There it is. Thump your chest or something. And now, you must listen to this, because it'll get you all ready to run a marathon or jump over something very tall. Or not, maybe that's just me again. But you gotta love the MoTab.
Showing posts with label Utah. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Utah. Show all posts
Monday, March 5, 2012
Olympics
So I have this obsession with the Olympics. The feeling of excellence, the inspiring performances, the bite-your-nails close finishes. Just seeing so many young people, the best of the best in all of the world, gathered together, gets me teary-eyed. And maybe it's silly, but I love that Utah got the olympics ten years ago and that everywhere you go there are reminders of it. Even though I wasn't even around at the time I've felt so much... state pride? as the commemoration events were going on. Maybe it's just Mormon pride. MoPride. Ha ha. But really, it wasn't just the Salt Lake City olympics; it felt more like the Mormon Olympics. MoLympics. OK, I'll stop with the portmanteaus. Anyway... I've really, really wanted a little piece of it, so:
There it is. Thump your chest or something. And now, you must listen to this, because it'll get you all ready to run a marathon or jump over something very tall. Or not, maybe that's just me again. But you gotta love the MoTab.
There it is. Thump your chest or something. And now, you must listen to this, because it'll get you all ready to run a marathon or jump over something very tall. Or not, maybe that's just me again. But you gotta love the MoTab.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Mormon Women Project Salon Recap
I was a bit apprehensive at first, because I've never actually met Neylan or any of the MWP contributors. I went by myself and was worried about sitting alone, but silly me. I was underestimating how irresistibly awesome all these women are. I got there early because we had driven up to go to the zoo for my story (I was worried I would smell like monkeys, but it turned out OK) so Andrew and I walked around temple square for a little bit and then he settled down to do homework and I went to help out with check-in. I was pretty much the youngest person there, but it was awesome. It was essentially what I had always imagined Enrichment should be.
The theme of the salon was Deliberate Womanhood, the idea of crafting our lives rather than just letting them happen to us, and it was such a good topic for me to hear about right now. The first speaker was Emma Lou Thayne. She's a poet and among many other things she penned the words to the hymn "Where can I turn for peace?" Despite being in her eighties she was so full of life and I loved hearing her speak about growth, trials, and decisions. She told plenty of stories about her family, her husband, her writing, her accident (she had a near-death experience after a terrible car crash)... she was lively but also wise; she spoke with so much authority about life, as if to remind us all: "I've been where you will be, and you should hear what I have to say." (I apologize for the inordinate amount of run-on sentences and the jumble of words that is this post, but if I don't get it out now it will never happen.)
She shared a hilarious poem she wrote after having a toe amputated:
"Ditty to my missing parts"
Where are you waiting, my missing contraptions?
Parts so long in on my acts and reactions?
We’ll be re-united in that other life
But meantime I’m lacking what’s gone with the knife.
First tonsils at four, appendix at twenty,
Since, gall bladder, uterus, moles more than plenty.
An eardrum, a breast, and wisdom teeth, So
Are they consorting today with my nipped second toe?
Where are my actual left hip and right knee?
With substitute fixtures, is what’s left really me?
Does my lost stuff know physiology?
And the source of its real genealogy?
Do items out there know they’re all related?
Does time of departure say how situated?
With so much I was born with now distant collection?
Is restitution included in resurrection?
So I’ve been taught and I know that it’s true
But will they all fit and say, “Boy we missed you!”
Aside from being really funny, it really demonstrates the humor she seems to have about herself. She's had her share of hardships: a severely bipolar daughter at a time when bipolar disorder wasn't recognized, an accident that should have killed her... but she wrote beautiful poetry throughout all of these things and found ways to see the beauty and humor in life.
