I wanted to become a crack addict and never feel anything again. After a few days, I was tired of it hurting. I ate one of those SKOR chocolate bars and a bunch of Twizzler bits, even though I’m mostly eating healthy stuff these days. I cried a little bit, too, but not a lot because I’m not a big crier. I wished I could cry more.

Today, my heart still hurts, but quite a bit less than it did. Here are the things that I’ve been doing, which have made a big difference for me over the past week:

- I stopped texting him.

- When things seem really overwhelming, I take a 12 second deep breath. I fill my lungs over a slow count to four. I hold it for a couple seconds (which are not part of the twelve…hmmmm…wait a minute…). And then I exhale over a slow count to eight. Even though I remember that lungs have a resting capacity (which we studied in my high school anatomy class) I try to squeeze all of the air out of my body. I repeat this a couple times, until I feel calmer. Doing some certain number of 12 second breathers every day adds up the same as like an hour of yoga, or something, but I don’t remember what, because I learned awhile ago that it’s good to breathe deeply, I don’t usually think about it.

- I’ve been listening to some specific music. Three songs that I have really liked over the past week are: “This is such a pity” (Weezer) (which is really not about boy stuff, but I like it anyway), “Happy Hearts” (Okkervil River), and “Miss You” (The Feeling).

- A few weeks ago I went to a really fancy place in Salt Lake (okay, I don't really know what to link to for them...sad.) to have my hair cut. I desperately needed to rid myself of split ends. But then, I couldn’t stand being somewhere so fancy and just getting a tiny trim, so I had my girl color my hair too. She weaved in blondish caramel highlights and also reddish brownish ones. It came out perfectly. This has helped me twofold: first, even though I’m sad, I feel awesome when I look in the mirror because I am still very pleased with my hair. Second, my girl had tons of personality and something she said has stuck with me. She talked about how she had pretty recently broken up with this guy she’d lived with for eight years. At first it was really rough, and she drank a lot. She was past that, though. Every so often as she was doing my hair, and as we were talking, she’d sing the little phrase that kept her going: “Just gotta keep on keepin’ on.” So now I’m singing it too, to no particular tune, and I like it.

- On Thursday, I found a neat book at my school bookstore. It’s called The Bounce Back Book, and it’s by Karen Salmansohn. The subtitle is “how to thrive in the face of adversity, setbacks, and losses”. I almost didn’t buy it, because I wasn’t raped, I didn’t divorce anyone, I haven’t lost my job, etc, but I really liked the parts I read while at the bookstore. It seemed like it would maybe help me feel better and it has. Tip #4 says “Feeling means you’re dealing means you’re healing.” I read that when my heart hurt a lot, and I kind of resented it, but now when I start to hurt I think that, and to me it means that the more it hurts, the sooner it will hurt less, and that’s comforting. There are also a bunch of other good “tips”. I’m glad I bought the book.

- On Saturday I spun a bunch of yarn. When I first started my spinning class, our instructor said that spinning would be relaxing. It wasn’t. It was hard. I had to really concentrate to get it to work at all, and never had yarn that was even. I’ve been spinning for a year and a half now, though, and now I don’t have to think about it. Instead of having to focus to have it come out even, I usually watch movies while I spin, and I sit back on the couch, relaxed. My feet move the treadle, and the wool floats from my fingers to the spool, and it feels like a cloud.

- Friday I visited UffishThought; I hadn’t seen her for awhile. I’m always happy to see her, actually. Friday was possibly my worst day, and Uffish helped me feel better. She gave me a hug. She shared Dr. Horrible with me, and also reminded me that I need to watch Pushing Dasies, which Optimistic had told me to watch a few times already (and I’d promptly forgotten). She told me all about Heroes, too. And I saw her garden, which I’ve wanted to see for awhile. My roommates have been very helpful through this too.

- This weekend I got a lot of sleep. When I started spending time with the guy, I stopped sleeping as much as I needed to. Getting more rest has really helped me think more clearly about all of this, and worry less.

- Also on Saturday, I finally went back to the gym. Before the guy, I had been going to the gym most days, following a rigorous training plan. I had been doing well for like 5 weeks, and I was so happy. When I became interested in the guy, though, I started attending ward functions most days, plus I was always tired, and things just always seemed to make my gym time impossible. Going back felt SO GOOD. Also, I bought a fantastic pair of like, stretchy fitted running/gym long shorts (that sounds ugly, but they’re really cute), which I’ve wanted for a long time. They make me happy too.

- Something else that has kind of helped my heart hurt less is thinking of reasons why it’s better this way. I think about the different trade-offs I would have had to make if I had seriously dated or married the guy. Obviously there were a lot of things about him that made me really happy, otherwise I wouldn’t feel awful. But thinking about the other things makes me hurt less. For example, knowing him didn’t make me want to be any better than I am, and that’s something that is kind of important to me. Similarly, I’ve tried to put things into perspective and look for the good. I haven’t really dated anyone since my mission, and the stuff with this guy will make it easier for me to have relationships with guys up in Salt Lake after I move. Good. Also, I gained a friend who understands some stuff from my life that nobody else really does, and that’s good.

- And then finally, I’ve noticed that I’m praying more than I had been before, and I think that’s helping. Also, this week I plan on attending the temple, which I haven’t lately, and I think I’ll feel even more peace after that.

Anyway, that’s where I am right now. I’m still sad, but I’m feeling a lot better than I did a few days ago. Things will be okay.