Here's your sign...

I just finished one of the craziest months in the course of my college education. Stress was constant, sleep was scarce, food was "fast", time was never enough, caffeine was essential, and friends were non-existent. In October, I did the following (in no particular order):

• 4 quizzes
• 4 Article Reviews
• 2 Five + Page research papers
• 2 other papers
• 1 Class Presentation
• 10 exames
• 7 Study guides
• 1 Annotated Bibliography
• 2 physics homework assignments
• 12 hours of DCFS training
• and I worked on top of it all.

I kept telling myself, and all who would listen, that if I could just make it to November life would calm down. There wouldn't be as much going on at school, and I could have a life again. So, of course, Tuesday November 1, 2011 a professor of mine offers me a second job, a professor that is on the board of admissions for the masters program I am applying to, a professor that I really respect and want to respect me. So what did I say? Yes!  Really, could I pass up the opportunity to create less time in my schedule?

Things I want to improve:  (1.)   Social Life      (2.)   Gym time      (3.)   Time Management Skills

As I left class Tuesday, I just thought to myself, "God must be trying to teach me something!" Then I thought of the Blue Collar Comedy group and the "here's your sign" routine; that shameful embarrassment is exactly how I felt. I had just maneuvered the most stressful 14 credit month of my life, and when I am expecting to get to work on those items on my list Heavenly Father sends me a message on a silver platter.

What He wants me to improve:      Time Management Skills (so that I can have a social life and gym time).

I am sensing a pattern here. It is all about the priorities. Time is the most precious gift that we have been given in this life. Just last week I ran into E on campus; we started talking about the mission and I noted how little we seem to get done in comparison to a transfer. In the mission, life happens only a day at a time, a week at a time and possibly 6 weeks at a time, but the division of life into manageable time periods makes it all so effective. So I am going back to transfers... month long instead of 6 weeks. November is the first month. I am setting my goals, I am planning my time, and I am making myself accountable to God for what I do.  I think it is all very doable as long as I don't procrastinate, go to bed at a reasonable hour, get out of bed at a reasonable hour, and refrain from "vegging"... ever. 

I have decided that I need to make new friends whose schedules fit better with mine so that I can be social, and I have to fight the urge to stay in when the opportunity to be social presents itself. For example last night there was a surprise birthday party for S and as I was getting ready to leave the house I thought...I should just send C a message and say something came up and I couldn't go. This happens frequently when it comes to me being social, I will be excited about something up until the minute comes to actually commit myself and then I chicken out and back down; I revert to my anti-social ways. But, I am proud to say that last night, I resisted the urge. I went, I had fun, I made friends.

So in honor of a new approach to the same old life: November here I come!

Will you be my friend?

     I was feeling inspired tonight; not particularly because I have anything to say, but more because I have this inexpressible feeling inside me that I have to get out somehow. And if all else fails I can make every attempt to make you feel it too in hopes that this moment/feeling isn't lost. Tonight I had dinner with K. I met K the first day of 7th grade after having my Dad walk me to the bus stop, because Heaven fodbid that I walk alone! For all that I am outspoken, opinionated, obnoxious, loud, bossy, intelligent, she is more so. In fact once upon a time K, K, And I were going to start a law firm together (It would have been KB & Associates, not KKK. Crazy when friends all have the same initials). Last time I saw K was General Conference April 2007, she was 5 months pregnant. Three children and a death later, we finally were able to go to dinner.

     K is amazing. She is so strong, so lovable, so generous, so kind, so inspiring. She is part of who I am. Isn't it "funny" how people come into our lives and just fit? K fits. We are opposites in so many ways, similar in so many others, and none of it implies that we would ever be friends, yet 11 years later here we are.