Next we went into breakout sessions, and it was hard to chose between them all but I felt drawn to the one on "Finding power in your personal story". Shelah Miner (She writes for Segullah, Feminist Mormon Housewives, and has written for the Exponent II and other mormon projects... all kinds of cool stuff) presented a workshop on writing about your life. It's been a loooong time since I've written in my journal, but her presentation on writing about yourself in meaningful ways really got my creative juices going. She gave a short presentation and then had us do various exercises to get us started. Some of the prompts were to write about a specific image in time (describe five senses, focus on a specific moment instead of a narrative/chronological description) and a few questions:
A moment I realized Heavenly Father loved me was when…
A hard choice I’ve made in my life was when…
A moment I realized there is power in what I do was when...
So we all got to work and wouldn't you know I just happened to sit down next to a fellow broadcaster! (Definitely not a chance encounter) Funny story though: when I first saw her and told her my name I started to panic because she said she had also studied broadcasting and suddenly I thought she looked an awful lot like KUTV's anchorwoman and felt pathetic that I wasn't sure because I'm supposed to know these kinds of things and I was freaking out because here I was sitting next to the anchor of a station I wanted to intern at and I couldn't even remember her name... thankfully it wasn't her though so I was able to relax. Ha.
Anyway: DeAnne Flynn is a former reporter/anchor and has written several books, speaks at Time out for Women, has hosted a talk show and does all kinds of generally awesome stuff. Basically, everything I hope to be someday--seriously. She also came alone so we decided to be buddies for the rest of the evening and she dragged me to the group discussion on "becoming a deliberate mother" because hello, on top of being crazy accomplished she has seven gorgeous kids. (I wasn't complaining much about being dragged, it was great. So was the food, by the way.)
She was so nice and was genuinely interested in learning about me. And I in turn was happy as a clam to fire away asking her all about HOW she did it all. I've been so stressed lately about decisions that are looming ever nearer. Babies. Career. Family life. Personal fulfillment. Ugh. She was encouraging and reassuring. She told me I had a great future ahead of me, but she did say that I might need to be flexible with my career choices in order to do it all.* Just being around all these incredible women gave me hope though, that I can craft my life in a way that will bring me joy in all aspects. I need to focus on what I want to and need to do (well and my husband too :) and not worry so much about what I'm expected to do by my peers, professors, and the rest of the world. Phew. (That doesn't mean I don't still have panic attacks every once in a while.)
The deliberate motherhood discussion group was cool. I just shut up and listened because I'm not exactly a model of experience with motherhood, but it gave me lots of good ideas and things to think about. The woman leading the discussion blogs at http://powerofmoms.com and she talked about how mothers can define themselves rather than saying "oh, I'm just a mom" and also about finding value in what we do. Lots of other good stuff, great discussion.
Finally we were all rounded up back to the main room for a panel discussion led by Neylan (Editor/founder of the Mormon Women Project). She asked the panelists, Valerie Hudson (distinguished BYU International Relations professor), Tiffany Gee Lewis (DesNews reporter) and Chrysula Winegar (Work-life balance advocate) various questions about womanhood, motherhood and the workplace and it was awesome. Valerie Hudson nearly got a standing ovation when she talked about the LDS doctrine of gender equality (if you haven't read this presentation she gave a while back, you need to. It changed my life. Also, I'm so sad she's leaving BYU in January--I took one class from her and desperately wanted to take her "political economy of women" class, but wasn't able to work it in. Now I never will.) and Chrysula Winegar gave me so much hope: she works hard to advocate balance between family life and work, especially for women and one of the things she said really struck me: she essentially said it was important for women's voices to be a part of the professional world and that it was possible, but women need to push back against corporations and force them to recognize that we also want and need to be mothers. One point that Dr Hudson made was that important legislation with regards to childcare, women's health, education and the family in general had come about because there were women judges, women legislators, women educators, and women activists that were active in making it happen: they understand the importance of those issues and have a unique perspective on them. They talked about so many things that I can't remember all of them, but the videos from the Salon will be on the website so I'll let you know when they're up. Oh and Chrysulla Winegar quoted Patricia Holland:
"We must have the courage to be imperfect."
