have you seen it?

the winner for the best commercial this Olympics does not go to Visa, surprisingly. It goes to that Proctor&Gamble commercial with all the little kids. Ahhh, it kills me!

fyi.

expect a lot of posts to come in the next few weeks, posts that will hopefully make you a little uncomfortable.  we all need to start thinking and discussing a little more.  how else are we going to learn?

Plushenko has upped the level of sport!

RANT TIME

***The word feminism is rampant in this.  Either deal or move on.  I welcome your discussion and opinions.  It is NOT the F-word.***

I know you've all missed it.  Believe me, so have I.  Whoa, I haven't written a serious rant since October? {in case you missed it, here's my rant against a person who showed a serious lack of class.}

I'm stuck in a hazy world of subjunctive verb conjugations, Chinese history and art, and lots and lots of reading and writing.  I am a Humanities major and I am proud of it.  My mom gets frustrated from time to time, exclaiming, "I sent all my kids to BYU as conservatives and they came out as liberals!"  While I can't speak for my siblings, I can tell you that I am about as Moderate as they get (I like gay people but I also like keeping my money) and I have no doubt that it's come from life experience and learning.  I've learned a lot in the last few years and really feel as though I'm coming into my own as a woman and as a writer.

There's an interesting debate happening over at Natalie Hill's blog.  I like her blog a lot, she has some witty anecdotes with dating and single life in the city, and as a former performer, I love taking a peek into the life I had once desired.  While I skip her Bachelor recap posts (I've never been able to get into it--coming from a person who loves Grey's Anatomy.  Don't worry about it), I enjoy her blurbs, large and small.  She had a post about cleanliness a few months back that caused quite a stir because someone accidentally put her foot in her mouth about Natalie's life experience, but now it appears I'm the one who has spurred the controversy.  I respect a blogger's opinion--it's their blog, they can say what they want to.  I've had people disagree with me from time to time on my writings, something I think is really healthy and vital to growing as an individual.  Good discussion is important, and as Noah Feldman (he's a total fox, BTW) said at a BYU forum, if we want Mormons to be more readily accepted in US culture, we have got to start discussing these things.

{Quick note: I don't know Natalie personally and have never met her, but I was performing pals with her sister Nina way back in the day, and I adore her sister Kara who has started ballroom dancing at BYU.  I would also love her sister Nicole to photograph my wedding when I eventually marry.  It's a seriously talented family.  This is in no way an attack on any individual, her post merely reminded me that it's time to address an issue that is driving me completely bonkers.}

K.  Here goes.

The LDS church is NOT against Feminism and it is NOT a bad thing to be a feminist.  Got it?  If you doubt, I encourage you to go to the church website and search "education women", particularly writings from President Hinckley, President Eyring, and Elder Oaks.  Radical feminism (aka the visual we all get when we hear the word feminist) is not helpful feminism, and certainly not the idea I subscribe to.  Post-modern feminism, and most interestingly, African American feminism, focus on deconstructing social constructs and barriers that limit a human being's potential.  In short, the feminism I believe in is a form of feminism where men and women are not equalized, but rather they are unified.  I do not want a Patriarchal society.  I do not want a Matriarchal society.  I believe in a Priesthood society, where man and woman are one with God.

Men and women certainly have unique attributes and personalities, but to state that one attribute is predominately feminine and another is masculine grossly limits human nature.  My boyfriend, parents, friends, and even teachers will tell you that I am a shark--I know what I want, I know how to get it, I'm intense, and I am as strong and opinionated as they come.  These individuals will also tell you that I'm extremely nurturing, loving, compassionate, and a peacemaker in difficult situations.  By an archaic standard espoused not only by early Christianity, but early American politics and social constructs, I am both feminine and masculine.  I apparently defy the laws of gender roles.

Guess what?  I want to work.  I have serious desire to work.  I want to obtain at least a Masters, possibly a PhD.  I want to teach.  I want to write.  I want to make my own money.  I want to contribute financially to my family because I want my kids to have all the opportunities I had (and I want to retire early).  I want to work because it brings fulfillment and happiness to my life.

I also want to have a family and raise children.  I want to teach my children to read and write the way my mom did.  I want to teach them to play piano.  I want to drive them to their sports activities and ballet lessons.  I want to cook breakfast and dinner and pack sack lunches with silly notes.  I want to teach them to do their laundry and I want to have a family cleaning day each week.  I want to teach them Gospel principles and I want them to see that I try my hardest to be like Jesus.  I want to sew quilts and have family scripture study and most importantly, I want a loving, peaceful atmosphere in our home, conducive to harmonious learning and growth.

