C is for Cookie that's good enough for me

Wanna know what I like. cookie dough.

Straight up raw egg in all its glory.

"don't eat too much of that, you'll get sick"

Sick? Nah, 21 years and it hasn't fazed me yet.

It sure makes me wonder though, how come the uncooked goodness of cookie dough is better (in my own opinion) than the cookies it's intended to be? Could this be an analogy of life?

Could cookie dough symbolize the natural state we all begin in? The make-up less, tan-less, fashion less people that we are created as? The un-spiced up version, the one that is truly better than the warm, gooey, addition of makeup and hair spray?

I only write this now as I look at my frizzy hair. Most days I get home from campus and happen to pass a mirror in my apartment. My usual thought, woooow I don't remember looking like that when I left for school. Somehow the few hours I spend on campus manages to wipe off all of the little makeup I began with, frizz the hair, mess up the outfit, and leave me looking like a mess. Straight up mess.

I go to school looking like this:

And come home a few hours later looking like this:

No wonder all the guys I smile at throughout the day don't hesitate to look the other direction.

What is it though, magic I tell you. Black magic I think, cause it sure isn't the good kind. Okay maybe I just don't know how it happens. And okay... slight exaggeration. I never look like the top picture, the bottom is usually where I start and end up...

Anyway

I choose to compare myself to cookie dough. Why? Because I can. Why else? Because I like cookie dough.

Other people may not like it, they may think it's gross, but personally...I like it better. It is easier, more natural,  and all in all...more me.

So call it a stretch or not, I just made a life analogy to cookie dough. Why? Also because I can. Why else? Because i'm eating some right now and it's dang good.

There's Too Many Things That I Haven't Done Yet...

...Too many sunsets
I haven't seen
You can't waste the day wishing it'd slow down
You would've thought by now
I'd have learned something


Change.


Gotta love it, gotta hate it, gotta accept it. 


Truly, there is no other way to look at it. Some change is easier to accept then others. And even pushed into life by those experiencing it. 


One such change was the marriage of my roommate Emmanuelle. It was beautiful, she is beautiful, now they are beautiful as they commit their lives to each other and to the temple covenants. This was a good change. A welcomed one. 

Another welcomed change is the new adventure for my brother and sister-in-law. They have the amazing opportunity to live in Honduras for the next year for his work. Check it out here if you'd like! They are living the extreme version of change. New home, new people, new culture, new adventure. It is hard to say goodbye, but luckily it's not a goodbye. It's just a see ya later. I'm pretty darn good at those these days. 


The journey they have coming their way is worth the hardship of saying goodbye. And boy was it hard. Family parties just won't be the same. But if I learned anything in Thailand it's that distance truly does make the heart grow fonder. If you want a quick way to learn what is really important in life, the people that truly matter, and the things in life that are just things, well leave your family and everything you know for an extended period of time. It gives perspective a chance to rush in. 


And boy does it rush. They will have some hard times, they will have even more good times, and I know it will make them change as a family. Yes, I guess we choose to count this as a welcomed change. I mean, it's only one year right??




Umm...a not so welcomed change. The closing of my mom's store. This is killing me to write because that means accepting it. They opened their home decor store when I was eight years old. I will never forget all of my memories that have come from Wood We Ever. Because honestly, that is just about all I remember from my childhood.
      
Practically living at the mall
Moving and opening endless amounts of boxes
Running around with Jenny in the new stores before they'd open them
Continually being amazed by my Mom and Dad's creativity and skill
Eating the mall food court on the floor of the stores
Rearranging displays to know that my mom would follow behind me and change it


The memories are endless. Wood We Ever is a part of who I am. It has shaped my childhood, and the first part of my adulthood. I have seen my parents go through lows and highs and work hard through it all. 2 hardest working people on this planet? My parents. Easy. No comparison. But now I guess is a time for change. A time to see where the future will take my family. I know we are being watched out for, although times may be hard, there is always a good change in the future. It's just surviving until then.

My parents created a beautiful thing together. They have created beautiful things and have spread them to the lucky people in Salt Lake. People always said they couldn't help but be happy in their store. My mom always chose to think that it was because of the cheery decor, but I know the truth. It was because she was a warm smile, good friend and a listening ear to anyone who entered their doors.


In one month those doors are closing. It is a closing of one chapter of my families life, but an opening to so much more. I just know it. 


There are 


Too Many Things That I Haven't Done Yet
Too many sunsets
I haven't seen 
You can't waste the day wishing it'd slow down
You would've thought by now
I'd have learned something


There are too many things my family hasn't done yet. Thirteen years with this store and now new adventures await. Whether this change is a welcomed one or not, it's hiding in the closet saying ready or not here I come. And to this we choose not to hide, but welcome it in. 

After All, We're Only Human

Studying Sociology has gotten me to look at people in a whole new way.

There is no such thing as a simple interaction.

Whether we know it or not, we are constantly managing the image we portray, while assessing the reaction of what we do from others. On top of that we are conforming to social norms while both losing and gaining our individuality. And that is just the surface stuff. It's all complicated if you ask me. Highly interesting, but complicated nonetheless.

I am currently writing a paper on Alfred Schutz who thinks that the "lifeworld" is the unproblematic ground for the emergence of all possible problems, the prerequisite for transforming any un-clarified situation into warranted ascertainability. It is the taken for granted backdrop within which all situations are measured and given meaning.


Well ultimately what he thinks can be applied to an elevator. You put people in an elevator and due to the preconceived social norms and protocol people know what to do. Now, what would you do if someone walked into an elevator and stared at you, or faced the back the whole time? It would either:


a) make you think that person is a weirdo
b) make you get out 4 floors too early because you a) think he is a weirdo
c) make you question their sense of direction or personal space and thus, a) he is a weirdo.


so all in all it just wouldn't fly. 