What words of wisdom. I remember at some point near the end of the Salon just sitting there, and thinking about how privileged I was to be in this assembly of brilliant people. It was humbling and inspiring at the same time, and... I can't wait for next year.
Phew, I made it through. If you're still reading, congratulations! You get to look at this really cool picture.
One last plug for the Mormon Women Project: "Far from a monochrome stereotype, the beauty and variety of our women prove that there is no one right way to 'choose the right.'" WORD
*Incidentally, here's a rocking BYU alum anchor/reporter who apparently is doing it all. HOW?! I need to write to her
Where are you waiting, my missing contraptions?
Parts so long in on my acts and reactions?
We’ll be re-united in that other life
But meantime I’m lacking what’s gone with the knife.
First tonsils at four, appendix at twenty,
Since, gall bladder, uterus, moles more than plenty.
An eardrum, a breast, and wisdom teeth, So
Are they consorting today with my nipped second toe?
Where are my actual left hip and right knee?
With substitute fixtures, is what’s left really me?
Does my lost stuff know physiology?
And the source of its real genealogy?
Do items out there know they’re all related?
Does time of departure say how situated?
With so much I was born with now distant collection?
Is restitution included in resurrection?
So I’ve been taught and I know that it’s true
But will they all fit and say, “Boy we missed you!”
Aside from being really funny, it really demonstrates the humor she seems to have about herself. She's had her share of hardships: a severely bipolar daughter at a time when bipolar disorder wasn't recognized, an accident that should have killed her... but she wrote beautiful poetry throughout all of these things and found ways to see the beauty and humor in life.
Next we went into breakout sessions, and it was hard to chose between them all but I felt drawn to the one on "Finding power in your personal story". Shelah Miner (She writes for Segullah, Feminist Mormon Housewives, and has written for the Exponent II and other mormon projects... all kinds of cool stuff) presented a workshop on writing about your life. It's been a loooong time since I've written in my journal, but her presentation on writing about yourself in meaningful ways really got my creative juices going. She gave a short presentation and then had us do various exercises to get us started. Some of the prompts were to write about a specific image in time (describe five senses, focus on a specific moment instead of a narrative/chronological description) and a few questions:
A moment I realized Heavenly Father loved me was when…
A hard choice I’ve made in my life was when…
A moment I realized there is power in what I do was when...
So we all got to work and wouldn't you know I just happened to sit down next to a fellow broadcaster! (Definitely not a chance encounter) Funny story though: when I first saw her and told her my name I started to panic because she said she had also studied broadcasting and suddenly I thought she looked an awful lot like KUTV's anchorwoman and felt pathetic that I wasn't sure because I'm supposed to know these kinds of things and I was freaking out because here I was sitting next to the anchor of a station I wanted to intern at and I couldn't even remember her name... thankfully it wasn't her though so I was able to relax. Ha.
Anyway: DeAnne Flynn is a former reporter/anchor and has written several books, speaks at Time out for Women, has hosted a talk show and does all kinds of generally awesome stuff. Basically, everything I hope to be someday--seriously. She also came alone so we decided to be buddies for the rest of the evening and she dragged me to the group discussion on "becoming a deliberate mother" because hello, on top of being crazy accomplished she has seven gorgeous kids. (I wasn't complaining much about being dragged, it was great. So was the food, by the way.)
She was so nice and was genuinely interested in learning about me. And I in turn was happy as a clam to fire away asking her all about HOW she did it all. I've been so stressed lately about decisions that are looming ever nearer. Babies. Career. Family life. Personal fulfillment. Ugh. She was encouraging and reassuring. She told me I had a great future ahead of me, but she did say that I might need to be flexible with my career choices in order to do it all.* Just being around all these incredible women gave me hope though, that I can craft my life in a way that will bring me joy in all aspects. I need to focus on what I want to and need to do (well and my husband too :) and not worry so much about what I'm expected to do by my peers, professors, and the rest of the world. Phew. (That doesn't mean I don't still have panic attacks every once in a while.)
