A Bit of Billy

Over the past couple of years I have acquired a great fondness for the poet Billy Collins. He's clever, witty, funny, and honest. I was thinking about this particular poem the other day amidst my crazy school schedule. Enjoy!

LITANY- By Billy Collins

You are the bread and the knife,         

The crystal goblet and the wine...        

 -Jacques Crickillon  

You are the bread and the knife, 

the crystal goblet and the wine. 

You are the dew on the morning grass 

and the burning wheel of the sun. 

You are the white apron of the baker, 

and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.  

However, you are not the wind in the orchard, 

the plums on the counter, 

or the house of cards. 

And you are certainly not the pine-scented air. 

There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.  

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge, 

maybe even the pigeon on the general's head, 

but you are not even close to being the field of cornflowers at dusk. 

 And a quick look in the mirror will show 

that you are neither the boots in the corner 

nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.  

It might interest you to know, 

speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world, 

that I am the sound of rain on the roof.  

I also happen to be the shooting star, 

the evening paper blowing down an alley 

and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.  

I am also the moon in the trees 

and the blind woman's tea cup. 

But don't worry, I'm not the bread and the knife. 

You are still the bread and the knife. 

You will always be the bread and the knife, 

not to mention the crystal goblet and--somehow--the wine.

Dream

I woke up this morning very disappointed. I had had this AMAZING experience (in my dream) and I remember consciously thinking, "wow, this would make a GREAT blog post, I can't wait to tell people about it!". And then I woke up.

I decided to write about it anyway.

I was at home recently (last night har!) when my mother asked me to go into her room to grab her hairbrush. I walked in and discovered some rather large (about 4-5 inches long) fuzzy caterpillars. Not just any caterpillars, red and green caterpillars whose heads resembled a shiny reflective silver "shooter" marble. Perturbed by the creatures I went back into the kitchen to grab a tupperware container so that I may dispose of them outside. When I returned to the room they had multiplied faster than rabbits. Instead of a few, there were now dozens!!! I filled the container and dumped them outside my front door. One particularly stubborn caterpillar refused to let go of the bottom of the container. Lifting it above my head to more clearly see the belligerent creature, I gave the container a serious hit and the caterpillar fell into my mouth! I continued foaming at the mouth long after I had spit it out and was thoroughly disgusted. All the while thinking, "Wow, this would make a great blog post"....

I Felt Pretty Cool...

I awoke this morning to a lovely surprise. I had three new emails (this is not the surprise, that there were 3 that is), two of which were from other MTC teachers both asking for subs today. Alright, even though I technically can't sub for them yet, because YESTERDAY was my first day of work, it did make me feel pretty special that I actually received the email. And the best part....One of the emails was from MY mtc teacher! Cool!

I love my new job. After I walked out after 5 hours of training yesterday I was utterly exhausted! I felt like crying (but didn't!) because I had just had a serious emotional workout. I was overwhelmed (by all the new info.), I felt the spirit a lot, and I was SO excited (I grinned the ENTIRE time).

This next week I will do a lot of shadowing and then I get my first district on Wednesday and I start teaching them by myself one week from today. ONE week, that's it.

I'm excited/nervous/overwhelmed, but mostly excited!

These are a Few of my Favorite Things

Rather than ramble off an apology and excuse as to WHY I haven't visited my own blog for the past two months, I thought I would write something I bit more enjoyable.

Generally, I am a pretty happy person. I find so many thing in life that give me joy. Here are a couple of the current things that I love:

Garlic-Lime Salsa (from Walmart) & Cottage Cheese with Chips

Catching Fire By Suzanne Collins

My new job working at the MTC (started today!)

Institute

American Idol (guilty face)

Phoenix weather (and a couple more things about phoenix...)

Tennis

My MAC!

Personal Finance Class (yes, it makes me happy)

Overheard @ BYU -it's a facebook thing

You miss 100% of the shots you don't take

After serious reflection and long hours full of nothing to do as I patiently wait for winter semester to start, I have come up with a list of things I want to accomplish before I head back down to happy valley for good. Here they are:
1-Memorize all the US President's in order
2-Read one book on Church material
3-Read two books on non-church material
4-Play the Piano piece of "Somewhere in Time" perfectly
5-Write 4 blog entries (work in progress!)

As for the non-church books I am having some debates over which books I should select. Those in the running are as follows
Cry the Beloved Country
Love is Eternal (By Irving Stone)
Three Cups of Tea
Left to Tell
Fellowship of the Ring
How Green was my Valley

Any suggestions?

Nauvoo Nostalgia

Here are the BEST 19 sister missionaries in the world.... okay, so maybe that's just my opinion. I sure do miss them though. Summer 2009, unforgettable.

Checking in and ramblings

I can't think of anything I did in the past week that you would want to read about (except for that I actually checked out Dooce.com, my curiosity got the better of me!). I still don't know how to rotate pictures and the mission preparations continue to move forward. So just quickly, I wanted to share this quote-of-the-day from today. I though it....profound :)
"There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness."
-Friedrich Nietzsche