Haircuts

I have an inescapable urge that has become hard for me to argue with. Although I normally get feelings that I want to cut my hair, I am able to shake them off and convince myself that's not really what I want in life. Now, though, it feels like part of my identity. I mean, I had my first child over two months ago; isn't it about time that I got a “mommy” haircut?

It's been a few months now that I've been considering chopping my hair off. I've gotten a major haircut about every four years since 5^th grade. It's been over five years now that I've been putting this off. I've cut in bangs as a compromise and since grown them out again. I repeatedly tell myself that any haircut will be like that—a passing fancy that will take years to grow out. It always is.

The truth of what pushed me over the edge? I tried to watch an episode of Battlestar Galactica. (Hangs head in shame.) The first episode was a bit racy for my tastes, but before I turned it off, I was tempted. And my temptation came in the form of a naughty thought: “Hmm . . . that sexy Cylon sure has great hair.” And that's all she wrote. (Though, she obviously wasn't me, because I'm still writing.) I immediately went to the computer and Googled “wavy chin length haircuts.” This minor infraction led to an even greater evil: the establishment of a Pinterest account. (My head slips even lower in the ignominy of the whole situation.)

Saturday morning, I was ready to go for it. There are such cute hairstyles available! I don't know if any of them would actually look good on my head, but they sure look great on the people who have them. Every time I looked in the mirror at my less-than-great Saturday hair, I thought about doing something different. If someone would have knocked on my door and said “I'm here to cut your hair,” I would have said “Let's do this!” Now, though, I'm a bit more hesitant.

First off, I hate caving to peer pressure. If every sexy Cylon got a cute short haircut would I jump off a cliff? Absolutely not; that's completely illogical! I might follow suit and get a haircut, though.

There's just the main problem that my hair is naturally straight more than it is curly. I keep justifying that with less hair weighing me down, I might be able to coax my remaining locks to cooperate in a bit of a wave, but I don't want to spend much time in styling. There's also the issue that I hate for that much hair to go to waste, but Locks of Love, the group that I've donated through each time before, requires 10 inches of hair. I don't know what that means for my future hairstyle. There's also the “What if I don't like it?” factor. Well, if that happens, I suppose I can grow it again for the four years. I've done it before, and I'll probably do it again.

[Some Arbitrary Number of] Things You Shouldn't Say to People Who Hate Lists of Things You Shouldn't Say

 

If you're on the internet, chances are that you've seen at least one of those lists entitled “[Some number of] things not to say to [some group of people].” These lists can inform us of things we shouldn't say to a wide variety of individuals: pregnant women, people with/without kids, deaf people, sober people, and people with anxiety. I understand liking to make lists, but I'm starting to realize that while it may be beneficial to write down everything you need to get at the grocery store or that you are hoping to accomplish in the day, it's less helpful to write down lists of every possible way you can mess up at a thing or all the wrongs that you're trying to avoid. For cases like these, I'm starting to recognize the wisdom of having one or two guidelines that you may actually be able to adhere to. I'm going to help you out here. Instead of writing a long list of things you should not be saying to single people (“When are you going to get married?”), married people (“So, it's probably about time you had a[nother] kid, right?”), rude people (“Can I offer you some manners?”), and old people (“Do you plan on dying anytime soon?”), I'm going to simplify this: Don't be stupid; be courteous.

The beauty of having a guideline is that it is so widely applicable that I don't have to spell out every thing you could be saying to offend various groups of people. Goodness, it even applies when you may not even be speaking.

One of the many problems with creating lists of things NOT to do is that you could be eternally adding to your lists. To pretend that you can exhaustively iterate offenses is pretentious—and to be honest, obnoxious. I also find it ironic that through informing us how not to offend an “in” group, list-makers, whether intentionally or not, are quite offensive to the “out” groups—both by assuming that we are so unintelligent as to be incapable of our own thought and by mocking our opposing positions.

I realized that I usually only read through the lists for positions with which I agree or identify, and then I smirk and think about how stupid people are. Today, though, I read through a list which contradicted my own opinions. Because it was a good friend who had posted it, I spent the whole time thinking “I don't think I've ever said that to her, but is that REALLY how she feels?” I also found myself feeling many of the concepts were juvenile and unfunny—sad, really. But I'm sure if the person who compiled that list were to read through the opposite view's “What not to say to people who ________,” they would feel similarly. We're all different. And we're all in different points of our lives. Let's exercise a bit of restraint and show some compassion.

