Friends Once Lost, Are Friends Again?

By Buckets Hall

Infinite apparitions from the past swarmed me, each awaking a separate, transcendent sentience.

People I saw and talked with the first week of the semester

January 5-9, 2018
Maya. A young woman from one of my mission areas. Anastasia. Childhood friend. Used to have sleepovers at her grandma's house. Alex. Ate at his apartment almost daily my freshman year. Garrett. Went to a scout camp together when we were twelve. Miraculously still looks twelve. Hayden. My mission trainer.

Actually, Hayden was the first person I saw on campus. Messy hair tousled by bitter wind. wrinkled pants clutched his slim thighs. A massive grin spilled over flushed cheeks. The needling cold numbed me, but the warm, sweet essence of our relationship pierced through the frost. 

Missionary trainers can potentially change your life, and Hayden did not waste his opportunity. As a collar-choked, nervous 18 year-old, thousands of miles and two years away from my family, Hayden closely resembled a mother hen coddling a frightened chick during a thunderstorm. He taught me what missionaries are and are not. Missionaries are instigators. They are not afraid of calling people. They are extroverts, not avoiding. Humility and Happiness 101.

That was almost three years ago. But this blustery Monday morning, I could see no difference. I bolted to him, nearly decking him off his penny board and onto the frozen ground.

In the Book of Mormon, there's a well taught story of a man named Alma who reunites with some old friends after a 14-year hiatus. He was elated, calling them "brothers in Christ." I was experiencing Alma's joy. Both of us captured the pure reunion with old friends--a holy serendipity. Alma and I shared a glance that Emmanuel Levinas describes eloquently.

"To approach the Other in conversation is to welcome his expression, in which at each instant he overflows the idea a thought would carry away from it. It is therefore to receive from the Other beyond the capacity of the I, which means exactly: to have the idea of infinity."

I was surrounded by heavenly Others. Infinite apparitions from the past swarmed me, each awaking a separate, transcendent sentience. These encounters were bronzed statues. Inexplicable. Overwhelming. Permanent. 

People I saw and avoided this last week

October 28 - November 1, 2019
Sarah. Went on some dates with her. Painful conversations. Professor Scott. Had his class a year ago. Had a question, but forgot. Some dude from World Religions, long ago. Always wears business casual. Athena. Current classmate. We walk past each other in the same corridor twice a week at 2:55. Hayden. My mission trainer.

Only 10 feet away. Same hair. And pants. His smile was exchanged for an unwelcoming grimace. Rushed steps whisked him through the courtyard. 
I cannot decide between saying hello and checking my phone. Contorted, dismantled thoughts. My jaw sags agape, waiting for a command. I eject a ramshackle "hey..." into the stony air.
He walks away, unfazed. Relief and regret, two unlikely friends, begin homemaking in the pit of my stomach.

They are everywhere. ghostly specters. I want to drop my backpack and say "CAN'T YOU SEE YOU AREN'T SUPPOSED TO BE HERE?" As they impassively float by. Something has changed, but what exactly? My bonds to old friends and acquaintances feel more like bondage. In its twisted way, Time has spewed corroded patina onto my memories like never before. Before, they were heavenly personages. Now, these cretins silently wail their siren songs as I reel through campus, haunting me with jilted taunts. "Remember me? Do you care? Do I care?" And guilt, ever present, bruises my circumventing heels. 

I have immense difficulty feeling the joy Alma had, and Levinas embraced. I don't discover infinity in the Other's eyes now; I confront an awkward conversation. Unneeded minutes spent on conjuring emotions. Betrayal and helplessness pierce me, like a magician discovering he is a charlatan. These relationships are no longer golden shrines preserved in my memory's memorial. There is no spark of eternal light in their doleful countenances.

When did I learn of awkwardness? Perhaps seeing old friends has become a glorified name game, scraping the dregs of discarded knowledge, done solely to reinforce how small the world is. Sometimes I wonder if I have too many relationships, and now I must dispose of expired ones from the fridge. Or maybe too many of these unexpected engagements have been met by disengaged faces, too bothered to ignite old flames.

For some time I have seen my old friends disintegrate to stoic ghosts. I have grappled with the distance between I and the Other. 10 feet becomes light-years when the timing fails me. "Sorry, can't talk. I'm supposed to see you in class, not the library." "Excuse me, I'm buying cookies from the vending machine. You aren't supposed to glance over here." My life appears too burdensome for memories now. They are a hulking filing cabinet. An outdated accessory, too heavy to move. Negligence appears more comfortable.

But one moment keeps the hope for joyous reunions on life support. Five minutes which jolted everything.

People I saw and talked with while I was late to class

March 23, 2018
Ashley. Sang in a choir together. Competitive dancer. Went to the Missionary Training Center at the same time.

