Day: August 26, 2011

Somewhat Confused

mayiwrite friends, weekend , , , ,

Yesterday, I left voicemail messages with family members about the news I received. One would think this type of news would motivate a quick callback. But no one has responded.

Class starts Monday. I’ve looked over my schedule and visualized where my classes are.

I wonder what my family members’ schedules are.

I will be way too busy to stay frustrated. But if they don’t call soon, I don’t know, y’all.

We all communicate so differently, and we all have different feelings connected to yesterday’s news. I just want us all to be able to support each other.

It’s a beautiful evening. The clouds are heavy, eager to burst. I walked around earlier after getting a haircut, and a slight breeze began to lift the heat of the day from the ground. It was nice.

While crossing State Street to go to University Mall (after my haircut), I heard someone shout my name from one of the cars waiting for a green light. I turned around, and I saw Senegal Grace sticking her head out of a black SUV, and we chatted for about 5 seconds in the middle of traffic, with me standing on the corner, and her in the middle lane of State Street heading north. Then the light changed, and Senegal Grace said that we’ll catch up sometime. I waved. It was fun.

Now, I’m watching Battlestar Galactica (and for some reason really appreciating the special effects and attention to detail regarding muted or no sound in space) and eating ice cream and wishing at the very beginning of this weekend that it doesn’t have to end.

At least there’s floating down the Provo River tomorrow.

In your face, end of the summer.

Warnings of a Different Kind

mayiwrite church, food, friends, mormonism, new york city ,

So, I still receive email updates from a ward I attended in New York City. Right now, they’re preparing for impact from Hurricane Irene. I’m tons of worried about my friends there. Hey, kids. You’re in my prayers.

Thursday, August 25, 2011 11:17 PM

All,

As you all prepare for the hurricane, there are a number of things you should do immediately (if you haven’t already done so):

1. Please see the hurricane map HERE to determine if you live within an evacuation zone. It is likely that it will be a category 1 hurricane, which means that zone A might be evacuated. Please stay tuned to what public officials say in terms of evacuations. The evacuations could be voluntary or mandatory (by law).

2. Please make sure your 72 hour kit is ready to go.

3. We need volunteers. If you do not live in an evacuation zone, we need volunteers who would be willing to temporarily house ward members who might be asked or required to evacuate. Please e-mail [this person] if you would be willing to house displaced members of our ward.

4. Please e-mail [the same person] if you live within evacuation zone A and let us know what your plans are (and if you need a place to stay). We would like to have a complete database to keep track of everyone in evacuation zone A.

5. Please be aware that public transportation might be shut down this weekend. Please pay attention to announcements from city officials for more info.

6. If you have not already done so, please contact those whom you home teach and visit teach to make sure they are prepared and have a plan.

HURRICANE EVACUATION MAP
and HURRICANE BROCHURE

Friday, August 26, 2011 12:58 PM

Please read carefully:

1. Mandatory evacuations have been announced for Zone A. If you live in Zone A, please contact [the same person] as soon as possible to let us know what your plan is. If you need a place to go, let us know and we will find a place for you.

2. If you would be willing to house members who have been evacuated, please email Kimber.Crandall@gmail.com to let us know (if you haven’t already done so).

3. All public transportation will be shut down beginning noon tomorrow. Please plan accordingly.

4. Church is cancelled on Sunday.

5. Please circulate this infomation with those you home teach or visit teach.

A Letter to Freshman May

mayiwrite miscellany, my life, nostalgia , , , ,

Dear Freshman May,

It’s been a long time. I’ve been walking the BYU campus this past week, shopping for books, wandering the library, going to work. You’ve crossed my mind a lot.

It’s freshmen orientation time right now, and it has taken so much mental and physical effort not to burst into laughter every time I pass a group of wide-eyed 18-year-olds. Instead I suppress a mocking smile, and so I traverse campus looking smug. All those beautiful and nauseatingly eager freshmen, if they’re aware enough to notice me, might wonder who the short girl is with a seemingly permanent smirk on her face. That would be me.

What was it like, Freshman May? Did you ever act the way some of these kids do? Did you ask the same questions, play the same pranks, have the same goals?

You were smart enough to be admitted all those years ago. You should be proud of yourself.

You lived in Deseret Towers, U-Hall. Officially, Ballard Hall. Have you heard what they did to Deseret Towers? They demolished them a few years back and they’ve rebuilt – they’re rebuilding – them, except they’re not going to call them Deseret Towers. I wish I could tell you how and why I know that, but I can’t. But that’s the news.

You’re facebook friends with a lot of your freshmen friends, Freshman May. It’s so great that all of you are able to keep in touch.

I missed the freshmen deluge last year. I officially stepped onto the campus proper on the first day of class, and all the students milling around seemed perfectly normal.

Within the first few weeks of being Freshman May, you wrote an email to your high school friends. Remember Cougarnet, Freshman May? You told them that you had gotten engaged to a young man named Jordan Rivers. You said that you had made eye contact with him across the Marriott Center.

You never went ice blocking.

You hiked the Y at midnight. One time.

You took calculus in the Jesse Knight Humanities Building; you went to church in the law building. The planetarium section of the Eyring Science Center was under construction but you sneaked up there anyway with some new friends, and it was cool.

You passed the Smith Family Living Center all the time. You might not have been Freshman May when they began calling that building the SFLC, or “syphilis.”

The JKHB is now the JKB, and campus has a fancy, new humanities building, which I love and where I have most of my classes.

The ESC is also very sturdy and feels new, and it hardly resembles the place where you spent hours working on physics labs. Your FRESHMAN year. Physics 121 and 122, really? Freshman May, how did you even do that? What kind of energetic ridiculous idealist were you?

The SFLC. Does. Not. Exist. It’s as if whatever parts of your life that had anything to do with that building never happened.

So many more changes in curricula and technology and everything else, it seems.

Freshmen swarm this campus right now. Like some cheery scourge. They flood my computer labs and wander into alcoves I’d claimed for myself.

I’m excited for them though, just like I was excited for you. You had your whole life to figure out. You met people who’d be your friends for the rest of your life. You were righteous and eager, but you were also SO SO SO YOUNG, and you thought you knew everything, and I know you have stories about being taken down a few notches which is so important to growing up.

You’ve had quite the journey, Freshman May. I have nearly doubled your life, which seems so hard to believe. You’re there, I’m here. Can’t you feel the distance getting close?

Watching this year’s freshmen herds, moving about like worker ants, carrying books that seem to be twice their weight, getting lost and in my way and too scared to ask questions or too intent on their focused wandering, I’m just grateful you were a freshman only once.

That’s all anyone needs.

Class starts on Monday.

Thanks for … everything.

May