It wasn't necessary for Thumper's mother to qualify her advice “If you can't say somethin' nice, don't say nothin' at all.” One of my favorite quotes from Benjamin Franklin recommends that we “Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.” Before you speak to someone, whether your best friend or a stranger, consider how it will sound. Is it stupid? Then don't say it. Is it courteous? If not, just chill in silence, my friend.

Lights on Hills

The Jehovah's Witnesses came by to see me again today. They hadn't been by in awhile. When they came by during the Saturday Session of April's General Conference and I accidentally answered the door with eyeliner and mascara on just one eye because I thought it might be my in-laws, I was nice to them. And while trying to show them but one side of my face at a time, I smiled and chatted for a bit. After all, I've known enough LDS missionaries to consider that it's got to be hard knocking on doors to try and talk to people about your church—especially in Utah! I tried to credit my kindness later when they came nearly weekly to try and talk with me, usually while I was at work. I thought they must be trying to catch us at the 8 to 9 months of pregnancy stage so that they could take advantage of the fact that we were starting a new phase in our lives and were a little bit anxious to do things right. And while I was telling myself that they kept coming back because of the way I was, it danced across my mind that their persistence speaks to their credit, not mine.

Yes, I was nice. But not “come-back-weekly-for-the-next-month” nice. Yet they came. And around this time I became determined to keep my front room clean so the next time they came, I could ask them to come in. Not because I'm interested in converting, but because I'm interested in the people themselves. I figured I would be honest and tell them “We're happy with our religion, but we always like to meet new people, so if you'd like to come in and visit, you're welcome.” Unfortunately, after I had discussed this with Alex and we had agreed on a plan, they didn't come back.

Until now. But they caught me off guard. I had just gotten to a good stopping point while feeding Melody (but was only half-way done) when there was a knock on our door. Since I'm home alone all day with a baby, I made sure to get to that door—I didn't want to miss out on any adult interaction! They offered me a pamphlet about their website, and seeing as I was holding a baby, let me know that their site had a lot of good stuff for strengthening families there. Young, old, married, single: their site could benefit all.

I appreciated it. And I don't think they came by just because they want to get greater numbers in their church, but because they want the world to be greater. This world can be a scary, nasty place to live, and families are being weakened by everything from adultery to zingers (as in, clever but hurtful comments, not the Hostess treat). Television shows minimize the importance of parents and celebrities model the ease of marriage—and divorce. We NEED people going door-to-door distributing pamphlets because their websites are good for families. So, if you're looking for a website to help strengthen your family, maybe you'd like to browse JW.org, LDS.org, or a site of your own. As members of different religions, people in various areas, or just unique individuals, we're bound to disagree on some things, but the value of family is fairly universal. If it's a cause we believe in, what are we doing about it?

Because of the feeding situation, my messy house, and the fact that I had a spider running loose on my couch, I still didn't invite the Jehovah's Witnesses in, but I hope they come again. When they do, I'm going to invite them into my [hopefully sans spider, clean-ish] front room to thank them for caring about families. They offered me a wonderful reminder about just how important my own family is to me and how I need to value and care for them. While we may differ on some points, I'm grateful that the Jehovah's Witnesses are persistent and that they're spreading the word about having strong families.

Great Expectations

I often find that big life events don't turn out much like I expected. They aren't necessarily awful, they just leave me wishing that I hadn't imagined them so much that I got a totally unrealistic idea of how they would be. I think the only time I wasn't let-down in my expectations was when I went to kindergarten.

When I was in the pre-kindergarten phase, I was obsessed with going to school. I would load the diaper bag with every book that I could and carry it to the front door to imagine that I was going to school. (Kudos to my mom for allowing me to string a trail of books to the front door on a regular basis. Also, for not ruining my fantasies by telling me about how truly awful school can be sometimes—say, as an eighth grader.) I found it unfathomable (“It means without fathom”) that I would ever be cool enough to go where the BIG kids go—the elementary school—let alone graduate from a university and be a mom. And yet here I am. How did this happen? It sort of went like this . . .