The somber March sun threw flecks of light from behind the cloud cover. Spindly legs launched me through the courtyard. Hopelessly tardy. Head down. Rushed steps,

"Richard!" From nowhere, a small, bundled woman blocks my path. Caked in spray tan, A bronze aura emanates from her. I can hardly recognize her.

This is Ashley. We strike a conversation. I walk with her. She smiles. I do too. We meet up weeks later. Date. Marry. We smile some more.

A coincidental run-in with an old friend altered my life's trajectory beyond belief. Because Ashley, a friend who once sat in mundane mission classes with me, had courage which I lacked--looked up instead of down--we took cheesy couple photos together instead of seeing each other's on Facebook.

The glimmer of light we saw in each other that brisk spring morning, sometimes it is replicated in other old friends. And while I enjoy the invisible wall that separates me from them, I cannot always avoid these apparitions. They look too much like angels. 

People I saw and made myself talk with last week

October 28 - November 1, 2019
Kami. Served in the mission as me. Not Facebook friends. Devon. Worked with him as an intramural referee. Great future car salesman. Jessica. In a current class. Spent most of the time figuring out who I was. Smiled in the end. Professor Boston. Refuses to call me Buckets. Knows me as "The student not named Buckets." Hayden. My mission trainer.

The Books I've Read This Year So Far, Ranked.

This year I have read more books than any year in my life--and it's only August! Between winter semester and the summer, I have started and ended 20 different stories (all but one for the first time), and I feel like they deserve some reflection before I hop into next semester. And what better way for a sports junkie to express his feelings than through a rankings system!
I'll get this right out there--ranking books is frivolous. There is no way you can quantify books by pleasure. I liked and disliked something from every book I read. Additionally, these books span a vast array of genres, some that were never meant to be compared. Imagine trying to see what household appliance makes the best pet. Books weren't made to be ranked.
But I would go with a microwave. Much lower maintenance than a sink, and it needs less exercise than the fridge, which never stops running.
However, there's a lot of joy to be found in organizing my emotions and pondering on which books I perceive as great. Sometimes you feel like there is a very loud, rambling figure that is trying to tell you to rediscover greatness, which makes you wonder in the first place, what is greatness? This was a fun exercise to reveal what I appreciate while participating in a broad spectrum of books.

So this exercise proves to be simultaneously pointless and fulfilling. Sort of like winning a video game, or burning leaves under a microscope. As the ranker, there was one critical rule I made myself follow: no religious books or texts included. While I am having fun crossing boundaries, this remains untouchable. It feels wrong to quantify a text I actually believe matters. And there is a rule that I advise the reader to follow: This list is not definite. It's a thought experiment provokes John Keating and oozes subjectivity. But hey, this is the internet, and you clicked on this link. So compliment, fire back, suggest new reads, but this is all really meant to introduce/reintroduce books you may have closed the case on.

So here they are, ranked 20 to 1 that also fits into a more inclusive tier system.

TIER 1: THE NEVER AGAIN'S
These books just didn't do it for me, and I don't think they ever will.

20. The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane (summer reading)
I knew I shouldn't have read this. The other Stephen Crane story I read wasn't my favorite, and the mundane, meticulous commitment to realist description slurred an exciting story into a drag. Additionally, it's hard to connect with the main character at all. Like, he's just a punk, and not symbolic enough to overcome his flaws. The brights spots in Badge were few and between for me.










19. The Firm, by John Grisham (The Law in Literature class)
iPlacing a Grisham novel ths low definitely defies popular opinion, but I perceived a critical flaw in the book I just couldn't overcome. Mitch McDeere. Not admirable enough to be a hero, not strong enough to be an antihero, we see him slipping into a gimmicky plot that I couldn't grasp. He's the center of a story too big for him, and described too bluntly to take seriously. I found myself laughing at bad times.










18. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker (The American Novel class)
Sorry Oprah. Bizarrely beautiful and filled with illogical positivism, it's truly a good book. This gets knocked down to the bottom because of its aggressive, physical approach to problem solving made me too uneasy. It's supposed to be jarring, and Walker does not respect your inclinations for one moment. Purple's rawness and plays against tenderness overwhelmed me. Perhaps it's unconventional path to finding its soul forced me to move on from it.









TIER 2. THE SLOW BURNS
While I would reread and recommend these books, they were kind of... a struggle to finish.

17. The Sound and the Fury, by William Faulkner (The American Novel class)
I enjoy Faulkner, so for this to be 17, you should recognize I really like most of the novels. Heck, I even said nice things about a book I never want to read again. With Faulkner, the strength and weakness of his books is his character building. Truly marvelous creations, but a thick, heady read. Moving from narrations from an autistic adult, a tormented college freshman, and a petty sexist is just hard to do. Overall fascinating, but a burden to get through.
P.S. there's a film adaptation with James Franco in it. The movie looks awful, but the trailer looks hilarious.









