Weeks

I spent about 178 hours without the internet a few weeks ago. I didn't even turn on my computer. Ok...I did actually go onto my mom's computer once to get a recipe for dinner, but that doesn't really count. I relied a lot on ChaCha for information...which didn't help when I ran out of questions.

Truthfully, the first few days were really, really hard. Every time I was bored, I'd go to get online...but no. On Tuesday I didn't even have access to the internet, which was good. By the end of the week, I was just curious about what I was missing, but I didn't need to get online. Instead...I actually did things.

I went to the library on Monday

Spent the day soul-searching on Tuesday, including a 20 minute, bare-foot walk home when I got locked out of the condo where I was without my keys, shoes, or phone.
I finally painted my room.
My mom's homeschool class reenacted the battle of Gettysburg with squirt guns on Thursday.
I decided to learn how to tune pianos.
Basically, the week helped me learn that the internet, and computers, really need to be more of a tool than a source of entertainment in my life. I rely too much on them.
(I know this is really late...but I've been sidetracked. I'm trying to post old things today that never got posted for whatever reason)

Freedom

For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return.

~Leonardo da Vinci

For a while now, I have felt a deep, inexplicable yearning to fly. I love flying in planes, but this…this is different. More. I look up on a perfectly clear day, and feel joy at the mere thought of soaring through the intense blue of the sky. I see myself gliding with the wind, dancing with the birds, and twisting through the clouds. I would give anything to laugh in the rain or fall with the snow, the crystalline flakes collecting in my hair.
I used to dream of falling…then missing the ground and soaring to great heights with a freedom unseen in my waking life. I can only imagine the joy I’d feel if my flight were reality.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.
Pilot Officer Gillespie Magee
No 412 squadron, RCAF
Killed 11 December 1941

Oh, that I were a bird...

This is what I'm thinking

So I found a cool website (http://rulesformyunbornson.tumblr.com) that inspired me. Well...it helped an idea already in my head.
Basically, I'm going to take a vacation.
No, I'm not going anywhere. It's from the internet. It's sort of become my life these past few months, so I'm going to take a week off.

What I want to do:
Meditate, pray, and fast for 24 hours straight. Ok...there might be some sleeping in there. But you get the idea. Completely alone.
Finish painting my room. There are only two walls...so it shouldn't be too hard.
Finish some paintings I've started
Figure out my monetary needs
Christmas presents!
Spend a lot of time outside. It was my main source of peace in Utah, and I've abandoned it. I need to get back to it.
Start wogging. I fail at running.
Play some of the video games I have, computer, wii, and game boy. I love them. don't judge.
Do math!
Record some songs I've been meaning to record...including my entry for Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir. Which I will need to go online for...hmm...maybe not this week then. But I can practice!
Do something to get more politically involved/informed. Colorado's state government sucks, and we're voting on some interesting measures next month.
Read two excellent books. Unless the book's really long...then only one.
Finish the 1500 piece puzzle my mom and I started today.
Watch Amazing Grace. Because I love that movie.

I suppose I should copy this list so I don't have to go online to get it...

True Story.

Love

50 questions

My casual addiction, stumbleupon, has brought me to yet another wonderfully inspiring website. It's based on a book called "Live What You Love," and it has 50 questions to ask yourself in order to help yourself discover what you really love. So I've decided to answer these questions, here for you, today. Or perhaps I'll expand this into multiple posts. Or even a whole blog! Hmm...the possibilities. Well, I'll start with the first question for now:

1. How do you really feel about what you are doing right now at this exact moment?

At this exact moment, I'm sitting in my Sunday clothes with my laptop on my lap typing up this post. I also have Facebook and the wonderfully inspiring website open in other tabs. It's 9:36 pm on a Sunday. Now, how does this make me feel? I'm pretty indifferent about it. This skirt is extremely comfortable, but my computer is getting low on battery, so I should probably go downstairs to my room and plug it in. Right now though, I'm comfortable. I'm not disappointed about what I'm doing, and I'm glad that I'm writing on my blog. I should post more, as I'd probably get better at it. I used to write in a journal, but it's been hard for me lately. There's either too much to write or not enough. Especially the not enough...so then I go into my thoughts about my life and it all goes downhill from there. So what I'm doing right now is good. I could probably be out socializing with my ward, but I don't know what they're doing. I prefer doing this. So what I feel right now about what I'm doing at this exact moment is pretty much indifference, with a slight joy from doing something productive.