One day, I finally DID get to go to kindergarten. I put on my [empty] backpack, my mom took a picture of me, and I went to class. It. Was. Awesome. We decorated paper cutouts so they looked like us—and they were almost half my size! Mine had mismatched blue button eyes, approximately three strands of light brown yarn hair, and a scrap of fabric that I would guarantee would not adhere to the For Strength of Youth modesty guidelines, but I was so proud. Later, we rotated through several activities. We played with blocks, and there was a large plastic trough full of water that we got to dip toys in to play, and we listened to Raffi (you may know him for his masterpiece, “Down by the Bay”). It was so wonderful. The only problem was that apparently the book on tape about some pigs that we got to listen to had a song at the end, but my partner rewound the tape before we got to hear it. Other than that, it was just as great as I thought it would be. With promises of finger painting, the trough being filled with a new substance, and the thought that I would get to hear the pig song, I was looking forward to my next week of Kindergarten. Then we had our assessments, and it was determined that I was better suited for first grade. My kindergarten experience had come to an end.

First grade, though! It would be even better because most of my friends were there, anyway. I think as I pictured walking into my first day in Mrs. Munk's classroom, I envisioned that it would be something like the Arthur theme song: I would be surrounded by my teacher, my friends, and some other kids who would all say “Hey!” What a wonderful kind of day.

It wasn't like that, but it was still pretty good. I've found that most of the so-called “big” events in my life have been kind of like that. Not quite what I expected, but still good. A bit anti-climactic, but good. I expected something crazy important and big each school year. Then I would sometimes be disappointed and a bit surprised to discover that this year, like the last, was good. The same thing happened with my high school graduation. The whole bit seemed surreal, but when it was all over I found myself thinking “That's it?” And life went on with some ups and some downs, but really I just found that things were very much the same as they were when I was in high school, and so on.

I have since discovered that dating someone is very much like being single, except that you're dating someone. And when I got married, my wedding day was a very exciting, happy day that made my life after just that much better. I had many people ask how life was being pregnant. Well, it was a lot like life, but I was pregnant. Now I'm a mom, and I love it. However, with all the time spent thinking about what it would be like, I would think my dreams would share a bit more fidelity with my current reality. Much like I haven't noticed day-to-day differences in the mirror, I still don't feel like my life has changed until I look back through snapshots of time and discover there are major differences. I wouldn't trade my current situation for what I thought it would be, though. I don't think my reality's broken, I think it has to do with my expectations. Maybe I need to finish kindergarten and renew my imagination.

Going Where No Congregation Has Gone Before: The Singing of Unfamiliar Hymns

“Thus, just as there will be many more Church members, families, wards, stakes, and temples—later on, there will also be many more nourishing and inspiring scriptures. However, we must first feast worthily upon that which we already have!” (Neal A. Maxwell in “God Will Yet Reveal” October 1986 General Conference)

What are we doing with what we have? I keep hearing people asking about when the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (which I will refer to as “the church,” since it's the church I belong to) is going to put out a new book of hymns. This would be nice, but I think if we would look inside our existing hymnbook we would find many hymns that are “new” to us because they are rarely sung in meetings. Before seeking to acquire a new hymnbook, I would advocate getting to know the hymns we have currently.

Let me tell you the perspective from which I write this. I currently serve as the ward music chairperson, which means that, among other things, I am responsible for selecting the hymns that our congregation sings each week. As a pianist/organist I have also used the hymnbook in my music sight-reading exercises. Thus, I find myself with a greater familiarity with the hymns than the average church member may have, and I want you to know that our current hymnbook is full of inspiring hymns. Many of the songs we never sing have lovely lyrics and beautiful music that would bring the Spirit to our meetings—if we we could get past the thoughts of “I've never sung this song before!” “Why are we singing this song?” and “Nobody knows this song.” That's why I'm trying to throw in some less familiar hymns (and why my ward may be wishing that the bishop would call a new music person).

I have heard people say that they actually hate this or that hymn simply because “we always sing it” and “I'm tired of it.” This is a very real phenomenon found in our congregations because we really only sing a small percentage of the hymns in our hymnal. I do not think that we should be hating any hymns. I understand having favorites, but to have a series of blacklisted hymns simply because they are commonplace is unbelievable to me. If we were to broaden our repertoire this would be far less likely to happen.