16. A Civil Action, by Jonathan Harr (The Law in Literature Class)
A completely true story about a lawsuit on two fortune 500 companies, this book is complex and stressful. Harr excellently describes how one real life horror story morphed into another one, and has the records to prove it. This may have struck a chord with my anxieties over finances, as Jan Schlichtmann almost spent himself to death. At times, Harr focuses too much on semantics and run dry, even for someone interested in law. But, they got John Travolta to be in the movie, so it's got that going for it.









15. The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway (personal reading)

This may come as a surprise to some, because Hemingway is one of my favorite authors. I loved the writing style, the relationships, the tension in the book, but in the end, did anything happen? Three guys go to Spain with a floozy and they all end up screwed (and not in the good way). Like, is this an Ashton Kutcher/Vince Vaughn/Owen Wilson movie? The plot is lame. You can't deny it. But I will hedge and say this is one of Hemingway's less-lauded books, and he still can write.









TIER 3: THE GOOD READS
These books read quickly, and though I won't rave about them, they were well crafted

14. Recursion, by Blake Crouch (suggested by Ashley)

A science fiction thriller that really stretches your intellect, Crouch relentlessly plugs his tragic, world ending theory at you until you feel like there is no hope (spoiler: there is hope), all while he gently reminds that the more important theme is simpler and purer. I read all 500 pages in under three days, and that includes taking a break. A very addicting book.





13. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman (The American Novel)

It's difficult to talk only about the story when there is so much to discuss about the writer and its film adaptation. I mean, Freaking Rob Reiner had to pry the screenplay from Goldman's reluctant hands. Even the story itself is about a different story that has been edited for better effect. The effect makes for a funny, postmodern icon filled with lovable characters. This book is a cult classic without its cult classic movie-ego.









12. Wise Blood, by Flannery O'Connor (The American Novel)
There's really only one way to describe this book: weird. And in its weirdness it sucks you in. Who in the world are these characters? Where are they? What type of world are they in? It's a modern fairy tale with unknown motives, all doused in obscure Christian imagery. The most helpful bit of knowledge I had while reading this book was that O'Connor was a Catholic woman in the Deep South. All sorts of weird can happen when looking at the world through that lens.









TIER 4: THE OH MY'S
Books that surprised me with their power and touched me on a special level. 

11. 1984, by George Orwell (recommended by Ashley)

About 70 pages in, I realized I was mad at this book because of how realistic it was. Of course, the motives for Big Brother and the party members are completely different than most people's, but this book is surprisingly human. I'm not going to lie, I read this book on 100% adrenaline, and it contains a heart-wrenching finish. But I will credit Orwell with his writing prowess, to spin a sci-fi story into a reality, and to constantly fool the writer.










10. Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom (summer reading)

The anti-text of 1984, Tuesdays with Morrie grounds itself in a reality that one wishes they could achieve. I feel that this story would best flourish in the 90s era, but it has a sentimental message that can still be felt to this day. I think the best part of this book derives from the non-novelist author. It allows the reader to cross a more sincere bridge to Morrie's story. I also appreciate how he doesn't take time to moralize the story, instead relying on his experience to induce a more honest effect.

9. Dark Matter by Blake Crouch (recommended by Ashley)
Another suggestion from my wife, another Crouch work. Essentially the big brother of Recursion. This book sucks you in from the start and only gets better. I read the last 70 pages in 30 minutes. Dark Matter's one-sentence paragraphs, perplexing plot and non-stop action makes this fast, enjoyable, and rewarding. Although the main character's motive (like the one in Recursion) remains altruistic almost to a flaw, Crouch uses meta-dialog to his utmost advantage, creating a humorous, preposterous, exciting novel.









8. The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan (The American Novel)
Tan zones in on mother/daughter relationships so precisely that you can't help but feel like you are reading a diary. Unlike most diaries involving awkward families, the melodrama is striking and sympathetic. It was a tearjerker in the most postmodern way, dancing with form and narrative and voice. You can see it coming down harshly against men, but when you perceive in its proper place as an immigrant narrative, you'll see critiques on harmful paternalism nurtured in the Far East. Overall outstanding writing.









TIER 5: THE KEEPERS
Downright good, completely re-readable, and will reside on my coffee table for years to come.

7. Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson (The Law in Literature)
If you think you are ready for this book, you are not. Shocking and captivating, Stevenson does everything in his power to pack sympathy into his work. You cannot help but become emotionally entangled by the webs of American courts and prisons. Call him crazy, but Stevenson's insanity is bringing justice against all odds, and if that's not an American story, then it's certainly a good story.










