Gratitude

I feel like I'm always trying to find things for which to be grateful.  I know November is a natural time for Americans to think about gratitude because of Thanksgiving. I'm sure that other months are months of "Thanksgiving" in other cultures.

Here's a short list. I hope to add some longer posts about specific things that I am grateful for in the coming weeks:

1. the Gospel of Jesus Christ
2. my husband, Cody
3. the restored church of Jesus Christ (the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints)
4. family
5. prophets, seers, and revelators today
6. books
7. library cards
8. chocolate
9. friends
10. letters
11. my mom and dad, specifically
12. Lindsey, specifically
13. carpools
14. airplanes
15. cameras
16. notebooks and pens
17. literacy
18. music
19. patient people
20. knowledge
21. Shakespeare
22. Dr. Seuss
23. Yo Yo Ma
24. blue things
25. warm blankets
26. colors
27. food
28. being able to cook
29. running water
30. indoor plumbing
31. indoor heating and cooling
32. a car
33. my job
34. Cody's job
35. that I live in the United States 
36. that I grew up in middle-class America so that I'm blessed with opportunities beyond many in the world
37. our local and national leaders
38. good people that have the desire to run for/be president/Senate/House of Representatives/Governor/etc. and who mostly are all just trying to do their best, so that I don't ever have to feel like I need to
39. scientists
40. iPods
41. running shoes
42. socks
43. my nephew who is the cutest
44. my brothers and sisters (counting in-laws, too)
45. American history
46. having gone to BYU and taken so many different classes
47. prayer
48. perspective
49. fall
50. that I'm not allergic to any foods or medicines

An insight into my adolesence

Looking back, I would say that I had a really easy time of being a teenager.  My sister and I figured out how to be friends (after I decided to stop getting mad at her for taking my second lunch; yes, I really did take two lunches to school, at least during cross country season), I got along great with my parents, my brothers were cute and young, I always had a job, I had friends at school and church and work, I was trusted by my teachers and employers, and I pretty much thought I had my life figured out.  I didn't get involved in any self-destructive behavior. I read a lot.  I worked a lot. And I liked boys, a lot.

Yet, even with knowing all of this, I also know that I sometimes had a really hard time as a teenager. Not because my life was overwhelming, or the odds were never in my favor, or because people were mean to me.  No, my life felt hard because I had a problem with loneliness.  I'm not sure what the root of it was, but there were nights when I would think about how all the guys I liked would never like me and how I would be miserable forever. I guess I just was a glutton for unrequited "love."  

The reason I got to thinking about this was that as I was looking through my revision exercise (that I mentioned last time), and deleting about 10 pages of ridiculous dialogue and plot, I came across this gem which will also be deleted. I am soooo sorry for the horrible writing; I wrote this when I was 14.  Also, I've put in dashes where there were names, so don't get tripped up by that.

"In the midst of her sobbing she began speaking aloud very softly to herself, “Why are you crying...I thought you were done…Oh goodness I just want someone to hold me, like when ------ just held me…please, someone just hold me…but not -------…not him…” her desire overcame her and she began sobbing again; her coughing worsened.  “Mom…Mommy, please come and give me a hug.  You could always make it better…cough cough cough…please!  I just want someone to hold me…” in her mind a picture of ----flashed.  She recoiled from the image...  “No…no…not him.  Someone who thinks that I am special and will love me for who I am…why is love so complicated!  I just want someone to love me and me love them in return…” she continued to sob. 

Slowly her sobs died away with only an occasional cough. The last thought ------- had before giving away to sleep was, “I just want to love a man…a good man…and for him to hold me and make it all better…”She managed to fall into a fitful sleep.  The blanket her mother had brought in that her grandmother had made was scrunched up all around -------, almost as if she were clinging to anything familiar to save herself from slipping away into the nightmare that had been her life of late."

I actually have a distinct memory of writing this part--on one of those lonely nights when I had been hoping my mom would come in.  Well, she didn't come in that night, so I turned on my computer, and typed that scene. It was self-therapy. I was calmed down enough that I could go to sleep. The next day, I was completely fine and didn't say anything to anyone.  Another time when I was lonely and crying, my mom did come in. The next day I was completely fine and we didn't say anything to anyone.

I wasn't depressed or anything in high school.  But I think sometimes we forget how emotional it is as a teenager (and I didn't even want to be emotional when I was a teenager).  I'm so glad I'll only be a teenager once.

