The charmed life

sometimes involves.....

- waking up, going outside, picking raspberries and blackberries, and eating them with your cereal.

- breaking world records in all Track and Field events after 2 hours of playing Kinect Sports with your sister.

- tackling your siblings in a concerted effort to get stronger.

- becoming addicted to the Big Bang Theory, simply because there is so much time around here.

- eating all the caramel in the world. Literally. ALL THE CARAMEL.

- saying, "Julie! / Joseph! / Jacob! / Sarah! How come.....you're so cute?" every time I see one of those cute people.

- becoming a pro at shooting a basketball backwards.

- narrowly avoiding vicious scams by people who don't live charmed lives like stupid Patricia J. Hall.

- listening to this song on a loop:

  

- following up every family prayer with 12 push-ups and 21 crunches (or however old you are).

- trying to tackle your brother only to bang your head on the wall.

- wondering, "but why is the jam gone?"

- laughing hysterically because Pluto isn't technically a planet.

- blasting this song every time it is on the radio and singing along with Baby Sister:

 

- going to Rita's whenever I feel like it, because it is just like 5 minutes away instead of 2000 miles away like it is when I'm in Utah....

- having friends over who cover your brother's eyes when an inappropriate part comes on in the movie you're watching.

- having brothers who cover your friend's eyes when an inappropriate part comes on in the movie you're watching.

- phrases like "Screw you, Tower of Babel!" coming up in scripture study.

- spending a morning watching Steve Irwin videos on YouTube with Baby Sister.

- stacking up significant fines on your library card and feeling really embarrassed about that since they just waived $18.40 in fines from the last time you checked something out (February of 2011).

- lunching with the Padre.

- hacking into my grandma's Facebook. getting nice posts on Facebook clearly written by my grandma who loves me.

The Essence of Moisture

Recently, Utah has been getting a little bit more rain than it usually does. I don't really like the rain here in Utah, and here's why: when I hear that it is going to rain, I get ready. I put on my black and white rainboots and make sure that my jacket has a hood. I leave my apartment, armed with my polka-dotted umbrella (ella, ella, ay, ay), ready to meet the rain head-on.

And then it doesn't rain.

Instead, the sky kind of glares at me, annoyed that I somehow managed to thwart its plan of ruining my day with its cold raindrops. It spends all day, gathering up gray until I go into a building for class, or until I go home for the night. And then, the second I step through the doorway, it starts to rain.

You might be wondering why this would bother a person. You might be thinking, "how wonderful, to have the world so in your favor that it never rains on you." But that's not really what bothers me. I am bothered because it never rains on me when I am prepared for rain. I am bothered because then, I carry around an unhelpful umbrella. I go out of my way to find puddles to splash through with my rainboots. My hood flops uselessly against my back. I was all ready for rain and it never came.

This is not so much a problem as what happens when I am not ready for rain. Sometimes, I get tired of hearing about the rain that is coming, because I've been wearing rainboots all week and have seen nothing but sunshine. Sometimes, I just don't remember to call the Utah Weather Phone and the rain takes me by surprise. Whatever the reason, there are some days that it rains that I am not sufficiently prepared.

On these days, I am greeted by an enthusiastic gray sky as a splash of water as soon as I leave my apartment. I walk through campus, head bowed, resigned to my situation. I look around at all the others students, happily shaking off their umbrellas and stomping their cute boots, and I wonder why the rain couldn't have come at a time when I, too, was wearing boots and toting around an umbrella.

However annoying this is, the thing that bothers me the most about rain is this thing that people seem to really like doing in Mormon culture. It's called, being grateful for the rain.

Not trying to hate on anyone's prayers, but I have to say that this has always seemed weird to me. Whenever it is a rainy day, or it is the day after a rainy day, people will invariably work that into their prayers somehow. It usually sounds something like this: "And we thank thee for the rain," or, "We thank thee for this good moisture we have received," or, "We thank thee for the moisture and ask that it can go to the places that need it." There are many variations of this idea, but it bothers me every time, no matter how it is worded.

I just have to wonder, why is anyone grateful for this moisture? We have sprinklers. Utah has been a dessert for.....ever, and everyone has got it under control. When I was graduating from high school, and I told people I was going to be going to school in Utah, many of them said something about how I would miss the greenness of the East Coast. But I haven't actually missed it that much. Utahns water their yards obsessively in the spring and summer, as soon as the snow disappears. They get fancy sprinkler systems that will water their grass every 6 minutes. The drought situation has been stabilized.

It also confuses me when people say this, because I don't hear anyone saying, "Oh, I'm so glad it's raining today! This is great that Utah is getting some rain!" (except when they are being self-righteous). More often, you hear people saying, "Look at my hair, I hate this rain." "My shoes are soaked, I should have worn my rainboots." "I just want to go dry off, this rain is ridiculous." That doesn't sound very grateful.

Personally, I am grateful for rain if the following are also happening:

1. I am inside, and I am sleeping.
2. I am inside, and there is cool lightning.
3. I am inside, and all the lights are still on.
4. I am outside, and someone really smokin hot is kissing me super-passionately.

If you also feel like this, you might consider saying thank you for your house, which keeps you safe and warm and far away from the "moisture."