6. To Kill a Mockingbird (The American Novel AND The Law in Literature)
This is the sole book on the list I read before this year. It was also an assigned reading in two different classes. Who doesn't love this book? If you don't, you aren't American (being semi-facetious). Similar to The Princess Bride, Mockingbird has its own austere aura. The writing is gorgeous. Lee pens a friendlier, endearing Mark Twain novel. And the story will never die; its overtone is too powerful. There is negative criticism on it regarding ensconced racism and sexism, but frankly, I think that is a reductionist at work. As much as I love this book, there are five more ahead of it. I have a lot of love to give








5. The Kite Runner (Recommended by Ashley)
I understand if you are surprised. A grand narrative on a personal level with a narrator so intriguing that I wished the book lasted until his death. I admit, there is a lot of "magic" in the book, but sometimes the suspended reality works. It was also enlightening to view a culture across multiple generations, tearing down the one-sided American view of Afghanistan while building up my country's view of its villains. It was also a gift to the reader to finish the book with such concrete hope.









4. The Chosen, by Chaim Potok (The American Novel)
I didn't expect a book about a smart Jewish kid in New York City to touch me so greatly. The matrix of relationships between the two fathers and two sons is so aesthetically beautiful. Potok craftily mixes the natural tensions in Judaism into his composition, forming a segue into a culture few know or have seen. Potok finds ways to traipse in between massive tropes and confine them into a likable teenage boy. An intimate book built upon love that I will gladly read to my children until they can read it on their own.









3. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen (summer reading)
I've been an English major for this long and I just not read this book. The irony of me enjoying Pride and Prejudice this much is almost too much for me to handle. I've watched movies rifting off of the plot, seen a Kera Knightly-played Elizabeth Bennet splayed on my parent's screen multiple times, heard my brother rave about it, and I never read it. I actually developed a bias against it--There's no way it is really that good. But it is. It's a satire trapped in a romance and it genuinely funny, engaging, and lovable. Yep, I was Elizabeth, and it was Mr. Darcy.









2. Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky (summer reading)
So yeah, this book was incredible. It's bare bones Barnes and Noble Classics page count was over 500 pages, but I never found a dry spot. Rashkolnikov is one of the most entrancing characters in literature, and the more confusing he becomes, the more you relate to him. The books "punishment" is relentless, and you feel it's heavy breath come down with a thrill that noir novelists would kill to have in their own pieces. It's a different type of terror, one that makes you tense until the very last page. If you can get past the Russian names, you will find a diamond.









1. Dr. Zhivago, by Boris Pasternak (summer reading)
Which leads me to my favorite book of the year. Yes, the Russians took silver and gold. You are allowed to see if there is an illegal doping scandal. This is a tough, intricate read that doesn't quite end with a warm fuzzy, but it is immensely rewarding. Pasternak uses his poetic background to construct a massive swath of Russian history out of intricate, delicate minuets. It's sort of like a Matryushka doll set, where one piece of art snugly fits over another, and then another, until you can't realize how many parts made the whole. It's a tantalizing work that refuses to figure out which side is up, and you have to admit that Pasternak outdid everyone. He wrote an untouchable story.

The Geriatric Community Has Had a Surprising Presence in My Life Lately

I live in a college town. It's not every day that I run into an old person, and it's not every day that I talk to an old person. Heck, I only call my parents about once a week! Simply put, me and the elderly do not cross paths very often, and they do not make a huge impact on me.

But this past week, there were  three occurrences where my heart was touched by the hand of an old geezer, and dang it, it meant something. So I wanted to briefly go over the power of these handful of experiences and share the little that it meant to me,

1. 

(There actually isn't a moment in the entire book where it mentions Morrie and Mitch are sitting on a bench together)

I randomly bought this book for 5 dollars at a used book store back in January. The reasoning was that I remember my brother reading it once and mentioning that a sports journalist wrote it. So I was like, "Why the heck not?"

Well, it turns out this book is awesome, and not because it has to do anything with sports. I read it in about 7 hours. Morrie Schwartz has a story that isn't normally found in a bestseller. But he is an outstanding person. I think MitchAlbom nicely constructs the reader's internal conflict when reading this book, which I jotted down in my journal. "I think we all have a person like Morrie in our lives, or at least want one. Then again, I think the idea is to be like him."

I  enjoyed how Albom made Morrie's lifestyle just as transcendent as it was practical. Like, yeah I know this is what I should feel, but it also seems too extreme to work. If Albom came across any more theatrical or moralized, it would have taken away from the story's power. Kind of interesting how those things work sometimes.

2. 

I started working at a call center where no one calls you. Sounds pretty great, right? The company, CaptionCall, helps the hard of hearing, and deaf, use the phone. They send or receive a call, it gets triangulated to me, and I dictate whatever is being said, which will show up on the client's screen. My wife says I'm a professional eavesdropper. She's not wrong.

Now I'll go ahead and say the obvious: about 99% of the hard of hearing are also on AARP. For most of the day I listen to old people talk to each other, and 3 things have hit me.

1- old people love their Jeopardy. 100% serious. Don't call them when Alex Trebek is onscreen.

2- Just because you're collecting Social Security doesn't mean you stopped being a jerk to your friends at times.

3- Geriatric depression is real, and it cones out the most in family scenarios. Like, I know people my age often say they don't want to get old, but some old people don't want to be old either. And when it comes to illness--dementia, Alzheimer's, depression--it gets harder to conceal what's going on underneath. 

