The Finger!

The other day I was driving home after a rather frustrating day of work and there was a man tale-gating me even though I was already going 5 over the speed limit. When I finally had the opportunity to merge over he slammed on his horn. I proceeded to give him the finger. I held my hand that brandished "the bird" out and allowed it to follow that dumb Toyota Tacoma until it was completely passed me. The driver also had a few expletives that he chose to yell out his window at me. Naturally, being the girl that I am, this has consumed my thoughts.

First of all, I have to say that I have never done that before. It was definitely a moment of weakness and I have to blame it on the fact that I really did have a rough day at work and there were many things happening that were completely out of my control, but again I do recognize that this was a moment of weakness on my part.

So, while I began to stew over this incident, I came up with many conclusions. First I kept thinking to myself about how I'm such a hypocrite. How dare he tale gate me and how dare he get mad at me for not going fast enough! When, just about every morning I get annoyed with every car in front of me while driving down Legacy Parkway for not going fast enough. Never mind that they are just following the speed limit because it's only 55 on that road, but that is beside the point. So really I am no better than this guys because I feel the exact same way that he does everyday. Then, I decided that I am not hypocritical because when I do get annoyed I keep it to myself and I don't act on that by honking at people. So, it was OK for me to be upset with this stupid guy in his stupid Toyota Tacoma. It was not however, OK for me to give him the finger and I think that I might always feel bad about it. I will say that it did feel kind of good to let out exactly what I was feeling at the exactly right moment.

Allergy Testing

This morning I went in for Allergy Testing. Apparently I am allergic to many things...

The Times When I Love My Job

I work for a company that provides homes and working programs for adults with various intellectual and physical disabilities and have been for almost 4 years. I started when I was going to school in Logan as just a direct care staff member. I would go into various homes and basically just help each individual accomplish basic and diverse daily living skills. Majority of the individuals who I worked with were fairly independent in these regular tasks and needed minimal support, but there were a few who needed almost total assistance. I was a direct care staff member for about 2 years and then when I was working in Ogden I was placed in the Day program, after that I was bumped up to an administrative position.

Now I work in Salt Lake City, still on an administrative level. Because I am on the administrative level and a supervise a few programs, I am unable to spend a lot of positive time with any of my clients. Most of the contact I have is usually regarding some form of a behavioral incident or a conflict. Even though this is the case, there are still a few days that I get to spend out in the community with my clients and not stuck behind my desk.

Yesterday was one of those fun days. Every summer we take our entire group to Lagoon. There are a number of staff members who don't really enjoy this day, usually because they end up getting stuck on bathroom duty (I always avoid that job like the plague). This year I spend the day with a girl names Sherry. Sherry is 22 years old and was recently released to our work program from high school. I love spending time with Sherry because she has an amazing imagination. On the first day I met her, she declared to me, "I need to learn how to work with animals because I want to get a pet and my mom won't let me get a pet until I am responsible enough."

"What kind of pet do you want to have?"

"A Dragon!"

Anyway, yesterday I was first, so impressed with Sherry because she had no fear. She went on every single ride without any hesitations. There are many rides that I automatically assumed she would be too afraid to go on, but she would have preferred to go on every ride at least 10 times each if we had the time. I on the other hand, would not go on certain rides because I was too scared. The second thing that I loved about being with Sherry yesterday was how happy she was the entire time that we were there. She was just so excited and we couldn't get to each ride fast enough. On the rides, while the rest of us were screaming, she was laughing with pure joy. Because she was so excited, while the rest of us were standing in line chatting about who knows what, she was roll playing how she would go home that afternoon to tell her mom about her day. She considered all the questions her mom might ask her and how she would answer them. If she noticed that we were looking at her or listening, she would simply tell us, "oh I'm not talking to you, I'm talking to myself about what I will tell my mom when I get home..." and then she would continue on. Often, I will go into the work program during the day and catch her talking to herself. She says that she does it to keep herself from getting bored.

It's days like yesterday that really remind me why I love my job. It's nice when I get to take the opportunity to spend one on one time with the individuals that I serve. Sometimes it can be hard and a little unpleasant, but most of the time it's an opportunity for me to take a step into a world where things are not as complex and people appreciate the more simple things in life.

A Booger to Pick!