Ok. So mentioning my ward reminded me. Today, my bishop got up and said that he's excited for the fall and for our ward as it currently is (all of the college kids left in the past couple of weeks). Then he challenged (or was this a commandment?) all of the guys in our ward to go on a date this week. He knew that this caused many men to panic, but they need to do it anyway. He mentioned how he'd recently spoken with a bishop that set the people in his ward up. He also said that if people didn't start going on dates, he'd have to follow in that bishop's footsteps. Now, I'm not sure if this was a joke or a threat. Bishop Calvert can be pretty serious sometimes. It's just funny how much dating and marriage get mentioned here...more than at BYU, if that's possible. 

This may have something to do with all of the single 30-somethings.

nah.

Happiness

"Men are, that they might have joy"

Once upon a time, I was suspended. This was a new experience for me, and I didn't really know what to do. I was extremely happy at school (which actually contributed to the bad grades...shh), and I really didn't want to go home, where I had few, if any, friends. I spent the entire summer wallowing in misery, half-heartedly trying to make something of my pathetic existence. What was the point in trying if I had failed so completely?
Last Monday, I was wandering the non-fiction section of the library when I randomly picked up a book called "The Happiness Project." Since I was so unhappy, I figured I might as well give it a go. I checked it out, went home, and started reading.
Wow. This book was wonderful. It's about this woman who isn't particularly unhappy, but she wasn't exactly happy either. So she decided to spend a year trying to do little things to make her happier. Her year inspired me. It took me two days to finish the book, and while I was reading on the second day, lying in the grass behind my house, I got an unexpected phone call from Dr. Staheli. I was just plain shocked for a while...a few days actually. It wasn't a big deal...but it kind of was. For me, anyways. I've always wanted to be in Singers, and I could have been in it if I hadn't been suspended. I was both sad and happy...kind of a weird combination. That night, I went to the library again and picked up Brandon Sanderson's new book, which was 1000 pages long. A good way to spend the rest of my week, I figured. He's become one of my favorite authors. Well, the book itself was alright, and Wednesday was mediocre. Sonic did have 1/2 price cream slushes though. Those things are heavenly. Thursday was ok, and Friday...well, I went to Brandt's football practice the whole time and replied to a rather offensive letter I received from a missionary that day, then found out my dear choir friend, Rachel Lynn Brown, got into Singers. I was, and am, overjoyed. She really deserves it, and she is a wonderful person. It made me so happy that she got in. Saturday was three hours in the hot sun at Brandt's first football game, in which he was awesome. That night I watched BYU's first game of the season, which we WON!
Now, none of this is particularly awesome. In fact, some of it could be just plain horrible. However, this past week something changed within me. Something is not the same (sorry...). I became happy. Now, I can't really say any of the aforementioned things made me happy. They made me happier. No, what made me happy was what always makes me happy: God. I decided to put my trust in God, and to give up some rather terrible habits of mine. In return, He made me happy. And I've been beyond wonderful ever since.
This past Sunday, I actually talked to people at church. Weird. And this Saturday I'm going to the Air Force - BYU game! So excited.
Oh yes. One of the best days I've had in a while was when I got up at 6:30 in the morning (I usually get up at ten. or later.) and went and worked for a one day thing. I was in the best mood.
So I've decided to get up early every day and go jogging. Or walking. God has blessed me immensely, and everything is so much clearer. A week ago, I had no idea what I was going to do with my life. Now, I have goals! I've made decisions about what to do. My main goal for the future is simply to get back to BYU, and get into Singers next fall. This goal brings a few other things into focus...such as the big marriage issue. I hadn't really known what to do about that, since most people in my ward are over 28, but now I really don't want to get married until I get back to school. This is big for me. It makes me less depressed over being alone.
Oh! And. I'm not sure I want to major in Math Ed anymore. Sad, I know. But my new major...it makes me so excited. There's a problem with it though, and that's my grades. Those buggers. It takes good grades to get into this major: Mechanical Engineering! Yay! I'd looked into it before (multiple times, actually), but either my parents or the guy/girl ratio scared me off. The thing is, what I think about in the shower (I have it from a good authority that what you think about in the shower is what you should major in) is inventing. My creativity, as discussed before, comes in the form of the sciences. I've come up with some awesome inventions in my time...and I would love mechanical engineering. To design airplanes...that's my dream. T'would be wonderful.

Oh! And I bought THE most awesome toy today. Buckyballs. Check them out.

I'm happy.

:)