I don't I realized how prominent this is. I'm definitely not saying every call I field has a paranoid senior complaining about life to their exhausted child, but it happens more than once a day. I experienced some of this as a missionary; I would visit retirement homes or an elderly person far away from their family and get caught in their orb of loneliness to the point where we could never leave, even if they could care less about our message. Even then, I didn't get the same response as some of their family members do.

I suppose in this case, I should play the role of Mitch. Mitch saw past feeding off of Morrie's happiness and instead walked him to the bitter end. Morrie is the center of the book, but Mitch wrote it. That book has become more valuable than Morrie's primetime television interviews. If I'm Mitch, I'm giving what I can, even if I don't have it all yet.

3.

On Saturday Ashley and I hiked through Rock Creek Canyon. at the entrance, a man, most likely in his late 60s, asked if he could take our picture and send it to us. We obliged, and he construed a nice but dated Nikon. He snapped a few pictures, and got down my email. He'll be sending them shortly.

As we walked up the trail, I heard him stop more people. He actually stopped anyone he could. He was always smiling and happy to take photos of families, couples, and kids. 

The photos aren't that great, but the man was. On a Saturday afternoon, he is spending his time collecting memories for strangers, no strings attached. He was simply a nice man, and you don't get that very often. That's what I liked so much about him, he just wanted to see other people happy.

He was still there when we came back. We smiled, waved, and then I decided to talk to him. I think most people would let a man like that talk to them, but I wanted to talk to him, and that's a pretty fundamental difference for two very similar things. He turned out to be very nice and knowledgable about the trail, and even corrected our mistake--we reported we saw mountain goats, and they were actually bighorn sheep (looks like all those years of watching animal planet didn't work out for me).

We said goodbye and I'm anticipating the photos, but wow, that was a wonderful experience for me. In my own life, I saw a flash of Mitch and a lot of Morrie, and it made me feel much more optimistic about things. So I thank you, Geriatric community, for giving me more happiness in life, and reminding me that a generation gap doesn't mean that you're a world away. 

Woah, I'm Married

Friends and classmates may say they saw me walking down the street, blinked, and I was engaged. Then they shook their head and I was married. By the time they let out an exasperated breath, or rolled their eyes, I'm writing this blog post. 

At times I feel the same way. It seems like a month or two ago Ashley and I were laying on a small patch of grass, catching up after not seeing each other for a month. It's late January, and life is a wash. Nothing has really gone to plan since I returned from my mission 7 months earlier. My baseball dreams dissipated, taking pills every day, finishing a 5-month construction stint--this is not the Richard Hall anticipated. However, it was the Richard Hall I was. In my life's wake, Ashley Vincent, longtime friend from Freshman year, greets me on an indiscriminate hill. 

And we've been talking all 7 months. The Sunday after my return we had an hour-long phone call: old friends rejoicing that we could talk again. We planned a trip to meet up in Pocatello (of all places), I visited her during General Conference weekend, and even invited her to Thanksgiving at my place, because I knew her family lived far off. While in town for my friend's December wedding, I took Ashley to Temple Square. Each time we texted, called, visited, the area between "good friend" and "more than friend" got grayer and grayer, until that chilly night in Salt Lake, when at the time I called it quits on real dating and she didn't seem to be feeling it too, but I realized that I wanted to be her friend, a real, genuine friend. Because when you get to know someone that well, you want to always keep them around.

A great night, but a platonic night

So here we are, plopped on some BYU property, simultaneously reminiscing and looking forward, and I'm being honest with her--I have no idea what my current life status is. All I know is that I want to know where I'm at. Being a 20-something was way too ambiguous for my taste, and I was fed up with it. I told Ashley I was ready to settle down, find more purpose. The feeling was mutual, but somewhat awkwardly not for each other. We had this unspoken understanding that our hook-up opportunity fatally passed. The cosmos declared us friend-zoned, and don't mess with the cosmos.

After some time we parted ways, and I walked away thinking to myself "whoever gets her will be a happy man, a good man."

...Surprise!

7 months over the hill, I'm the happy man. It did not look like this the whole time, obviously. I left that January meeting thinking I said goodbye to an old friend, not my future wife. Sometimes, I ask myself, "How did I get here?" It's an honest question, based on the fact that at the end of April I was buying a single-student housing contract. Now I've been married for most of August. Yeah, that's a change.

My peers and close ones know me as meditative, thorough, and calculated; most would consider my dating and marriage timeline the contrary. Ashley and I started dating in March and were engaged by late May to be married 91 days later. That's hardly enough time to smell the dating roses. But rather than revealing a passionate, impulsive mindset, it attests to how right it felt logically/emotionally/spiritually/etc. The process went faster and better than I imagined. After complete soul searching during early May we agreed to get married. I proposed a December wedding, to which Ashley craftily shot down, and before you know it, I am calling temples for August. Many parts of the relationship have gone this way: better, more convenient than imagined, and personally, it has proved our compatibility.