When selecting the hymns, I often make an effort to match the theme of the music to the topic of our Sacrament meeting. This is hard. I come across many hymns that I think would be a perfect complement to the talks, but I don't dare select them too often because I am afraid nobody will sing. Which is a shame, because I typically end up selecting a hymn everybody knows. Then, in my paranoia I find myself thinking “I'm probably reinforcing someone's dislike of this song.” I'm stuck. More than my concern over whether or not people hate the hymns I'm singing, though, I'm concerned that we aren't getting what we could from our music in church meetings. Having sung the same hymns repeatedly, I kick myself into auto-pilot and fail to pay attention to what the words I am singing mean. They become trite. Then again, if people are caught up in the unfamiliarity of a hymn they aren't likely to glean much meaning from it, either.

What to do, what to do? I understand that for organists with limited abilities the suggestion of an unfamiliar hymn can be quite stressful. Their comfort is more important than the introduction of new hymns. I would imagine that an organist having a nervous breakdown would be far more disruptive to the Spirit than singing “Nearer, My God to Thee” for the third week in a row. However, many of the hymns from the so-called “sealed portion” of the hymnbook are actually easier to play than the ones we know. It just takes a little looking. Remember, though: “Seek and you shall find”!

I like my comfort zone, and I know others do, too. There is a certain amount of peace that comes from singing an “oldie, but a goodie.” Can't we broaden our horizons and find more songs that we will love? That is my hope. I have some ideas I've tried to implement and some that I still need to test, but I'm trying to give it a go without completely scaring (and scarring) my ward members. I try to select a less popular hymn for the congregation to sing each week or so. I usually put it as an opening hymn so that people can forget the awkward feeling that can sometimes come from after having to sing a song they don't really know. I mark the hymns in my hymnbook with a date and my goal is not only to avoid singing the same songs too often, but to have a date by each song. I don't think I'll have this calling long enough for that, but I'm aiming for it. I also try to play through some less common hymns as part of the prelude on weeks that I play the organ. The thought has also crossed my mind to use the choir and special musical numbers to familiarize ward members with the songs they may not know. Occasionally the Mormon Tabernacle Choir will sing uncommon hymns during General Conference. Seize the opportunity and sing the song shortly thereafter in your ward! Perhaps the best place to practice new hymns is in the home. If you are a pianist, consider using the hymnbook to improve your sight-reading. If you are not, all the hymns can be found on lds.org. Sing them for Family Home Evening. Be brave and improve yourselves. Whether at home or in your ward, persist and rotate through until it becomes comfortable.

In short, by singing only the hymns with which we are already familiar, we deprive ourselves of the beauty they contain and progressively limit the hymns that we can sing—which can sometimes cause negative feelings or automatic singing of the hymns we do sing. These thoughts—or lack thereof—can disrupt the Spirit of the meeting. Singing a wider range of hymns can help with this. Keep in mind that side-effects may include decreased singing in your ward, nasty looks from ward members, and general discomfort. Singing less familiar hymns may not be for everyone. You may wish to discontinue treatment if your organist has limited abilities or if you experience chronic disruption of the Spirit. Talk with your bishop to determine if unfamiliar hymns are right for your ward.

Caution: Dangling Participles Ahead

I'm a bit of an English language . . . nerd? Enthusiast? Grammar Nazi? No, definitely not that last one—I tend to be a bit of a Laissez-faire Englicist. (As evidenced by my propensity to use words that are not actually words. Like Englicist.) I currently have at least three dictionary tabs open in my web browser. That being said, you probably won't be as excited about the following entry as I am. But if you are, please correct me if I'm wrong.

Public service announcement: I feel I ought to tell you that I've just discovered what a participle is and how it can be “dangled.” For many years now, I've heard people berate the dangling of participles, and I've never known what it is or how to do it. Fear no more. I will now educate you on the mysterious art of participle dangling.

Let's talk first about misplaced modifiers. (Keep calm, guys, this is going to be FUN.) Modifiers are words, phrases, or parts of a sentence that give us further information or description of another word, phrase, or part of the same sentence. This can help narrow things so that we better understand what the writer meant by the original word. SO, when we talk about misplaced modifiers, the word “misplaced” is modifying “modifiers.” Thanks to this word, we know what kind of modifiers we are specifically discussing—the misplaced ones. These modifiers can cause some confusion and sound awkward because instead of being placed near the phrase they are modifying, they make it look like they are modifying a different piece of the sentence. Observe.