I was recently told in a church meeting that as a woman, I am the world's accessory.  That as a woman I should be sweet and demure, attributes that men are most attracted to.  That the world's attack on traditional family means I should be putting my efforts into preparing for homemaking.  {None of this is an exaggeration, by the way}

Nothing is said of finding your divine potential, your incredible worth as an individual.

Women have serious issues we need to overcome.  We have got to find self-actualization and ownership of ourselves.  So many problems stem from poor self-worth and self-esteem and much of the solution is to realize who we are and OWN IT.

I believe I am a Godly individual.  I am intense, strong, motivated, hard-working, passionate, aggressive, compassionate, loving, and nurturing.  To say that the first traits are not Godly not only offends me and my sex, but the entire male sex that identifies with such traits.

We have got to stop engendering personality traits.  We have got to stop forcing ourselves into a binary.  We have got to figure out how to unify.  We may never be able to leave our social construct completely, but we can at least try and improve the state of the world.

I smell a publicity stunt.

seriously. I love the Olympics. They give me something to do when I'm procrastinating homework and feeling sorry for myself (10 more days).

Evan and Nastia are dating?



It's a match made in Olympics pretty people Heaven. May they have tall, lean, five-headed, long-nosed publicity super babies.

there she is....Miss America

All I can say is that he was robbed of at least a fourth place position, but whatever. I still love this queen.

and for your enjoyment, Plushenko, who's whining about how Lysacek isn't a true champion because he didn't do a quad, but "I suppose Evan needs a gold medal more than I do because I already have one."

Bitter Bertha!!

Gosh I love the Olympics.

My favorite kind of tears Or How the SLC Games ruined Ladies Figure Skating

In 1997 I started figure skating really seriously, fell completely in love with the sport, and immersed my life in everything figure skating. I really liked watching Tara Lipinski skate. I also remember my coach telling me to ignore her. "Watch Michelle," she'd say. "That's what you want to be as a skater."

1998 came and I watched. I also cried. I'd never seen skating so poignantly beautiful and mature. I also cried that she lost to the jumping bean who eventually disappeared into obscurity. So began my love affair with the Winter Olympics.

The summer games are cool and all. I like gymnastics. The running rocks. Michael Phelps has the body of a greek god. But it's missing something.

Figure skating.

It's quite easy, really. Figure skating appeals to everybody, male and female, young and old, obsessed and disinterested. While we enjoy the human interest stories of all olympic athletes, we usually only watch them compete for a matter of seconds. Maybe a minute or two if we're lucky. It goes by so fast, we can barely catch a glimpse of their faces, much less their facial expressions.

In skating, we get to watch their bodies twist and manipulate for two and a half to four and a half minutes, but we also see their faces, too. We get to know these individuals as we watch them launch into the air and stretch into gorgeous spins. We cringe and sympathize when they fall or put a hand down or lose their focus. It's sort of like reality TV - we put ourselves in them for a few minutes, forgetting our lives, adopting theirs.

But skating has changed.

We all know what happened. It was DC - a senator from Ohio needed Pennsylvania to cooperate. You give me this particular vote, I'll give you that particular vote. Except it was Salt Lake City and it was France and Russia doing the dirty work. The clear winners were the Canadians, but then the Russians won and all hell broke loose. People actually cared about Pairs FS for about ten days or so. A drastic overhaul was completed, meant to eliminate bias, and the ladies of figure skating lost out BIG time.

Funny enough, the Code of Points (COP - the scoring that replaced the 6.0 system - ahhh, don't you miss those days?), serves pretty well for pairs and men. Luckily Ice Dance isn't as affected because they don't jump or do large lifts. But the Ladies? It killed it.

Exhibit A: Michelle Kwan. Arguably the finest ladies figure skater the world has ever seen. Even without Olympic gold, she'll remain the sentimental favorite, partially because of longevity, but mostly because of her emotional presentation in skating. Say what you want, but film scorers, sports fans, even politicians will testify of the power of a great beat, melody, or chord progression to get you going. We want to see awesome tricks, but when we talk about our favorite programs, the ones that touch us emotionally are the ones that win out. COP all but eliminated the emotional factor. And we had to watch brilliant skaters like Michelle Kwan fade away. Their artistry was still greater than the winner's, but they just couldn't rack up the silly points from jumping and ridiculously ugly spinning positions (incredulous? Go watch a youtube video of Irina Slutskaya).

Men, on the other hand have always incorporated intense jumps as well as the pretty stuff. The artist, no matter how gorgeous he is, will never win.

Example: Johnny Weir. Here's his short program from Tuesday night. Gorgeous, no? Yeah, so what if he's a fruit with a hot pink and black corset. His lines are stunning. Guess what? He's in sixth place.

Then there's Timothy Goebel, the fade-away bronze medalist from 2002. AKA The Quad King. Kid could jump but kid was AWKWARD.