My Freshman roommate, and subsequently the man who indirectly introduced me to Ashley once told me his list for what he wanted in his future wife. It seemed long and particular, as is some icebreakers were deal breakers, and in contrast he viewed my list as too simplistic. It made me rethink what I truly wanted in my spouse. A few weeks later, I met Ashley. I'll admit, the wedding bells weren't ringing, but I also admit that I've never really used my "What I Want in a Girl" list. Like, ever. Probably because it's so short and inclusive. Ashley beats everything that I imagined. Her character astonished me. She was an excellent friend, but an even better girlfriend. Day after day I couldn't believe the discovery I stumbled I across: true love. It surprised me, and my life felt like a Buddy Holly lullaby

and before you know it the Beach Boys kicked in

Between my junior and senior year I discovered the quintessential album "Pet Sounds", and though my music education was limited, I realized this was one of the Greats. Songs like "Still Believe in Me, " "God Only Knows." "I Know there's an Answer." and yes, "Wouldn't it Be Nice" penetrated my hopeless romantic soul. I longed for someone I could equally cherish: the sober realness, the giddy anticipation, the incredible feeling love and life gives. I was 16 when "Pet Sounds" united with my soul, and I had considerable work to do before I reached these euphoric highs. I was mature, but not mature enough to be married. Compatible, but not that compatible. Understanding, but not really.
Five years later, I feel much different, but still fairly incompetent. I suspected one day I'd achieve this bliss, but so quickly, and clearly? It caught me off guard. I felt like I wasn't ready. All of my roommates were engaged when I started dating Ashley, I didn't want to come off as anything but sincere, far from replicated. Love felt dangerous, failure seemed likely.
While I am understanding, compatible, and mature, I'm not "marriage-ready." Honestly, there was a stretch after my mission where I felt I wasn't "life-ready," but that's not how you know you're ready. Ashley gave me an attribute that surpasses any other--Faith. She makes me feel like anything is possible, and I feel the same way about her. I trust that whatever happens will happen, and she will still be at my side. That's what a role model, good friend, loved one, and Ashley is all of that. As sappy as it is, she is all I need. And you know what, I'll take it when I can get it. When you find something this good, you do whatever it takes to keep it. So I married the crap out of her.

The Art of Depression (Pt.2)

I found this Google searching "anxiety art". While it accurately expresses
the disorder, it also poignantly captures depression's infuriating clutch

He's slowly waking up to the morning hollow;

the tears tasted sour and so did the air.

should he arise or stay in bed's fictioned warmth?

cold was the season and life's spark left him dead.

This stanza is an exert from a poem I wrote long ago. It's somber, bleak, and beautiful. In it a man struggles with understanding his identity and accepting the dreary winter. He's a hopeless mess. "His frost-born brain iced away time/like trees--not losing leaves, but love". Poignant, gorgeous, and miserable. Who is this man? 

It's not me, but he's very similar to the me that wrote it. The character is my thought-child, therefore he is part of me, but not wholly me; and I'll deny that my characters are ever myself, no matter how much they resemble me. 

The same could be said about my battle with depression. Did I ever have depression? Though I was never diagnosed, I definitely say yes. My early high school years were an ugly time filled with dark thoughts. It was a perpetual downward spiral; I always felt controlled, nothing was enough, nobody really cared for me. My dad--my math teacher--would make me count on the white board how many times I smiled in a day (usually under ten). I was enveloped in acting, trying to infuse my soul with my characters (displacing your soul is heavy work). I'd voraciously critique myself, hoping to avoid the pain associated with letting others down. My mother called me moody and my dad and I fought, but to me that was easier than admitting mental illness: some chemical imbalance estranging me from family and friends. 

Sure, I had highs, but with the lows were frequent and agonizing. I didn't have to hide them, but I tried, because if other people could see them, then they would know something was wrong. And there was already plenty wrong with me.

Something was wrong with me.

Eventually, I saw a therapist, started to realize the atonement's power, and began to "lighten up". Life became beautiful, and I a happier person. It's all over now. I currently love life. I haven't felt truly depressed in probably 4-5 years. 

But this post isn't about how I conquered depression (though I did). It's not even about how awful having it is (because it is). It's about how beautiful it is. I don't know if you can read British Romantic literature without catching depressed tendencies in the protagonists. You can't listen to a true break-up song without hearing the illness' sputtering moan. Starry, Starry Night doesn't look right if Van Gogh wasn't a little crazy. Art connects with the soul so intimately because it presses the our emotions' reaches until we feel something naturally eternal. Mother goose's childhood purity, Stravinsky's brilliant climaxes, and A Clockwork Orange's deprecating self-portrait. Depression has a thrill, a lasting truth that exclaims beauty equal to joy's light--it just goes the other way.