In my math class there is a kid who is kid who I made the mistake of sitting next to for the first week or so and then i realized that I should find a new seat. This kid is of the more nerdy type, but more the annoying kind. He's very obviously fresh of the mission because in almost every comment that he makes he has to talk about his mission. To me this seems a little odd because it's a math class so it doesn't really make sense to talk about your mission at all, plus the teacher is catholic so he so clearly doesn't care. I have also heard him make comments like, "Naturally, everyone knows what a Z mega thousand drive is with blah blah blah and this and that on your hard drive and you soft drive..." Really? Everyone knows what that is? Or there was one day when he wouldn't stop talking to the poor girl on the other side of him about his iPod and how he got to go inside the temple in street clothes because he left his iPod there and it was just so amazing that he got to walk around in the temple in his jeans and hoody..... seriously?

Anyway, yesterday I was only 5 minutes late for class and when I walked in, another student who is always at least 30 minutes late was in my seat! everyone knows that even though it is college and your seats are not assigned, if you sit in the same seat for an extended number of times that seat becomes yours! Because this other guy was in my seat I was forced to sit next our nerdy friend. So I'm sitting in class taking notes and things when I see in the corner of my eye his left hand rise to his nose. He then inserts his left index finger into his nose and pulls out a booger. He then examines this booger, rolls in in between his index finger and his thumb and then proceeds to wipe it on his seat! OK, I understand that sometimes you totally have a booger to pick. It happens to all of us, but there is an appropriate way to pick the booger. If you must pick it and you don't have a tissue or anything, don't wipe it on the chair you are sitting in so that the person to follows you has to set in it or possible touch it. GROSS! GROSS! GROSS!

The Augusteum

The book that I am currently reading is Eat, Pray, Love. So far it is pretty good. The beginning was a little slow. I didn't particularly like the first few chapters where she laments continually about her divorce and her affair, but once I got passed that and into the traveling I have found it to be quite entertaining. Anyway, yesterday I read a part that was interesting, thought provoking and even profound.

In these few paragraphs she is talking about the Augusteum in Rome. I'll just quote her directly because my describing it really isn't as good as the words that she chose:

This big, round, ruined pile of brick started life as a glorious mausoleum, built by Octavian Augustus to house his remains and the remains of his family for all of eternity. It must have been impossible to the emperor to have imagined at the time that Rome would ever be anything but a mighty Augustus-worshiping empire. How could he possible have foreseen the collapse of the realm? or known that, with all the aqueducts destroyed by barbarians and with the great roads left in ruin, the city would empty of citizens, and it would take almost twenty centuries before Rome ever recovered the population she had boasted during her height of glory?

Augustus's mausoleum fell to ruins and thieved during the Dark Ages. Somebody stole the emperor's ashes- no telling who. By the twelfth century, though, the monument had been renovated into a fortress for the powerful Colonna family, to protect them from assaults by various warring princes. Then the Augusteum was transformed somehow into a vineyard, then a Renaissance garden, then a bullring (we're in the eighteenth century now), then a fireworks depository, then a concert hall. In the 1930s, Mussolini seized the property and restored it down to its classical foundations, so that it could someday be the final resting place for his remains. (Again, it must have been impossible back then to imagine that Rome could ever be anything but a Mussolini-worshiping empire.) Of course, Mussolini's fascist dream did not last, nor did he get the imperial burial he'd anticipated.

Todya the Augusteum is one of the quietest and loneliest places in Rome, buried deep in the ground. The city has grown up around it over the centuries. (One inch a year is the general rule of thumb for the accumulation of time's debris.) Traffic above the monument spins in a hectic circle, and nobody ever goes down their- from what i can tell- except to use the place as a public bathroom. But the building still exists, holding its Roman ground with dignity, waiting for its next incarnation.

I find the endurance of the Augusteum so reassuring, that this structure has had such an erratic career, yet always adjusted to the particular wildness of the times. To me, the Augusteum is like a person who's led a totally crazy life- who maybe started out as a housewife, then unexpectedly became a widow, then took up fan-dancing to make money, ended up somehow as the first female dentist in outer space, and then tried her hand at national politics- yet who has managed to hold an intact sense of herself throughout every upheaval.

I look at the Augusteum, and I think that perhaps my life has not actually been so chaotic, after all. It is merely this world that is chaotic, bringing changes to us all that nobody could have anticipated. The Augusteum warns me not to get attached to any obsolete ideas about who I am, what i represent, whom I belong to, or what function I may once have intended to serve. Yesterday I might have been a glorious monument to somebody, true enough- but tomorrow I could be a fireworks depository. Even in the Eternal City, says the silent Augusteum, one must always be prepared for riotous and endless waves of transformation.