The deliberate motherhood discussion group was cool. I just shut up and listened because I'm not exactly a model of experience with motherhood, but it gave me lots of good ideas and things to think about. The woman leading the discussion blogs at http://powerofmoms.com and she talked about how mothers can define themselves rather than saying "oh, I'm just a mom" and also about finding value in what we do. Lots of other good stuff, great discussion.
Finally we were all rounded up back to the main room for a panel discussion led by Neylan (Editor/founder of the Mormon Women Project). She asked the panelists, Valerie Hudson (distinguished BYU International Relations professor), Tiffany Gee Lewis (DesNews reporter) and Chrysula Winegar (Work-life balance advocate) various questions about womanhood, motherhood and the workplace and it was awesome. Valerie Hudson nearly got a standing ovation when she talked about the LDS doctrine of gender equality (if you haven't read this presentation she gave a while back, you need to. It changed my life. Also, I'm so sad she's leaving BYU in January--I took one class from her and desperately wanted to take her "political economy of women" class, but wasn't able to work it in. Now I never will.) and Chrysula Winegar gave me so much hope: she works hard to advocate balance between family life and work, especially for women and one of the things she said really struck me: she essentially said it was important for women's voices to be a part of the professional world and that it was possible, but women need to push back against corporations and force them to recognize that we also want and need to be mothers. One point that Dr Hudson made was that important legislation with regards to childcare, women's health, education and the family in general had come about because there were women judges, women legislators, women educators, and women activists that were active in making it happen: they understand the importance of those issues and have a unique perspective on them. They talked about so many things that I can't remember all of them, but the videos from the Salon will be on the website so I'll let you know when they're up. Oh and Chrysulla Winegar quoted Patricia Holland:
"We must have the courage to be imperfect."
What words of wisdom. I remember at some point near the end of the Salon just sitting there, and thinking about how privileged I was to be in this assembly of brilliant people. It was humbling and inspiring at the same time, and... I can't wait for next year.
Phew, I made it through. If you're still reading, congratulations! You get to look at this really cool picture.
One last plug for the Mormon Women Project: "Far from a monochrome stereotype, the beauty and variety of our women prove that there is no one right way to 'choose the right.'" WORD
*Incidentally, here's a rocking BYU alum anchor/reporter who apparently is doing it all. HOW?! I need to write to her
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Today I saw
A really big desert.
Lots of sage brush.
Roadkill (I'm pretty sure it was a fox)
A hare -- it jumped out of a bush two feet away from me and hopped off
More flies than I care to count
Several lizards
Some very fancy equipment made to measure ultra-high energy particles coming from outer space.
And a bazillion butterflies. Sadly, I killed most of them with my windshield.
Lots of sage brush.
Roadkill (I'm pretty sure it was a fox)
A hare -- it jumped out of a bush two feet away from me and hopped off
More flies than I care to count
Several lizards
Some very fancy equipment made to measure ultra-high energy particles coming from outer space.
And a bazillion butterflies. Sadly, I killed most of them with my windshield.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Turley resignation
Hey, guess who's at the top of the newscast! Check out my story:
It's always fun to squeeze in next to KSL and KUTV for an interview.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Real news
That's what I did for tomorrow. I was at the Provo City Council about "what to do with Steve Turley"--I'll give you a hint: he didn't show up. Trepidating stuff (no, really).
And I met a real classy lady this evening. Cristina Flores from KUTV. This was kind of a big deal apparently, so all the SLC stations were there. As soon as they adjourned the meeting everyone rushed out to interview several key people and one lady was completely surrounded. I tried to squeeze my way in to get a good shot of her face, but try as I could I wasn't getting my mic close enough. Cristina Flores was right next to her interviewing her and motioned to me to hand her my mic, and there I had it: great audio. I was really touched that she would go out of her way to lend me a hand (quite literally). Especially when you expect angry cut-throat people (and let me tell you, trying to squeeze my camera in there was pretty scary. You have to get aggressive...), it was nice to have a friendly face in the crowd. She certainly won my respect tonight.
