Envelope

I don't want to go into too many details, but things are going well.  I will say that I am learning not to second guess thoughts I have, at least in regards to Am. Like asking her out, for example. Even a couple of months ago, I would have had the thought to ask a girl out, but then decide against it for whatever reason.  But I asked Am right when the thought came to me.  And it totally paid off.  There have been several similar thoughts, and they all have paid off in similar fashion. Like delivering flowers to her school, among others. The results have been satisfying. 

In Case of Confusion

In case of any confusion about how I feel about Am after the last post, I'm quite happy with how things have gone thus far.  You could even say we are officially dating.  (As if people have to fill out paperwork to get 'official' status.)

What A Difference a Week Makes

So, there's this girl. She's relatively new in the ward here. I started talking to her after FHE several weeks ago now. It was just friendly, get-to-know-you kind of stuff. Then I started sitting by her at church. It started out as, "I need a place to sit, there is an open spot on the aisle, so I'll sit there." I talked with her after FHE the next week. We seemed to be connecting on certain things, but I thought she dominated the last hour of our conversation. I wasn't sure what that meant. I kept sitting by her at church. I talked to her again after FHE last week, but this time she let me dominate the conversation. So I figured asking her on a date was long over due. She had plans for friday, but was open on Saturday. Except we had stake conference this weekend. Well, we could do something after the Saturday evening session. Then her Friday plans fell through. So we bumped up our plans a day. We spent all night talking at her place.

We still had conference to go to the next night, so we kept the plan to go together.  This is where things changed.  We'd been scooting a bit closer together throughout the first part of the meeting.  And then she asked me a question:

"Could you do me a favor?"

"Yeah, absolutely.  What do you need?"

"Could you put your arm around me?"

It wasn't what I had expected, but I wasn't about to turn her down.  

We've now done something every night since then. This has all gone kind of fast for me. I've been in somewhat of a similar situation before, however. Some of you may know something about another girl I dated a few years back named Linda. That went really fast. Ever since Linda and I broke up, I've been really cautious about girls. Too cautious. I felt like I needed to be absolutely sure about a girl before I even asked her out. But that took so long that the moment passed and nothing happened.

This has been fast, but not as fast as with Linda. This has been different. I feel like taking this chance has been validated, at least so far. I don't want to jump to any conclusions.  I just want to see where this new situation takes me. It's been awhile for me, and this feels pretty good so far.

Deer Valley

I went skiing on Thursday with my brother. I had been kind of nervous about it this week. You see, previous to our trip this week, it had been over 12 years since I had been skiing. Couple that with the news about the actress that died from complications of a seemingly minor fall, my reticence might be justified. It wasn't. We had a blast.  

We thought it would be wise to go on the bunny hill first to see if we remembered how to ski after all these years. But the bunny hill was populated with practically all children and ski instructors or parents. My pride got the better of me so I said we should just take a real run and find out the hard way. Skiing is like riding a bike. Both my brother and I were amazed at how quickly we got up to speed, picking up pretty much where we had left off so long ago.

I was surprised by how long I lasted up there.  I was expecting more of an aerobic experience which would have knocked me out pretty fast.  But it was more like resistance training.  The first run down I was worried about my feet and legs cramping up, but once we got to the bottom and I tightened all the bindings on my boots I was fine.

It was a beautiful day on the slopes.  The snow started getting a tad slushy as the day wore on, which lead to my only fall, which wasn't too bad.  I was going a little too fast and my ski caught an edge in the slushy snow.

We lasted about five hours before our legs threatened to turn to jello. It was nice then that our lift tickets had been given to us rather than buying them ourselves. Skiing is an expensive hobby, but especially so at Deer Valley. The lift passes there go for $80 each! We rented our gear from Outdoors Unlimited at BYU for considerably less than I would have imagined. While renting our stuff, they had a board that listed the conditions at the local ski resorts, with some comments about each place underneath. For Deer Valley they said if you could afford the lift passes, then you could afford to own your own gear.