NOTE: Mom--don't feel bad about this if you read this.  You're a great mom.  I needed to learn to grow up.  Maybe I also needed to find this piece of teenager in my "monster" and reflect on how great my life was as an adolescent compared to how it felt like sometimes.  Thanks for always being there when I had concerns and gathered up enough courage to voice them. You read my mind a lot more than you didn't when I was worried about something.  You're the best mom for me!

Junk. Trash. Garbage.

Why did I write it to begin with? 

(my reigning thought right now)

After working on French Club lessons for the majority of the day, I finished (yay!) and decided I would look into the questionable, mocking folder, "the monster."  I gave a background story on this folder about two years ago and then an update on its progress about a year ago.

Why on Earth did I take a look at it? It was hibernating nicely.  But now I get to be racked with self-mocking laughs and thoughts of "What persuaded me to write this?!"

The reason why I'm so critical of my story aka "the monster"?  I'm now looking at prose that I wrote nearly ten years ago. It hasn't been touched in ten years. It is awkward and flowery and unreal and hilarious!  I just read through what I wrote, highlight, and press delete (for those of you worried that these first versions are being lost forever, do not fear I have a folder entitled "old monster" where all of my original drafts from ten years ago are safely lodged).

Screen shot of the folder where my "monster" resides

I've just deleted about six pages of this junk that I wrote.  Even though I was somewhat hopeful a year ago that I could someday whip this story into good enough shape to get it published, I think that it's more of a revision exercise for me.  I look at it every year or two, practice how I can revise, and then don't look at it again.

So I guess what the bottom line of this rant on my poor manuscript is, is that I don't know if I have enough creative, good ideas in my head now, to change the flowery, unreal garbage I wrote ten years ago. I mean, the characters are still living in a castle in what I was deleting today. I haven't had a castle figure in my mind since ten years ago. Ten years ago I made the switch from "Let's pretend you can write fantasy" to "You're really a much better realistic fiction writer than a fantasy writer."  And here I am, weeding out castles and kings and queens from this realistic fiction story.  It is soooo painful.  I don't know if I can keep doing it.

But knowing me, I probably will. It is my revision exercise after all.

Lessons I'm learning in D.C.

I finished out the school year, set up my new classroom, visited my family in Michigan, and then on Monday I was reunited with my husband after 33 days apart.  Frankly, I don't advise 33 days apart if you can help it. It was hard, but now it's over.

I decided I would spend my first day in D.C. as a proper/improper tourist.  What I mean by that is that I dressed up in dark clothes, including a skirt, so I would look like someone going to work, but then I went and visited tourist attractions.  My ruse worked and as I was on my way to my first tourist attraction, a man and his wife stopped me and asked me a question about transportation.  Thankfully, I knew the answer or I would have had to admit this was my first day back in the city after two years, and even then, I'd only been here for three days.

I visited the Smithsonian Castle (which is where the Moongate Garden is), Freer and Sackler Galleries (in a nutshell: Whistler, Leyland, and Asian art), Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden, and Renwick Gallery.

In the Hirshhorn Scupture Garden

The Burghers of Calais by Rodin in the Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden

Looking at the fountain in the center of the Freer Gallery

Smithsonian Castle viewed from my bench in the Moongate Garden

The Moongate Garden

Lessons I've already learned so far:
CVS does not have a public bathroom
McDonald's does have a public bathroom and the museums
Most museums and galleries open at 10 but the Castle opens at 9 and has free wi-fi
Traffic lights don't really apply to pedestrians; if the way is clear, you go
Try to get a map of the National Mall before you realize you've almost walked by it completely
Asian art is really cool

My second day in DC was a lot less uneventful in terms of sightseeing.  I did the laundry, bought groceries, vacuumed our apartment (for the sole purpose of passing out on the floor in a nap later in the afternoon), vacuumed the common area on our floor and swept the laundry room (I did those rooms in addition to our apartment because 1)I was the only one around and 2)I like to walk around without shoes on when I'm home and I didn't like continuously getting things stuck to my feet), finished Hunger Games and started Catching Fire, took an hour and a half walk in which I got several awesome blisters on my feet and still didn't find my way to the French Embassy, made dinner, went and got a milkshake with Cody at Johnny Rockets, and watched some Studio C skits.