Green and warty, the people saw the frog as disgusting.

Now, see what happened? You read the first portion of the sentence and thought I must be writing about wicked witches. Only after you finished reading did you realize I was instead writing about a green and warty frog. This could be avoided if I were to move the modifying phrase so that it reads

The people saw the green and warty frog as disgusting.

This eliminates any confusion over who is green and warty.

So, these dang participles—I mean, dangling participles—that I was talking about before all of this are a specific type of misplaced modifier. (For you logicians reading this: all dangling participles are misplaced modifiers, but not all misplaced modifiers are dangling participles. By the way, if I'm wrong, I'll admit that I always lie.) Anyway, participles are words that we would normally recognize as verbs acting instead as an adjective. An example of this would be a plunging neckline. Plunging is totally something that we could do—which, as we learned in our early language classes, is what makes a verb. However, in this case it's not a verb, but an adjective. What sort of neckline is it? A plunging one.

Dangling participles are participial phrases that are placed in such a way that it leaves you hanging, so to speak, and wondering what exactly is happening in the sentence.

Burned and disfigured, I looked at my cookies.

Am I the one who is burned and disfigured, or would that be my cookies? Well, given my history in the kitchen, it very well could be either. But let's pretend that my intent was to describe the cookies. In that case we can wave our magic revision wands and instead get

I looked at my burned and disfigured cookies and cried because I had once again failed in the kitchen.

(That last part wasn't a critical part of the revision, but I thought it might help me more clearly communicate the situation.) What I'm trying to show you is that by moving the participle, we have clarified what could have been a concerning statement. We can all breathe a bit easier—especially me—at knowing that I haven't suffered a horrific kitchen accident.

Because some dangling participles can be easily interpreted, such as Jumping into a lake, my article informed me, is a good thing to do when being chased by bees. Jumping beans, maybe, but articles? Hardly. Therefore, we automatically interpret the sentence correctly because the alternative is so improbable. For this reason, dangling participles have become somewhat accepted by all but a small group of grammar gurus who continue to insist on their un-dangling. Despite this traditional battle, the participle dangling continues to grow in popularity, especially among tour guides.

Looking off to the right, a blogger can be seen boring her audience by babbling on about obscure English concepts . . .

Oops, I Did It Again: In Which I Confess That I'm a Blockhead

So, this week, in addition to having a baby to care for, laundry to do, a house to clean, and sickness, I also had writer's block. (For those of you who really wanted to know the inner happenings of my life. For the rest of you, sorry, but the solution seems obvious: don't read my blog if you don't want to know.)

See, the thing about my writing is that I've always written when I wanted to and not when I didn't want to. If I don't have something I want to say, I struggle with coming up with a topic and feel guilty the whole time I'm writing because I know that the attempt I'm giving is mediocre at best. My heart just isn't in it. To solve this, I don't usually talk when I don't have anything to say and I don't usually write when I don't have any ideas. It's both good and bad.

In high school I used it as a wonderful excuse. My English teacher: “Do NOT put this assignment off. You'll be sorry if you do.” Me: “It's cool. I'll just wait for inspiration to strike me and then I'll be done in half the time.” And it typically worked out okay (most often in the wee hours before the assignment was due), except that it reinforced my awful habit of procrastinating.

That's not what real writers do, that's the approach of someone who occasionally writes. I've been cheating my way through; this is the exact reason that I started a blog—I wanted something to hold me accountable and keep me writing, even when I didn't have the words bursting out of me.

I find it interesting that my lack of ideas coincides with my sister-in-law's offer to let us use her Netflix account. I thought I was doing all right. I mean, I haven't sat down to waste entire days watching entire shows (yet!). What I've found, though, is that increased TV time seems to be robbing me of more than just time. In moments when I would normally be pondering odd thoughts like “Where does the phrase 'I trust you implicitly come from? Is it possible to trust someone 'explicitly'?” (which questions, by the way, were resolved through a simple dictionary search), I'm instead wondering “On whose side is Mulder's informant, and will he be in the next episode of X-Files?” I'm still undecided, but it seems the only way to get to the bottom of this is to continue watching and see if I can come up with any ideas and prove my hypothesis wrong. Who knows? Maybe this question is unanswerable.