Coincidentally, I read this exact part while Garret and I were sitting in his Dad's hospital room in the Bone Marrow Transplant unit keeping him and his mom company while nurses and CNA's came in and out checking his temperature, blood sugar levels, putting a pic-line in through his arm that will run all the way to his heart and trying to establish whether or not he has the influenza type A-1 or the other type (I want to think it's type B). While we watched all of the commotion, these few paragraphs shed some light on the hole situation for me. One minute the Nurses and CNA's came in with full on protective clothing because they though he had the flu then they came in without the protective clothing saying he didn't have the flu. An hour later they came back in with protective clothing because they redid his labs and now he has the flu again. We and Garret's dad could do nothing but just watch and accept it. Cancer, like many things in life, is one that simply happens to you and not because of you or by you. Sometimes you fight it, and other times you sit and wait it out, hoping that the you who comes out the other side is still recognizable.

Many people say that life is short. I think I might disagree with that and say that life is actually long, but it just goes by fast. I only say that because we go through, experience and accomplish too many things for it to really be short.

The Apple Doesn't Fall Far from the Tree

Growing up we used to make fun of my Dad because he used to eat everything watered down. I don't really know why he did, but he did. I have very clear memories of him taking a tall glass and only filling it half way with Orange Juice and the other half with Water. "Who likes watered down juice?" I thought to myself.... well maybe it wasn't that exact phrase. I was pretty young, so maybe it was really just "GROSS!"

Anyway, I have discovered that I do the same thing. We have these awesome new water bottles that I bought at Costco (best store ever!) that are extra big and amazing and I really like those Crystal Light packets that are meant for a normal size bottle of water, but I just fill up my big water bottle for just one of those packets when I should probably just use two or at least 1 and 1/2 packets. The other day I had my bottle of water and I put my packet of Crystal Light in it and Garret said, "Oh, what flavor is that?" I responded, "Strawberry, why?" He proceeded to tell me that he loves that flavor and put his hand out for me to give him a sip. Just before he went to take a drink he stopped and asked, "Did you only put one packet in this? Because if you did I don't want any, it tastes flat." I took a sip and said, "It tastes just fine! You can't put too much stuff in because then it's too strong and it ruins the whole drink, but if you're going to be a baby about it I'll put a little bit more in." So, I did and took a taste and all I could think was that it was now ruined because there was too much in it! It was in that moment that I realized that I like my drinks watered down just like my Dad.

Maybe I am Made of Tin

Yesterday was fast Sunday and to be completely honest, I really don't like fast Sundays. Here are some reasons why:

• I just hate when people get up on the stand and start balling so hard that you can't understand anything they are saying. When people start going on and on about their feelings, I really just want to get up and scream out, "I don't care about your feelings!" Yes, I know this is incredibly rude which is why I keep it to myself, with the exception of now because I'm writing about it.
• I understand that many couples struggle to have children. I have not had to experience this trial so far in my life and I really do feel for those who are faced with this trial. In fact I do have many close friends and family members who are currently faced with this trial and it can cause large amounts of undue stress and anxiety to a person who is very undeserving. That being said, if it is not appropriate for you to blatantly discuss your sex life in public, how is it appropriate to covertly discuss it? Do you realize what you are really saying when you say, "we are desperately trying so hard to have a baby..." There just has to be a better way to discuss your desires to be blessed with a child over the pulpit.
• Is the poor Deccan who walks around the chapel with a microphone really necessary? I understand the importance of having that for those who are unable to walk because really everyone should have the opportunity to share their testimony if they feel so inclined, but the problem is that as soon as one person uses it, everyone decides that they should use it and majority of the time, those who are using it are perfectly able to walk up to the podium. If you are an able bodied person, you are perfectly able to use both legs and walk up to the pulpit to share your testimony just like everyone else in the chapel. If you are the 15 year old boy who was seen running down the hall before church started, you do not qualify for the microphone to be brought to you in your seat! Everyone else got up and walked to the pulpit, why can't you?!
• On my mission, it always worked out that the one Sunday out of the entire month that an investigator, who was already on the fence about the church in the first place, could come to church was always fast Sunday. Without fail, this always happened. And, without fail, the one ward member that everyone wishes would keep their testimony to themselves gets up to share it. You all know the one I'm talking about because every ward has it. It's the one who talks about Kolab and bursts out into random bits of song. It's the one who talks about their own personal revelations regarding the second coming and being translated in their lifetime.

I'm totally aware that I sound like a completely heartless person, but I think that I'm just voicing the things that you all are actually thinking while you are sitting in your own fast and testimony meetings.