Saturday Morning

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01/29/2011

When I woke up for work the sky was filled with white clouds that hung rather low to the ground. It was late enough for the sun to be out, but the whiteness of the clouds created an artificial brightness that made it feel more like a cloudy noon than a foggy sunrise. I am partial to overcast days, so I rather cheerily greeted the dense fog and dressed for the possibility of snow. When I got on I-15 and began heading south toward the point of the mountain the light shining through the fog became lavender and the ground began to glow brighter--more yellow. I couldn’t see the sun, but the fog was being stirred around by the winds off the point and would sporadically reveal flashes of blue sky.

I expected to round the corner to a bright winter morning that had been blown clean of haze, but instead I was plunged into clouds so low and thick they looked like pulled cotton hanging in columns from the sky barely 20 feet off the ground. Again the light changed. It was no longer flat and white as it had been over my house in Sandy, nor was it lavender or yellow as it had briefly been near the point, it was…somehow warmer and darker than it had been. It was slightly pink--or pale orange--and the denseness of the fog decreased the intensity of the sunlight that was able to get through to the ground and made it appear as a soft grey.

As I drove to Orem the fog closed in around the lanes in front of me like a tunnel. I could barely see 100 yards down the road, yet somehow it felt bright all around.  Strangest of all, by the time I drove in to the parking lot at work, the fog had settled, the clouds had mostly blown away, and the light from the sun resembled the clear, pale, lemon I am used to in the early morning. I wish I had had time to drive more slowly and get a good look at what changes were actually going on around me, but they all happened so quickly I doubt that would have done much good.

This morning was a puzzlement. Each time the light changed, I thought I knew what kind of morning it was going to be, and my attitude automatically adjusted for it. Overcast mornings always make me feel excited in anticipation of what sort of storm could brew up later in the day. Mornings rich in color like purple or yellow give me pause, and cause me to look more closely at the familiar world around me to see how it is affected by the changes. Dark and foggy mornings generally make me feel like eating kiddie cereal wrapped in a quilt in front of a long movie. Ultimately, however, this morning surprised me by ending up just like so many others I have known, and in consequence, I had no idea how to feel about it.

How's that for a ponderous metaphor for life?

Mountains

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I am taking a lighting design class at school (very exciting). 

 

Part of our work in the course is keeping a journal of significant, non-production-related lighting moments in our everyday life.  I wrote my first one and thought...hey!Iinstant blog post! (Actually I did edit it a bit ;)

This is for you Kelly :)

Right after class I had to drive down to work in Orem, and as I turned East toward Provo Canyon I was confronted with the sunset shining on the snow-covered mountain in front of me.  The light was one of those gorgeous, clear, orange-pink hues that nature only produces every month or so.   It was so striking it caught me off guard. 

It appeared that the mountain was the only thing affected by the light.  As the sun began to dip below the canyon rim on the other side of the valley, a grey-blue shadow creept up the bottom of the mountain’s slopes.  There was also a thick cloud hanging over the sun that seemed to cast a shadow over the very top of the mountain.  The sky behind the mountain was very blue, but darkened as well because there were no clouds in it to reflect the setting sun.  The result was a strip of light pink as a rose in the center and fading to a peachy-orange on the edges.  It shone on the mountain-side as though it were a canvas, highlighting the striped layers of rock that had been forced out of the earth when the mountain was first made.

I encountered this moment in the middle of a very busy day, my mind occupied with organizing all the things I was going to do, but the beauty of this picture--the bigness of it--really gave me pause. I have always been awed by mountains. To me, they are the grandest things in nature, and my favorite aspect of Utah. I love how big they are, and how they never look the same. The sun sets every day on those mountains, but I’ve never seen it quite like this.

I took a picture with my phone (Yes, while I was driving. Don’t tell.), but of course it couldn’t even come close to capturing the huge reality it represented. I don’t know how to describe the feeling it gave me. It was...big. The mountains seemed so immense, and I was so glad that I was there to appreciate it. Rather than making me feel small (as sometimes viewing large things is said to do) it made me feel special--like I’d been given a gift--to have been able to be there and see it. This occurence was only made more precious by the fact that I am a part of it. Those are my mountains. I’ve hiked them many times, and have spent many moments otherwise appreciating the wonder of their raw beauty. Seeing them in this way I felt at home, and very happy to be who I am, and where I am.

Disappearing

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Today (in addition to pounding out 1,000 words of a 3,000 word paper) I have applied for assistant professorships in dance at 4 universities, and started applications for 3 more.  An application generally consists of 4 or more of the following:

Cover letter (tailor-made!)
Curriculum Vitae (in which I bullet point everything I've ever done)
Teaching Philosophy (spent 20+ hours on the current draft and still don't think it covers it)
Research Interests (what, I have to research stuff too?)
DVD of choreography (Have yet to edit this one.  Hence the "started" applications)
DVD of me teaching an entire class (yeah....)
Transcripts
PDF of Diploma of highest degree attained (had to dig that one out of a box in my parents' shed)
References
Letters of Recommendation (I can't get them to write them any faster!! Help! Deadlines!!)