MUSIC

Above is a link to Sufjan Steven's "The Only Thing". It's a lovely piece discussing a man flirting with suicidal thoughts, tortured by recollections of his lost love. The music surges passion into your heart, and the lyrics tug at your empathy. The orchestration and sound mixing creates a delicate mist to wander in, and you wonder how something so horrid could be so poetic. Well, I wouldn't say Sufjan is truly depressed. This is the same man who wrote "Come on! Let's Boogey to the Elf Dance!" But he obviously knows how it feels. He uses those emotions to create art. It may be raw, but it is true, and real, and everything you'd like.

THEATER

Othello doesn't directly engage with beastly Depression, but it does torment the viewer. (SPOILER) Othello kills Desdemona, his innocent wife, because he believes Iago's evil whisperings. The audience views in horror as he denies every alternative before he slays his wronged wife. It's cruel and painful to watch, but you can't deny the play's greatness. The play purposefully confuses Iago's evil with accomplishment, making the audience ponder the classic questions "why do good things happen to bad people? Why do bad things happen to good people?" and while excellently portrayed in Othello, little is more depressing than that

THOUGHT

"Maybe they're right"

Perhaps Psychology is a science academically, but it's studying an art form. This particular thought rampaged my mind during my depressed days, and now occasionally slips through cracks during weak moments. It was almost always connected to my family. While many friends will exclaim my greatness, often my family gives little reassurance that I'm excelling. It has always been difficult, to say the least--having the people I care most about most not bother to let me know I'm doing good in their eyes. And if I attempted to break down the wall I'd be called "sensitive" and "emotional". I can get chewed out by my boss, I can get disgraced by a professor, but I am intensely motivated by the idea that I could make my family, God, and loved ones proud. But if I let their impassive observance get to me, "maybe you're right" jumps into my mind, and every accolade and joyful shred becomes dust.

Depression has claimed your life sludge. You are guilty for not being enough, then ashamed for not trying hard enough. Even when you realize you are thinking with depressed perspective, depression oppresses you for doing so, slashing you for your weakness. The thought process is horrifying. It is impressive. Depression is anything but beautiful, but it proves itself powerless, because it empowers itself by beautiful things. It dethrones that which it uses to raise itself. Depression uses logic, intuition, counterargument, all the same tools given to us by God, the source of light. Its sound argument that you are worthless is the same argument God uses to argue you are worth everything. And when your life includes God, you cling to the good.

It should be noted that I love my family, and I recognize their love frequently. 

Depression contains truth. And anywhere you find truth, you can find real knowledge. And that is a beautiful thing.

Capturing Happiness (Pt. 1)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d13_LoHQkRM

I haven't watched all of You're a Good Man Charlie Brown, and I probably won't, but there's a gorgeous song right after Charlie Brown discovers the Little Red Haired Girl chews on her pencil. "Happiness" touches the memory's most innocent, untouched areas, reminding you that childhood's beauty isn't far away. Tears pressed on the corner of my eyes the first time I heard it (about 6 months ago). On this lazy Sunday I reflected on the simple lyrics, and gave thanks for the happiness gracing my life.
Happiness cultivates a purity that elevates it past other emotions. Often happiness stands alone; it doesn't rely on other events or people. When you run into a chipper person, they're separate from their surroundings, like an orb of light floating in a grey world. Sometimes you wonder if they even belong. Happiness is inherently transcendent, and noticeable.

Part 1 of this series will attempt to magnify snapshots which caught happiness: precious moments that shouldn't be forgotten. Searching for happiness has its benefits. For one, once you find it, you've found it. You know where to go! And eventually, you'll realize happiness starts in moments and ends in lifetimes.

SONYA AND MOSBY

Happiness is a pleasant surprise. These pictures encapsulate joyful bursts. To the left is an extra photo taken between poses. Sonya moved to Jerome from Utah State before her mission and we grew to be friends. She was struggling in the dead space of a relationship's end and a mission's beginning when my good friend Benny, his girlfriend and I grabbed her and escaped to Sun Valley. We were taking pictures in front of a lovely resort, and I was being my usual self: silly, clever, dumb. I made a stupid joke and she laughed, which made me laugh. And now I can share this simple laughter between us forever. I guess she needed it.

My sister Callie and her husband Spencer and their celebrity-status dog Mosby visited me sometime in March. On our way to dinner we realized that we had no place to keep the dog in the meantime. Well, there's only two front seats, and I wasn't getting shotgun. Driving through Provo with a giant poodle trying to cuddle with you is absurd. It's also hilarious. My sister turned around and saved this ridiculous memory, and it makes me smile every time I see it. These little moments make for all kinds of joy.

TWO NORDQUISTS AND ONE VINCENT 

Happiness is a finish line. There are few photos which capture bliss as well as this one. Erik and Nathan Nordquist flank me after the Redfish Lake Fun Run. The two brothers were my first friends in Idaho, and 11 years later it's stilling running strong. This occurred only weeks before I became a missionary, and it would be my last moment with them for a while. Countless hours of backyard football, Lego-building, speech-writing, cross-country practice, Calculus studying, culminated right here. What could be happier? 