Some other people who just "fit":

    To friends who are always there right when you need them.  So this is not even recognizable as the post planned in my head, and there are so many others who could be on this list but I just don't have pictures with them on my computer. But K got me through some interesting years, and knows me well enough to send me cleaning rags in a Christmas package. K (the other one) also needs an mention; I also met her the first day of 7th grade, she was the first one to say "Hi" to me, my Siamese twin (we share a brain). She got me through some other interesting times. B who I didn't meet until 11th grade and I was slightly intimidated by her at first...until a certain camp-out, but she is definitely my emotional-breakdown-go-to-girl. We shared a personality, I was just more vocal (we found our own, no worries). M who for some unknown reason still puts up with me and V who didn't know what she was getting her self into sophomore year. I love you all!

                                  "Because I knew you, I have been changed for good."

Dios me ama...

I have felt the need to start blogging for months now. Friends have been pressuring me to join the "community" for years, so in an act of procrastination: here I am. My excuses have been many, and TIME is always the largest issue. As far as managing my time well, I don't. It is my eternal battle. This week I have been trying to produce research papers, I haven't been successful. I have wasted hours on Facebook, blog stalking, and finding people to eat with me. Today, I am not allowed to leave the library until I finish at least one of my two 5 page research papers due next week, and hopefully, make progress on my physics homework, or study for an exam or two. However in the 5+ hours since I got out of bed this morning I have filled my car with gas, gone shopping, picked up breakfast, established a budget on mint.com, created a new station on Pandora, blog stalked, Facebook stalked, edited photos, and started my own blog. Homework done: 0!

However, that is all superfluous, the real reason I have caved to the blogging epidemic has nothing to do with the research papers or impending academic disaster, I am here because Dios me ama (God loves me). Two years ago this week, my amazing mission trainer and I were running from the city center of Malaga, Spain to the baptism of Austin. We were late. We were praying for a taxi or bus or ride, anything that would get us to the church faster than our own two feet. We missed the bus by 15 seconds, the taxis were all headed the opposite direction after a futbol game, and members with a car were all already at the baptism: We ran. As we were running up that last hill, the thought came to my mind that while no transportation had made itself available as we had asked for, my knee which had ached for weeks was completely without pain. While God didn't give us what we asked for he answered our prayers. He was aware of us. That is when I turned to Hna. S and said, "Dios me ama."

In the last weeks and months I have had countless "Aha!" moments where I realize, yet again, that God loves me and is ever aware of me. I have had a car emergency in the last couple of months, namely I didn't have one, really needed one, and couldn't find anybody selling one for even close to what it was worth. I would have been stuck up a creek with out a paddle had it not been for two angels in my life , Uncle W and Aunt M, who loaned me their cars. Three weeks ago as I was driving one of their cars to Eagle Mountain for work, it stopped at a stoplight and wouldn't start, two other angels quickly hopped out of their cars and helped me push it to the side of the road. I prayed. I called Uncle W. The car still wouldn't start. I prayed again, and I decided to check a problem that neither I nor my Uncle thought could be the source of trouble. Did I feel inspired to check? Well, yes and no. Expressions like "I was impressed to" or "I felt like" or "something told me to" are all much to strong to explain what happened. I just got out of the car and checked the emergency fuel shut-off switch. Guess what the problem was? The emergency fuel shut-off switch. I can't say that I was inspired to get out of the car, but was that God's hand in my life? YES! At that moment, I knew that He is aware of me (and my puny car problems) and He loves me.

Thursday, one of my favorite professors was telling us about how she came to be a professor at BYU and again I felt strongly the reality of God's awareness of us all as individuals. Prof. R was born in Korea; she had a hard life. But after 30 years of separation from her brother, the Lord inspired her to find him "because he was in danger". After a long and difficult search, she found the brother that everyone else had forgotten and overlooked: Alone in the world, he was homeless, jobless, and an un-diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. The morning after she found him, the police picked up corpse after frozen corpse from the street where the homeless frequently slept; had she not found him, that brother would have been another dead body, but because God is aware of us, in His infinite wisdom, He sometimes sees fit to intervene in His time and as He chooses.

I am just ever grateful for His hand in my life. For the amazing family, and friends that I have been blessed with. May I never forget that Dios me ama.