I've spent so much time defining myself and my life and my career and everything I think about all of it in the past few days that I'm starting to feel like I have no definintion at all.  It's kind of like saying a word overandoverandover until it becomes just the phonetic sounds your mouth makes and it doesn't seem to have meaning in your brain anymore.  It doesn't help that in doing research on all of these universities and programs, I have read dozens of bios of my potential peers and collegues that outshine any bio I've ever had like the lights at a stadium outshine my bedside lamp.  That would cause anyone to question who they are and if what they've been doing is what they should have been doing.

All my life I've been focused on this one thing and doing this one thing the best I could as much as I could and it doesn't seem to have filled out my life in to a specific anything.  I'm still expected to have more to me.

Well, you know what?  I have lots to me.  Not all of it is good.  Not all of it is bad.

So, here's a definition of all the other parts of me that don't fit in my CV.

Shaun (shän) n - 1./a human female of the independent, overly-honest type; person possessed of an innate need to share things (clothes, details, food, heightened emotional experiences, random thoughts, secrets, stories, time, etc.) and to ask pertinent (and impertinent) questions; 2./wearer of hats, sparkles, boots, dresses, and any kind of socks but the usual kind; anglophile, bibliophile, cinema-buff, balletomane, arachnophobe, sunday school teacher, late-night philosopher, lover of dogs, nephews, naps, and sweet things able to be sucked through a straw; 3./oblivious to important details, but enamored of obscurity; friend to the quirky, wierd, nerdy, or slightly disturbing, and tormentor of those toward whom she feels the most affection; a singer of songs in the shower, avid listener of NPR and CPR, Trekkie, Potter fan, and loyal admirer of the Riddermark; 4./a clinger-on to the little-supported and oft-discouraged hope that every person is inherently good, that dreams become realities when you wish for them hard enough, and that everything works out they way I want it to eventually; 5./a person for whom spirituality is a personal lifestyle, and a constant pursuit; frustrated perfectionist; recipient of constant and needed forgiveness, understanding, and benefit-of-the-doubt from God, humanity, and the driver in the next lane; 6./one for whom greatness is achieveable and excellence is demanded; 7./possessed of a family of warm, witty, wonderful, incredibly talented people she loves more dearly than she has ever found means of expressing, and wishes she could get even closer to; 8./hypocritical, tactless, impatient, selfish, insensitive, proud, snob who wonders why people can't just get along?; 9./idealistic dreamer unconscious of the impossible; --ME (see also: Shannon, Shanny-pan, Ballerina-Nina, Shaunathan, Miss Shaun, and Princess Tangent)

Note: this definition is incomplete ad infinitum, depending on how you look at it.

Life Shopping

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For me the switch to January is clearly demarcated; instantaneous.  As the year winds down to December, the days get darker, richer, and there is a sort-of cuddled-up-homey feeling that goes along with it.  December is like being wrapped up in a quilt in front of a lazily glowing fire and looking out at a midnight-blue sky studded with warm yellow stars. 

January is completely different.  At the beginning of my new year, everything feels open and fresh, the light gets brighter--kind of white and baby blue--and the cold brings with it a clarity and vigor that just begs for action.  I love that feeling.  It makes me feel like doing things--big things.  This is really good considering that I'll be looking for a "real job" this year.  I'm a little intimidated, not going to lie, but it's also kind of exciting.  I have no idea where I'll end up.  Job hunting is like picking out a future.  Finding my new life is going to be a little adventure!

Wish me luck!

Go me.

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As they say in Texas: "if you done it, it ain't braggin'".  Well, I'm bragging about something I didn't do today.  I didn't make it any worse. 

I'm sure most of us are a little sick of sweet things to eat right now, and can feel the Christmas fallout sinking in...a little to much dessert, a little too much shopping stress, lots of party cheer and noise, not a lot of sleep...and we're probably realizing the wisdom in the "less is more" mentality. 

I've never been very good at denying myself things that I want (especially if they are covered in chocolate) but lately the things I want have been conflicting with each other.  I want to be happy now, but I also want to be happy later.  I don't want to be alone now but I also don't want to be alone later.  So often that later takes careful building and planning, and it's necessary to wait through the boring, lonely, or painful to get there, and that means self-denial (crap!).  If I give in to my desire to have the exquisite taste of home-made chocolate-dipped toffee on my tongue now, even though I am stuffed to the brim and have eaten too much dessert, my later is going to feel a lot more queasy and be a lot more susceptible to cavities that it would otherwise have been.  Likewise, if I indulge in something that might feel like the right thing now but that I really know is kind of wrong, my later isn't looking to promising.