I was talking to my dear friend Ashley after she finished her final ballroom performance Saturday night. Having done my fair share of musicals and plays, I know what the feeling is after a good show's closing night: a sort of electric serenity hard to define. So I asked her "how do you feel now that it's over?" "I'm happy." "Happy that it's over?" "Happy that it happened." 

And happiness is that it happened.   

BASEBALL

Happiness is baseball. Next to God and my mother's cookies, baseball has been at my core. The shoe tip pressing on a base, flying down the pitcher's mound, hearing the mitt snag a pop-up, quirky dugout conversations, it's my heart and soul. 

Amidst collegiate chaos, my good friend and I went to a BYU baseball game. It was heaven on earth. Life was good already, but this--seats behind home dugout, eating a two-foot long doughnut, on a bright spring day? Bliss.

"Happiness is anyone and anything at all that's loved by you."
- Charlie Brown

Pray for...

I had to drive the company truck back to the shop to drop off of some pallets. It's a bit of a drive, so I flipped on the radio. While most of my coworkers listen to one of the swath of country stations that cluster Idaho's airwaves, the old man within me flips it to National Public Radio. I heard a reporter shouting over screaming herds of people. He was in Barcelona. A man drove a truck through a crowd on the busiest street at the busiest time of the day. over a dozen dead, even more injured. It was jarring; scary, really. The rest of the world stopped as I drove down a country lane in Idaho, almost as if the next hill over I'd be in Spain. Forget about pallets and orders, this was it. For today, at least.

A few weeks later I took a truck off site and almost the exact same thing happened. I switched the station and heard a massive explosion in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia. Hundreds of people dead. Clips playing of Somali refugees living in the US were sharing stories about family members that died in the attack. Doctors in the city described looking at the carnage with horror.

These two cities joined a sad slew of other towns that have their name on a map for the wrong reasons. What do you know about Aurora, Colorado? How about Columbine? Or Newtown? Even New York and Las Vegas have been scarred. This year there it seems like there is no time to breathe or
to dwell.

It reminded me of a song by Mark Kozelek. In the song "Pray for Newtown" he uses his intensely intimate writing style to describe what it feels like to go through these experiences, this time on a more personal level.

"I was a Junior in High School when I turned the TV on
James Huberty went to a restaurant, shot everyone up with a machine gun
It was from my hometown
We talked about it til the sun went down
Then everybody got up and stretched and yawned and then our lives went on"

"I just left Safeway, when I walked through my doorway

When a guy took a boat to an island and shot up a bunch a little kids in Norway

Called a few friends, but no one much really cared
But I did, because I got a lot of friends there"

I had a friend serving her mission in Paris the same time as the bombings. She sent out an email saying she was fine. I would occasionally tell people around me of the coincidence. They would be jarred for a second, then courteously sympathize when they learned she was okay. But, there was no reason to feel bad for me if she was okay. It was a strange moment.

Three weeks ago, while flipping on the TV to check in on my favorite team's game, and just like the radio, a reporter is in between me and the game, telling me there was a church shooting in a small town near San Antonio.
Blood began to rush a little faster. I finally felt the same as Mark. "I lived in San Antonio suburbs. I actually know people who that could be." The next ten minutes I battled a sling of emotions as I searched for more information. "Thank goodness, it wasn't a Mormon church." "How could you say that?" "It's also a town I never heard of." "It's still a shooting, there's still something wrong with it." "That's only 10 miles away from where I lived, how are my friends?" "They're probably still in church, how could they have ever been there?" The thoughts blasted on, but this was something that I really cared about., this was something that could have had detrimental impact on me. I felt like Mark, rushing for comfort, but I didn't really need it.
None of my Texan friends said anything about the shooting. My mission friends still in Texas said nothing of it the next day. The story kept unfolding to uncomfortable degrees; politics was tossed into it; opinions began to be made, and the last coals of this heart-breaker are almost out, to sit alongside Newtown, Aurora, and Columbine in the dark halls of history.

What can we do though? To get flustered over these moments simply isn't worth it. We can't prevent what already happened; we can't quite console those who went through it, but there's an overhanging guilt that presses on our empathy.

Mark goes on:

So when Christmas comes and you're out running around

take a moment and pause to think about the ones who died in Newtown

They went so young, who gave their lives

To make us stop and think and try to get it right...

When you're gonna get married and out shopping around

Take a moment to think about the families that lost so much in Newtown

Like the other attacks, Sutherland Springs is another dark spot in life that we must walk away from. For Mark, it's enough to think. Just take a moment out of life to sympathize and especially apply. It's perhaps the only we can do in these circumstances. Ugly things are not fun to look at, however there's still something to learn from them.