The Lists that Govern my Life

Year Two: I thought I’d made a terrible mistake. I thought I’d unwittingly abandoned history (my undergraduate degree) and thrown myself into a discipline I knew nothing about and could never know anything about because what even is German Studies? I grasped at literary straws and struggled to sort through new academic jargon ( see Year 1 of grad school). I was therefore elated to take a history class this past semester, to prove that maybe I had made the wrong choice in field. But taking that class actually made me feel happier in my chosen home of German Studies. Because that's what year 2 has felt like: home. It seemed that history in graduate school is a lot more historiography (at least in this course it was), or talking about what everyone has said about events, rather than exploring historical oddities and quirky personalities and events (not the analysis of events) that changed the world. But literature? The main chunk of German Studies I'm investing myself i...

This was hard to write. I wondered if I should write it. And if I should share it. But I did write it. And want to share it because the thing that helps me most in my questions of faith is knowing that I am not alone and that struggling is not inherently a sign of weakness. So if you are in that space, I hope this helps. I wasn’t sure how vulnerable to be, so I tried to pick a middle ground, but this does lie close to my heart. In fall 2014, I considered myself a part-time feminist.  This was because I generally considered feminists as bra-burning, man-hating, revolutionary figures whose cause could occasionally be just but their methods wrong. In fall 2018, I had a two month long breakdown as a full-time feminist, a time period I call in my head:  “the fall of the patriarchy.” Specifically patriarchy in a Latter-Day Saint context. My “feminist awakening,” so to speak, started earlier than autumn that year though. In fact, it had been building slowly over th...

"Um...okay." These were words I muttered to my mom in January 2017 when she asked if I'd run a marathon with her. I had just graduated from BYU in December and was looking for ways to create purpose in what I presumed would be a downward spiral of existential angst without the learning structures of school. So I said okay. Post Marathon. Trying to pretend my body wasn't actually jello. I've been running for many years. I ran my first recreational mile with my mom in 2007 and it was awful, but eventually running became a healthy, consistent way to manage stress and be healthy and promote positive self image. I'd been asked many times along my running journey if I'd ever run a marathon and the answer was always, "Well, I've run several half marathons, but no, never a full one. That's a special type of pain and I'm not that crazy." Not yet, I wasn't. Like Tim Urban in regards to his goals of giving a TED talk, running ...

Sometimes I get sad in the winter. I know that I’m sad because I don’t want to go to bed because it means I have to wake up. This probably sounds odd. Let me explain. I love getting up. It's the best to wake up with a fresh slate of hours. Yes, I’m one of those people who loves mornings. One of those people you’ve probably (definitely) hated at some point in your life because who in her right mind is stoked to wake up at 5:15am in the summer to go for a sunrise run or a long day hike. I’ve convinced myself that the most beautiful time in the world is between 6am and 9am, when the light is of the day is new and untarnished. I go to bed so that I can wake up and take part of some of this newness. So when I don’t want to go bed, it means I don’t want to wake up, and I know that something is wrong.   This happened last January too. Bloomington is right on the border of EST and so the sun doesn’t rise until approximately 7:59am. And when I say the sun rises,...

I think it was 2007. I was running Christmas errands with my mom and was still under the impression that I could sew. We had stopped at Johann’s and Christmas fabric was on sale. I asked my mom how easy it would be to make a Christmas skirt. She said "pretty easy." I bought some black fabric with red and green candy canes and went home to sew my first skirt (she was right—pillowcases and skirts are probably the easiest things to sew and thus the only things I can make). I wore it once a week throughout December and decided this was a good thing. The next year I went back to Johann’s and bought enough fabric to make four more skirts to sport throughout the month. Or maybe it was 2009. I invited a friend to go “Christmasing” with me. Which basically meant we drove to Target and spent hours ooh-ing and ah-ing at, trying on, and buying apparel, which we then put up all over my bedroom as well as screaming giddily at all of the Christmas lights we passed ...