Pushing things forward.

I got a calling! First one I've had at BYU. I'm teaching Elders' Quorum now. Even though I'm not actually an elder myself. I taught for the first time last Sunday. I'm hoping I'll get better every time I do it.

Gilmore Guy is getting married!!!!!!! Holy Smokes!! We talked about it running one night. Actually it was more like me asking questions and him talking. I admire him for making this bold move. I hope to be in his shoes someday. This is some of the best news I've heard in a long time. I'm incredibly excited for him.

At the same time these sorts of thoughts make me worry. Not about him so much as myself. I guess that's the root of the problem though, being selfish about these sorts of relationships. I don't even know where to begin with girls. Also, there are certain feelings I can't imagine happening with a girl. But I hope they can happen.

I remember the first time I found a guy my age that I liked. It was in high school. I really wasn't too big on the church at the time. In fact, the church just made me angry.

I remember being at his house laying on his bed, looking out the window at the stars and then looking at him and his curly dirty-blond hair and light eyes and we were both kind of asleep, but not, and thinking about each other and it was warm and great. Not forever great, but just great right that moment. But that moment seemed like forever, right there. I got lost in it. And I didn't really want anything else.

Of course, he drove me home later that night and I saw my parents and my brothers and sisters and I had to do homework and not tell anyone. I just came crashing down to reality like it had all been a dream I was waking up from.

Still, could I ever feel like that for a girl? Could I ever just get lost in her? Just purely because of her physical attractiveness and warmth and just being with her close? It is something I would miss deeply. Is it even necessary?

I don't think it is. I think the most important thing is commitment and just being there and being able to do all the normal things like homework and working and taking care of the kids and what not. This isn't to say that I couldn't have sex or anything like that with my wife. I could, I'm sure. I'm just not sure about always having the urge to, or about those moments when you just sort of want to lay there starry-eyed cuddling each other, being totally attracted and totally content. I think all things are possible, I just have trouble imagining this. Does that make sense? This train of thought upsets me a little sometimes, but I'm willing to give that all up.

Sorry if that weirds out any of you who read my blog.

At any rate, more stuff that has happened:

Smurf is a manager now at Los Hermanos. This is great for him because he gets paid well, receives health insurance, and gets to eat for free all the time. Weird, and a little uncomfortable for me though. It's odd having your best friend be in charge of you sometimes, even if that's his job. I think I'd like to find another job to work at in the morning in addition to Los Hermanos. I should be earning as much money as I can. Also, some deep insecurity inside me is cautioning me against feeling like I work for my friends all the time and I rely on that. I'm not sure how to feel about this.

I got into Fiddler on the Roof, a play that will show at the Orem Scera. We were accepted into the ensemble, which is actually pretty cool considering the calibur of this "community" performance. Smurf and Robb from work got in too, but Smurf can't do it anymore because of his new managerial duties (which we really werent expecting when we tried out). I'm not sure if I will stick with it or not. They always have these surprise practices that I can't make because I don't have enough time to get work off. Also, I've already missed a couple rehearsals already. Hmmm..

Went to the Manti pageant with Blueshorts, Smurf, Brown Sugar, Wiggle and Tracie. The temple in Manti is amazing. It's this big old castle of a building out in the middle of nowehere, and it's gorgeous at night, especially when the lights of the temple come on and the stars come out. I think it's one of my favorite temples. We had lots of fun playing games and munching on the snacks we had smuggled in before the show.

The pageant, on the other hand was really cheesy. At least I thought so. Smurf tells me that this is the nature of pageants, and that is why we do not call them "plays." They are "melodramas." I guess a lot of people have profound religious experiences and feelings there, but that wasn't me. There were a few things I really liked, like the sound of the narrator woman's voice and the vocabulary she used and also some of the effects, like all the fire and lightening when Jesus came to the Americas and the pillar of light at Joseph Smith's prayer. But there was just a lot of hokey stuff in-between.

I was also sort of being sarcastic and making little comments about how cheesy it was through the performance, which I shouldn't have been doing. I feel sort of dumb about that in retrospect. I don't like myself being so vocally critical.

Los Hermanos is getting harder to work at. I hope this is only a temporary thing. I had a server critique the other night, which is where a manager sits down with a clipboard at a table in the restaurant and grades you on how well you serve them. Brown Sugar was doing my critique and she was sitting there with Blueshorts, so it was a little awkward, as I am generally on pretty casual terms with both of these two people. So the short and skinny of it is that I made all kinds of mistakes, like forgetting to even fill the water pitcher I had in my hand before going to fill their glasses. (who does that!?) and leaving a tray stand in front of their table, and getting Brown Sugar's order wrong. It it was this horrible mess.

Aside from all that, it's hard to be "on" all the time and just be smiley and helpful and polite and the center of attention always to everyone. I get really burned out from it lately, even though I still have to do it. I've been making more mistakes, and all the customers I serve seem to just have this gloomy look on their face like, "so why haven't you gotten me my ______ yet?" Hmm. I'm hoping to stay positive and get over this in time.

I served Chris Canon yesterday at lunch. For those of you who don't know who he is, (shame!) he represents Utah, specifically the third district, in the House of Representatives. Not only that, but his wife was roommates with my mom in college and they were good gal-pals. Her name is Claudia Fox. She and Chris Canon were at my parents' wedding reception and lots of other stuff. I told the couple who my parents were and they were thrilled to meet me and ask me questions about how my family is doing and I thought it was really cool that I was meeting a congressman who knew my parents back in the day. They remembered a lot about my parents. Claudia tole me to tell my mom to call her. (I'm so sure she has your number now...) They were nice folks, but I had to seperate the politics from the people. Congressman Canon and his wife started telling me about his policy on immigation (in favor of building a fence along the border, no road to citizenship or amnesty for any immigrant who crossed the border illegally, etc) and I couldn't help but think how silly it was that he was telling me this while a bunch of most likely illegal immigrants who forged their papers to get jobs were making his steak, enchilada, and spanish rice back in the kitchen. They probably washed his dishes too. It was especially ironic when two obviously illegal construction workers came in for lunch and sat down at a table right next to the congressman and couldn't speak enough English to ask me what exactly was in the Joya del Mar soup and what kinds of cerveza we had. I explained everything to them in Spanish, making sure I was loud enough for the congressman and his wife to hear. When I returned to Canon's table, they both smiled plastically and told me I spoke Spanish very well. (She served in Spain, he in El Salvador and Guatemala, surprisingly.) Funny story. He ended up leaving me 7 bucks on a 23 dollar check. Pretty good...for a Republican.

I talked to my mom later on the phone and she was really excited and happy that I had talked to Chris and Claudia. My dad thought it was cool that the two had remembered them. I told my mom that Congressman Canon had asked me to ask her to put a Chris Canon lawn sign up at their house, to which my Mom replied "Oh, well I hate to tell them this, but I'm pretty sure I'll be voting for the other guy."

Way to be Mom, way to be.

I find solace in my car lately, which I have back now. This old hunk of junk is mine, and I love driving around and just thinking and singing along and listening to music in it. Blueshorts gave me an old cd player of his to use with my tape adapter.

Cookies are also pretty good to have around.

I'm gonna get to bed for now. Thanks for reading all this random crazy stuff. Later, amigos.