Well... I was supposed to do that, and maybe still will. We'll see how I feel in the morning. But thanks to my roommates we just role played that scenario on our rug. Well I failed, miserably. I ended up crying for a few seconds from laughing so hard. I guess weirdo just isn't my thing :)

But anyway, it's got me thinking, what would I do? Probably d) all the above.

Oh good ol sociology...

Set Fire to the Rain

sometimes I do dumb things to myself.

ya know, the occasional sleeping in late and running to class looking like a FOOL
forgetting dinner...that's just about as dumb as it gets in my book. food is gooooood
singing a song in my head to realize it's not just in my  head...
ya know, that kinda stuff

but now i've done something bad. real bad.

not once.
not twice.
this is my third time doing this to myself...

what is it you're wondering, or maybe not even wondering but will read anyway?

running another half marathon.

Running=rain   Hayley=fire
They are not compatible, don't like each other, and don't belong in the same sentence let alone the same situation. And where do we find them? yeah...

madness right? i STILL don't even like running. and i figure if two races hasn't made me like it yet, a third won't either. but it's all good i guess! the accomplished feeling is all worth it in the end....gotta keep reminding myself that one.

i only write this because for some reason, writing it holds me to it. if the ehm few people that read this blog know i'm going to run, then i guess i better do it huh? another reason i write this, well to procrastinate the run i need to go on of course. we're in for a long training i can already tell...

and to make this not so nice thing to myself even worse...the race is LESS THEN SEVEN WEEKS AWAY! i have usually "trained" (i swear what i do can't be called training, as shown by my not so good times...) for 12 weeks. and now i have almost half of that to do the same amount of running. yuck i tell you.

but one day, oh one day i'll like running. maybe. hopefully? no? fine, i'll accept it either way and get on my run.

wish me luck though. like really. i got this!

I get by with a little help from my friends

Far and away the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing. 
          Theodore Roosevelt


I've got a theory that if you give 100 percent all of the time, somehow things will work out in the end. 
          Larry Bird


For anything worth having one must pay the price; and the price is always work, patience, love, self-sacrifice - no paper currency, no promises to pay, but the gold of real service." 
          John Burroughs


I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it. 
          Thomas Jefferson

Some people dream of success... while others wake up and work hard at it. 
         Author Unknown

           


Sometimes it feels like everything requires effort. nothing comes easy anymore. Oh wait, that's because it's true

the good dinner I want is trumped by the easy access pb&j
the power is turned off because we didn't put forth the effort to read the welcome sheet
the run I should go on falls short because I can't manage the effort of tying my running shoes
the relationships that should be easy never are

how come the best things in life are worth working hard for?

who decided that is how things need to be? I mean, i get it. I just don't necessarily like it all that much.

sometimes effort is just plain exhausting. i guess that's when you turn to the people that love you, like really love you and let your effort collapse for a bit. forget the effort of putting on a face and holding yourself together for just one second and rely on the love of others to keep you in one piece. I mean, that is what life is all about right? working hard but not doing it alone?

because ultimately, effort or not, we can't do it alone. I can't do it alone. but ya know what, we'll be okay. Everything will work out as it should. it may take all the effort in the world, a lot of tears, a lot of faking it, but one day it will be real and it will be easy and it will be worth it. but until then, i chose to lean, and lean hard.

"I'll lean on you and you lean on me and we'll be okay."
- Dave Matthews Band



"Best friends just won't leave your side" -Blink182



"Lean on me, when you're not strong, and I'll be your friend, I'll help you carry on, for it won't be long, 'til I'm going to need somebody to lean on."
- "Lean On Me"


"In good times, in bad times I'll be on your side forever more, that's what friends are for." 



We've gone our own ways and I know its for the best, but sometimes I wonder will I ever have a friend like you again?"
-Blink 182

Not Ready to Make Nice

2 weeks home from Thailand

whirlwind might be the only thing to describe this time at home.

in these two weeks i've had to reintroduce myself to america, to my high school guy friends, and now back to provo and my college life.

i think i am bad at being home. i find it really hard to bring the person i have become since high school, plus the person i became in Thailand and mesh it all into my current life. i can't figure out why it's being so hard for me.

i hear jet lag takes one day per hour time difference to get over. that would give me thirteen days. meaning my jet lag excuse ran out yesterday...bummer.

so now my only excuse is that i'm trying really hard to figure this out. not much of an excuse i know, but it's the best i can do.

i'm super frustrated that i can't fit myself anywhere anymore. i am too overwhelmed to meet people at school, i don't feel like i fit in with my old high school life, and....well, that's about all i've got.

where does this leave me? quiet, removed, and closed off. am i really that person though?

NO!

that is what is so frustrating.

since coming to college i've become a whole different person, more life of the party than fly on the wall type of person. where did that person go? i loved who i was in thailand. where did that person go too?

is it weird that i was only gone 4 months, and have now been home 2 weeks but STILL can't get myself together?? i seriously don't know what happened. but it's no fun. and who knows, maybe it's normal. i mean, when i get back with thailand people i fall right back into that person. i just need to figure out how to make that permanent...

i can't keep trying to fit into the role i filled before college and before thailand. because simply put, i'm not that person anymore. i don't even want to fit into that role. why make myself go three years backwards when i've tried so hard to move to where i am now?

sad thing is, i realize that. i just don't really know how to execute it...

i'm a different person, i guess it's only fitting that i have to figure out where i fit in the whole scheme of things again. i just wanna be done with it though. is there a time limit for this kind of stuff too?? cause i don't think i can handle it much longer... it's lonely and frustrating and such a waste of time. maybe i just need to work harder at it or something. eh i don't know, hopefully i'll just figure it out soon, whatever IT is!