Now with day three, I'll be working on research in two hours, I'm anticipating reading and possibly writing.  I've contacted a friend who worked at a temp agency last year when she was in DC and hoping maybe I can get some leads for that.  I just don't think I can sit around all day.  I mean, if it doesn't work out, I'll just have to be creative...and that wouldn't hurt too much for me to practice that.

Pruning is hard work

I never thought I would be as unimpressed with some of the things that I wrote in my story when I was in high school as I am now.  I thought I was brilliant.  I was just stupid and silly.  Thank goodness I can revise and change things, though I believe it will take a bit longer than I had anticipated.

I started again...

It's been a year and I decided I won't have the excuse of completely falling in love with Cody to distract me this summer.  Distracted from what?  From the story I started 11 years ago. ELEVEN YEARS!! What is wrong with me?

And want to know the best part? I still laugh at my lame jokes in the story.  I was able to breeze through the first part of my story today--only took me an hour and fifteen minutes. That's probably because I'd started to go through it last May/June. It'll get harder as I keep going.  Parts 3-5 I haven't looked at since August 2008. TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT, people!  That's four years! That's a really long time to get distracted with school and dating and working and graduating and finding a job and dating the best man ever and then getting engaged to him (and then marrying him).

Four years.  Eleven years.  Who knows, maybe I'll actually finish going through it for real this summer and if I have any guts left in me after that endeavor, could I really go after my goal of trying to get it published? We'll see.  Kinda scares me and makes me want to write with a penname so that no one can trace my silliness to me but then another part of me thinks that I should be proud of it and not be scared.  Plus, one of the reasons I used to play around with pen names was so that if I got it published when I was still unmarried, it could still be traced to me (dumb, I know).  But I'll be Beth Knudsen forever and I don't need to worry about that.

Oh yeah, another thing I started again: running.  I mean I have been running (or doing yogalates--yoga and pilates) since the new year started, but I ran three times this week! The first two days kicked my butt, but the last day, that was great.

I've also started planning again for school next year (I'm such a nerd) because I want to do so much better at teaching math next year, especially with the new math standards for fifth grade.  I did an alright job and my students learned this past year but I know I can do so much better and I'm really looking forward to it.

Part One is done!!

After a stupid mistake last Tuesday that involved me updating the format of Part One of My Story which resulted in the entire document being encrypted and destroyed.  All the changes I had made last Monday were lost.  I shed a few tears in frustration and sadness.

But then I buckled down and worked on going through Part One once more. I finished going through it today! Now I'll be able to move on to Part Two tomorrow.  If I keep at this pace, I should be done with going through and weeding through my whole story in just four more weeks.

My twelve-year-old writer-self is very happy at this accomplishment. :)

My story aka The Monster--alive once more

Judging by the last save date on my documents, it has been nearly three years since I have opened up, looked at, worked on, saved, or in short, done anything with regards to the story that I began exactly ten years ago.  However, despite all the setbacks that seemed to inevitably come with school, work, dating, etc. I have decided that since I have so much leisure time now, I might as well make myself useful.  Next to the search for a job (which takes up it's own space of time each day) and scripture study (which I'm finally giving it more time, as it deserves), I've been dividing my time into four parts: reading, watching movies, drawing/painting, and now, writing.

Since it has been so long, and since it is in all respects "finished", it now needs to be weeded, reworked, and made to fit the moldings of my mind and goal for it.

This story, without a name still--I have just referred to it as My story for ten years, or to my own self, by the name of the folder where all the documents are: The Monster--has occupied my thoughts to varying degrees the past decade.  There have been times, usually the summers in high school, when my characters occupied a real and active part of my imagination and thoughts.  Of late, there have been no thoughts, except as it relates to the sigh, "I really should finish my story..."

I began reading through Part One yesterday and made it through 29 of the 37 pages. I was surprised by some of the things that I had added through the years--having nearly forgotten many of the small details that had been added since the original drafting of Part One ten years ago.  (Interesting to note: when I wrote Part One as a twelve-year-old, I thought it was all I would write about the Setay's and Egerth's.  Only, come to find out, it now has four other parts and it has morphed into something quite different, yet retaining the main premise of that first draft.)  I found myself laughing out loud at some of the things I had written.  That may seem vain of me, but it's true.  I honestly had forgotten in the past three years what I had written probably five or six years ago.

So the journey begins again: I am going to wade through The Monster that has taken over my imagination and storage space on my computer for the past ten years and for once I am going to get it into the shape and story that I like. From there, we shall see.  Perhaps then step two may finally emerge: maybe I will get it published, or try to at least.