And here's my favorite male skate in the Olympic Games, Alexei Yagudin. Now this is skating.




But where did this leave the women? Tell me this - do you know of any female skaters in the Olympics right now? Any? At all? Nope. You don't know them because none of them are inspiring. They're not inspiring because they're young. Eight years ago these girls were starting to lace up skates for the first time. They only know skating under the COP and therefore don't know what it means to skate beautifully because it means something. Beautiful skating now is done in the hopes of getting a higher point value on your spiral. The COP sucked the life out of ladies figure skating and most of us don't care anymore (a potential problem for people like NBC, who rely on Ladies Figure Skating to be the big ratings draw of the Games).

We will never see something like this, ever again, unless they can find a way to fix their regressive scoring system.



A note, however. You know the male skater's names. You know Johnny Weir. You know Evan Lysacek. You know Plushenko. Because for the men, skating hasn't really changed all that much. That's why we still see the above names along with Brian Joubert and Stephane Lambiel.

The most competitive and exciting figure skating competition is going to happen tomorrow night, not next week. Whoops. Sorry NBC. Blame the French lady in the big fur coat.

I always loved the east coast.

My parents almost moved us to Virginia instead of Connecticut when I was a kid - and while it doesn't have all the charm New Canaan offers (but really, does that exist anywhere else?), after staying there (and driving through most of it) for four days, I've decided that I would love living in VA. As we were driving up I-64, I found myself straining my eyes to see houses through the dense woods that surround the highway (freeway? parkway?). It reminded me of driving between exits 35 and 36 on the Merit Parkway, where, if you looked at the right moment (during the winter, of course), you'd see our house from the Parkway. I was fascinated with that for the first year we lived there and it became habit to casually look to the right on our way to Stamford or Greenwich or the city.

I'd forgotten how much I adore the tiny, narrow, windy roads and the subtle freeway entrances.

It's a little ridiculous; enough that I didn't share my adoration with my companion, but I'm nostalgic. I'll always love the things that remind me of home.

Then I drove home from the SLC airport an hour ago and passed the Chick-fil-A billboard southbound on I-15 and I finally got it with the cows and the "eat more chikin" slogan.

I'm so smart.

because I like some good drama.

What Mormon women need these days is a good, quality, intense book club. None of this fluffy stuff. No more Austen or Bronte or Hugo or Dickens. Not that there aren't beautiful things to be read and understood in the aforementioned, but they're safe.

Madame Bovary, Lolita, Mama Day, Catch-22, The Road, Infinite Jest, A Vindication on the Rights of Women.

Feminist Literature. Postmodern literature.

Hopefully I'll be called a heathen at some point by certain women, women who don't realize that they are trapped inside the confines of social binaries and constructs.

Dear East Coast,

You're getting a lot more snow than usual. I'm so happy for you. I'm glad your children are getting days off of school now, days that will be repaid well into the third week of June. I don't know if you realize this, but I really like this guy who lives in Virginia. You see, he and I are forced into a long-distance relationship because he's in law school there and I'm finishing my undergrad here. It's not ideal, and it can be really hard, but the way we make it work is by seeing each other at least once every three weeks.

Please, for me, for him, for our relationship, for my sanity--please can you not be snowing ridiculous amounts of snow this weekend? It would be one thing if he were coming here, Utah knows how to handle it. But Charlottesville does not, and if I can't see my man, I just may go insane.

Love,

Jen

review.

In my English 311 course, the assignment was to write about my relationship to art. Music, naturally, seemed the most appropriate and I have a story that I knew I would feel connected to. Enough of a connection to write 9 entire pages.

It was reviewed by a few peers, and because I asked him to, my teacher. I've had a blog for a few years now, where I've written anything from a 4-line essay, to a 2,000 word essay, all reviewed in your minds, whether or not you express it. This was the first time I opened my emotions up to a classroom, and potentially the Mayhew Contest. It's scary to take something that's been an emotional baby of mine for years, put it in an essay format, and turn it in for review. They're not judging my ability to analyze and synthesize ideas and themes in literature. They're judging my emotional well-being and connection.

This is what I want to do.

Creative nonfiction is my thing.

Hopefully Pat Madden will agree.

more to come.

she felt secure only in her terrible sense of insecurity.

--Azra Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran

I'm so tired.

all the time. I can't even begin to convey to you how hard this semester is. It's not comprehending the material. It's actually finding a way to get through all of it.

Only 3 more months.

I can do this.

Right?

#11

Utah is ranked 11th on a "best looking states" list.

Accuracy?

Who knows.

But entertaining, no?

Dr. Gloria Cronin

is a wonderful, wonderful woman.

That is all.