I like skiing more than tubing or sledding, except for the cost. I have the hardest time with climbing back up after a sledding run, even on relatively small hills. If only they had lifts for sledding! But then, that would increase the cost for that activity as well.

Percolation

I've been having some thoughts bubbling up recently, and I thought I'd put them out there.  It kind of started when I commented on Tim's blog entry about modern political tea parties.  The bulk of my response wasn't so much about the tea parties, but about the recent HBO miniseries John Adams adapted from the biography written by David McCullough.  

I really liked parts of it, and hated other parts when I watched it.  Here is this great man, that had so much to do with gaining our independence from Britain in getting the continental congress to join together to sign off on the Declaration.  And then he is sent to be an ambassador to France where his talents and abilities are absolutely wasted.  He was ill treated by Benjamin Franklin in France, the same man who had guided him to success back in Philadelphia.  That made me sick.  Then he is sent to Great Britain after the war to be ambassador there, and he starts getting all these imperial notions. When he finally gets back to America, his children are grown and he hardly knows them at all. He wasn't around for the composition of the Constitution either.  He struggled as Vice President under Washington, trying to be useful, yet stay out of the political machinations between Jefferson and Hamilton.

The strife between Jefferson and Adams grew when Adams was elected President.  Looking at it, it never made sense how the second place candidate became Vice President.  Jefferson and Adams were friends, yet they had very different political views, and Jefferson totally undermined Adams.  He had these very negative pamphlets published about Adams.  It was disgusting.  And then there were Adams later years as his family kind of fell apart.  So sad.  But then he bit the bullet and made the first gesture to reconcile with Jefferson.  They corresponded back and forth for their last few years.  On the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, both men died within hours of each other.

There is a scene near the end of the series where Adams and his son John Quincy view the famous painting by John Trumbull of the signing.  He criticized the painting for being inaccurate.  The Continental Congress was not so neatly organized or seemingly serene.  It was filled with regular men, with regular passions and short comings.  And looking back, I know why I hated the series in parts.  It didn't jive with the common perception I had of the Founding Fathers.  In my mind, they had been nearly deified.  But they were, in fact, just men.

This is what triggered the thoughts I've had recently.  The Founding Fathers were not gods, they were imperfect, regular men.  But they lived during extraordinary times, and were called upon to do extraordinary things.  And they did them.  They accomplished great things.  So often we tell ourselves that we could never achieve great things.  We don't count ourselves worthy or able to do these things.  But that is because we think of our heroes as being otherworldly.  We see in ourselves our own weaknesses, but those who accomplish great things we think of as being nearly perfect.  But they are not perfect.  On the flip side, when we find out that our heroes made terrible mistakes, we discount the great things they did do.  It is important for us to come to terms with this dichotomy within everyone, but especially ourselves.  Not to minimize our own accountability, but to realize that even though we are not perfect, that is no reason to despair and count ourselves out.

Next Time I'll Read the Fine Print

Hi! Some of you may have wondered what I have been up to the last month and a half.  You'll have to keep wondering, as this post will not attempt to address that issue.  But at least you know that I am, in fact, still alive.

I was visiting Into the Woods... and jumped at the chance for a free handmade item from Wood. But I failed to read the rule that I needed to offer handmade items to receive a handmade item. Now I am obligated to make the same offer to the first five respondents to this post.  

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me!

My choice. For you. This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

1. I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!
2. What I create will be just for you.
3. It’ll be done this year. {translation: you may be waiting a little while}
4. You have no clue what it’s going to be … it may be cards, a poem, a bookmark, something yummy or a complete surprise to you (and me!) … who knows? not you, that’s for sure!
5. I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.
6. Most importantly, you must offer the same deal on your blog - the first 5 people to comment on your blog (or if you do not have a blog, facebook) get something made by YOU!

The first 5 people to do so and leave a comment telling me they did win a FAB-U-LOUS homemade gift by me …

So... buyers beware.  Nothing in this life is free.