Cryptic-ness aside, whatever this little analogy might mean to you, for me it applies to my seemingly endless quest to shed my single status.  It's hard to be alone anyway--it's boring, it's painful--but when everyone else around me seems to be part of a two-some; when everyone else is able to move forward in that aspect of life and do that work that is (every holiday movie will teach you) the real reason for living, my own life feels maddeningly and helplessly incomplete. 

In that state you can see how easy it might be to wrap yourself up in something now that really isn't what you want later.  But today I didn't.

I didn't send an e-mail, I didn't write a text, and I didn't get on an airplane to Fargo at 8:35pm.  For me these are achievements; a bit painful and hard-won, but small successes in their own way.  They are the building blocks for the later I hope to have someday.

Simple Christmas

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First day of freedom! Finals are over, grades are in...I'm still randomly shaking myself awake in the middle of the night afraid I've forgotten something...but that's wearing off, so I took the time today to get some long overdue cleaning done and decorate my room for Christmas.

I'm a pretty sentimental person, and though I haven't kept everything, I have packed away many meaningful tokens from as far back as 1993 when I was in sixth grade and performed in Ballet West's Nutcracker for the first time as a toy soldier.  Since then--I've tallied it up--I have performed some part or other in the Nutcracker 113 times (a relatively small number for most in the professional world).  I should be sick of the music by now, but strangely, I still get chills listening to the Grand Pas and Waltz of the Flowers, and I feel a little rush of adrenaline whenever I hear "Journey Through the Snow".

Each year I pick a card or two that is particularly meaningful or beautifully written and it goes in a box with my Christmas socks.  Generally I don't read them all again every year, but this year I did.  One card I almost threw away because I didn't recognize the handwriting, but when I read it I was very touched (again).  It was from a girl in one of my singles' wards who had (for some strange reason) been impressed with something I had done and took the time to tell me so.  You never know what people think of you, but sometimes it is really nice to hear.

I have kept quite a few from the girls in the first little ballet class I ever taught.  It was held in the drafty attic of a house that had been converted into an arts center.  The room was small and freezing and there was only marley on half the floor, but I learned to love those little girls, and I hope they learned to love ballet.  Their little handmade cards were just too precious to toss out with the other cards I'd recieved.  I never admit to having favorites when my students ask me, but there are several of the girls in the ballet B (and later C) class at the Hinsdale Center that will always have a special place in my heart. 

I've also kept every ornament I've ever recieved--even the silly ones.  There are some from my days in Young Women and choir, but most are from my students.  I can't believe how many ballerina ornaments I have that are in the exact same pose ;)

Unpacking all of this made me see the irony in how inseperable ballet is with Christmas in my mind.  Christmas time has always been Nutcracker season, and if I wasn't doing it myself, I was teaching little girls to do it.  A good 70% of my Christmas decorations are ballet related, and most of the cards I've kept have been from people I danced with.  It's ironic mostly because I've been coming to realize more and more lately that my own life is inseperable from ballet.  I just love it.  It is who I am as well as what I love to do, and teach, and watch, and read about.  I didn't know it could become more important to me than it already was when I was dancing, but it has become what I think about when I don't have to think about anything.  Last weekend I went to two different Nutcracker productions, and though the dancing was far from perfect I still got lost in the dancing and the joy of it all. 

Irony #2: In many ways, ballet has become another way for me to understand the Gospel (the second thing that occupies my mind quite frequently).  They are both governed by many of the same principles: the daily pursuit of perfection, the rewards you recieve from your efforts, the roles of students and teachers, the levels of understanding that come layer by layer, how it requires every ounce of your energy and affects every corner of your life.....much of what I understand about the Gospel, I understand because I learned it from ballet.  Like Pres. Uchtdorf, all of my analogies are based in my profession. I hope my Relief Society isn't sick of it yet....

I guess what I'm getting around to saying is that Christmas is wonderful.  Ballet is wonderful.  The Gospel is wonderful, and I'm realizing how important all these things are through the simple sentimental things I've collected through the years.  Thank you, dear reader, for being a contributor. 

Merry Christmas!!

Lost...

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I was driving around the other day and happened to find myself behind an ambulance that actually had someone in it.  It wasn't in a hurry, the siren was off, but he lights were on and I could see the EMT's bustling around a bit--just enough that I felt the reality of the situation.  The gurney must have been facing toward the front of the ambulance because the EMT's were looking down and slightly towards the back windows, as was a man seated somewhat farther back and on the side.  He had his hand to his ear talking on a cell phone and he was also looking down at whoever was laying on the gurney, but what struck me most was how much worry was in his face.

Of course random moments like this make a person think about how precious some things are: life, love, family, friendship...and how fragile those things can be; how easily they can be lost. 

I really have so much to be greatful for, and so much that I need to put time and energy into keeping strong and bright.