Hey, don't forget to watch tomorrow at noon! :)
And I met a real classy lady this evening. Cristina Flores from KUTV. This was kind of a big deal apparently, so all the SLC stations were there. As soon as they adjourned the meeting everyone rushed out to interview several key people and one lady was completely surrounded. I tried to squeeze my way in to get a good shot of her face, but try as I could I wasn't getting my mic close enough. Cristina Flores was right next to her interviewing her and motioned to me to hand her my mic, and there I had it: great audio. I was really touched that she would go out of her way to lend me a hand (quite literally). Especially when you expect angry cut-throat people (and let me tell you, trying to squeeze my camera in there was pretty scary. You have to get aggressive...), it was nice to have a friendly face in the crowd. She certainly won my respect tonight.
Hey, don't forget to watch tomorrow at noon! :)
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
"Silence radio"
has it already been a week? yikes! actually, I have nothing to say, I've just been soaking it all in lately. It's good to be back. I'm slightly anxious about the upcoming year and having to be a serious person again. I'm excited for advanced reporting, but I also know it brings stressed-out-of-my-mind feelings with it... and I also very much want to be an anchor this year. Also, I came back from France with quite a few extra pounds of... we'll call it body mass. Hence the trying not to eat too much lately.
Oh, and we celebrated our second wedding anniversary Monday by watching the last Harry Potter and having dinner at Zupa's. Harry Potter was awesome. (Andrew is too, of course)
And I finally get to go back to the hairdresser's this weekend! Getting any sort of service in France is... not cheap. Thank goodness for hair school.
There, you survived a series of completely mundane sentences. Well, the anniversary wasn't mundane. It was awesome actually. Isn't my life so exciting?
(Insert plenty of things about failure that I almost wrote publicly on this blog. Awkward.)
Subject change!
Check out the new apartment (not entirely settled, but getting there. And I'm aware the photos aren't great quality, but hey the place isn't even finished yet. I plan to have a proper housewarming first):
Come visit why don't ya!
Oh, did I mention my back was KILLING me for the past month or so, and going to a chiropractor just made it feel worse? Awesome!
Oh, and we celebrated our second wedding anniversary Monday by watching the last Harry Potter and having dinner at Zupa's. Harry Potter was awesome. (Andrew is too, of course)
And I finally get to go back to the hairdresser's this weekend! Getting any sort of service in France is... not cheap. Thank goodness for hair school.
There, you survived a series of completely mundane sentences. Well, the anniversary wasn't mundane. It was awesome actually. Isn't my life so exciting?
(Insert plenty of things about failure that I almost wrote publicly on this blog. Awkward.)
Subject change!
Check out the new apartment (not entirely settled, but getting there. And I'm aware the photos aren't great quality, but hey the place isn't even finished yet. I plan to have a proper housewarming first):
 |
| Couches -- plural! |
 |
| You mean I get my OWN closet? Gasp! |
 |
| A pantry just for us? Aw shucks |
 |
| We're getting there |
Come visit why don't ya!
Oh, did I mention my back was KILLING me for the past month or so, and going to a chiropractor just made it feel worse? Awesome!
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Driver's ed: I'm terribly effected by it!
I am learning just how uneducated driving instruction people are right now... it's kind of useful to know the difference between "effect" and "affect"! Does the good state of Utah not care that its driver handbook is laced with spelling errors and other embarrassing typos?
(Incidentally, I am just biding my time until I make a spelling mistake in one of these sorts of comments... I know it's bound to happen some day. I'll take that risk.)
Also:
Now you know why the instructional videos are boring to death. Their voices alone make me want to go out back and beat myself with a rubber hose, especially when they tell me to "keep your hands on the will."
(Incidentally, I am just biding my time until I make a spelling mistake in one of these sorts of comments... I know it's bound to happen some day. I'll take that risk.)
Also:
Now you know why the instructional videos are boring to death. Their voices alone make me want to go out back and beat myself with a rubber hose, especially when they tell me to "keep your hands on the will."
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