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On Burping

I grew up sandwiched between two brothers, so I suppose it's only natural that, along with them, I perfected the art of burping at will at a young age. I occasionally outstripped them at it, even. I admit it. This was a talent that I naturally did not display at church or around young women my age, but it wasn't something I considered "gross," seeing how I knew the effort it took to gulp down enough air to save up a big one. I enjoyed delivering shock value at home. Mom could never abide burping at the table, but Dad thought it was great, and for a while so did I.

Then I went to college and had a roommate who burped often and unrestrainedly. Loudly. She was so used to doing it that she didn't even hear herself anymore and would deny burping if told she'd just done so. That was the troubling part: she couldn't even control it anymore. Shock-value burps delivered every day lose their ability to shock and just, to me, became the disgusting sound of her innards, prominently declaring that she had no control over her body and no desire to take control either, not for politeness' or roommates' or anyone's sake.

After living with her, I can't stand it when girl friends burp out loud on purpose. Especially when they think it's funny. When you're over twenty, it means something more than that you've got air in your throat. "I can't help it!" I sometimes hear. Yes you can. It's called closing your mouth.




That said . . . . . . . . . . . . .

I still think this is hilarious.

On Beauty

Sarcastic envy makes me bold
in mocking virtue I behold,
missing, my heart's cockles cold,
in everyone a strand of gold.

I know that beauty isn't everything, but sometimes I forget. Particularly when I come across someone who is stunningly gorgeous. When I see a stunningly gorgeous girl surrounded by admiring young men, my thoughts go like this:

Beauty = Admiration by males
Admiration by males <= Love
Love = Happiness

Therefore,

Beauty = Happiness

I knew a stunningly gorgeous girl in one of my wards (church congregations) at BYU. She was one of three girls with the same name, we'll say Brenda. To distinguish the three Brendas, me and my roommate made up nicknames. One of them, who made my cheeks ache just looking at her, we called Smiley Brenda. Another was just Brenda, because she had no obvious characteristics from which to hang a moniker. The third, the stunningly gorgeous one, was Barbie Brenda. It fit like a charm. She had all the signs: bleach-blonde hair, perfect complexion, and a ditzy lilt to her voice. Oh, and boys mooned over her like coyotes over the . . . well, the moon. One of those boys, who I knew since he was one of my home teachers, was crazy about her. He remained crazy about her all through his mission and I saw them together afterwards. I was pretty sure they'd be getting married. I was just surprised she hadn't gotten married before he came back. Even at the meatmarket that is BYU, where girls outnumber boys two to one (notwithstanding the myth of equal numbers), you could tell Barbie Brenda was a hot commodity.

That was the way I thought about her. Sarcasm made me feel better about being jealous. I chuckled with my roommate over Barbie Brenda and then after that school year I mostly forgot about her.

Still, I remembered her when she added me as a friend on Facebook. "How does she remember me? I'm not a boy. I don't remember if we even really talked," I thought as I paused over the button to accept her. "Eh, why not." Suddenly we were friends. I was curious about whether her statuses would give me more to chuckle over.

Ironically, she's the one who introduced me to TAMN. She said she loved this new blog and put the link in her status. Because it came through Barbie Brenda, it took me several articles, during which my jaw dropped and my sides ached from laughing so much, to realize it's a satire. It never occurred to me that Barbie Brenda, who I thought was a perfect candidate for "besties" with TAMN, would be deep enough to appreciate that kind of humor. It was only then that I began to think maybe Barbie Brenda wasn't the shallow one here.

I've looked a little more closely at this friend of mine. Strangely, she's not married at all. Like me, she's done with school for now. She spent some time doing social/humanitarian work in Mexico, and now she's not sure what exactly she wants to do with her life (also like me). She was engaged for a little while, but that broke off and it really hurt her. I followed her out to her blog and began reading some of her articles. Blown away. Her prose flows in smooth, image-laden sentences that make mine seem stodgy and rigid in comparison. She has sincere feelings and thoughts that rival the beauty of her face.

I began to think about what it would be like to be Barbie Brenda. I imagine that she is hated for her good looks just as much as she is adored for them. Maybe she feels more pressure than many single girls our age to be married, because she's got a face that's supposed to guarantee young love. She probably knows better than me or most other people that in the truly important areas of life, beauty doesn't count for anything. Beauty is not really the same as happiness. I bet she's come across a lot of people in her life who were sure they knew who she was just by looking at her. I would hate that, but yet I did it too, for the sake of my own pride. As I read her words, I was astonished at my own harsh insensitivity.

It's not much, but for what it's worth, I just wanted to say, Brenda, I am so sorry. I hope to prove myself a better friend in the future. And I mean it when I say you are beautiful.

Happy New Year, I think

For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We'll take a cup o' kindness yet
For auld lang syne

Robert Burns, "Auld Lang Syne"

Happy New Year, everybody! I hope your Christmases all happened beautifully and you got plenty of time to relax and welcome in the new year. The holidays at my house were crowded, chaotic, and wonderful as usual (yes, even with the desolate hole left by the absence of minest elder brother and his fam).

I always get to pondering conclusively at holidays and ends of things. Holidays are times for memories; they're like measuring sticks to my life as I think about where I was and what I was up to at this holiday in years past. However, I think sometimes it's just better to abstain from thinking about things. Examples:

1) I've been a little bit irritated with some people at certain times during all this Christmas hullaballoo. The thing with being irritable around Christmas, though, is that I always feel particularly guilty about it. But I noticed something one day when I was grumpy, and that is that I was sitting there fixing all my thoughts on how annoying people were. The more I thought about it, the more annoying they became. I realized that the feelings that were making me miserable were not generated by the people around me, but by the thoughts in my own head. I was making me miserable. Why would I want to do that? Feeling better meant abstaining from blaming, annoyed thoughts.

2) The other day I played a charades-type game (which ended up being a rather interesting gender commentary, but I'll save that for another day maybe). One thing that struck me was how reluctant some people were to get up and act things out. Some of the girls I was sitting with were embarrassed. Because I wanted to fit in, I pretended to be shy and embarrassed for a little while too. But then I thought, "What on earth is there to be embarrassed about? In this kind of game, the people who lose their inhibitions and make gigantic fools of themselves are the coolest." That's what acting's all about, really. Once I realized that, I stopped thinking too much and acted out "underwater basket weaving" with flair. Someone guessed it in just a few seconds.

3) I've been doing a lot of thinking about my story over the holidays, but not a lot of actual writing on it. It wasn't even the good kind of thinking, which usually happens as I'm writing, staring at the paper or my computer screen, visualizing the next part of the scene; it's the "oh, I'm bored, so I'll sit here and think of my favorite part of the story that's coming up" kind of thinking. Then I just play one part of the story in my head a couple times. But because I'm not actually writing it down, I'm not focusing on it enough to make alterations and improvements, so I just get bored of it and then I have to redo it when I write it out anyway. Does this make sense to anyone not living in my head? Maybe not. But the key is, less bored thinking, more writing!

Okay, so it's not so much that one shouldn't think, but that one should avoid thinking too much, thinking about negative things, and thinking instead of doing. I should do a better job managing my thoughts.

I guess I have one new year's resolution now . . .

Note about the photo: No alcoholic beverages were consumed for the taking of this pic. It's Cherry 7-Up. Just in case you were worried.