Take the Stairs for a Healthy Heart...and foot

I got my foot stuck in an over-zealous elevator today, which chose to leave me behind, but not without a parting snide remark and an attempt at amputating my right foot. Good laugh for the freshman inside who sided with me and worked desperately (i think she was genuinely concerned...one hand poised in front of the emergency fireman button) from the other side to unstick what had been stuck. 

Topher

 

love love love those chubby cheeks

Got Your Nose

Yesterday, somebody told me my nose made me look like a Who, I agreed. Thank you Cindy Lou. What do you think?

                          

"Seaweedy" may not be a word

Realism is all about protecting ourselves, usually from vulnerability and sometimes from the often harsh reality of life. Self preservation encourages realism but i have a feeling that sometimes we take it a step beyond and enter the dimly lit realm of pessimism. Once you jump in, you kinda flop around, flounder and if you're not careful, lose yourself to its slimy, seaweedy depths. The davie jones locker of pessimism has engulfed many a soul lured by the protection of realism. Realism has its place, but only with a thick, moist layer of optimism right underneath. Afraid of disappointment, pain or failure? yeah, me too. President Packer notes, "it was meant to be that life would be a challenge. To suffer some anxiety, depression, disappointment, even some failure...there is great purpose in our struggle in life". Finding out that purpose should occupy more of our time than protecting ourselves from the consequences of mortality. 

The Plan of Happiness

 

This is the story of Mr. and Mrs. Nielson: click here

Death and physical trauma remind us about the fragile, unpredictable state of mortality and conversely, the lovely promise of a certain eternity in which, if we live worthily, can be spent with an omniscient and inherently loving Father in Heaven. A brush with mortality and a seemingly tragic nature of death gently, or not so gently, reminds me of the principle of the gospel that is ever changing yet constant in my life, the atonement of Jesus Christ. Elder Scott addressed what he thought was the most important thing college students learn and that is a greater understanding of the applicability of the atonement in their lives in an individual and personal way. I love Alma 7 and how it describes this sacred pillar of the gospel of Jesus Christ. How wonderful and truly marvelous it is that tragedy, unless wrought by the unrighteous use of one's personal agency and individual consequence does not truly exist because of the atonement. Death, sorrow, disappointment etc. etc. etc. is all rectified by faith in this sacred and beautiful sacrifice. There is ultimately no tragedy unless it is chosen. How grateful i am that this atonement is in effect EVERYDAY of my life and that it can be used for the minute details of my life as well as the more grandiose aspects; its power applies equally and fully. It brings immeasurable comfort to me that through personal faith and Heavenly Father's Plan of Happiness, which includes as its center, the atonement of Jesus Christ, all things will be restored to us. Personal progression is reliant on this same power and pure joy is dependent on the exercise of it. Someday, all things will be restored and the joy that will then be accessible is hard for me to imagine. It's lovely to remember, however, that a significant portion of that joy is already available to us here in mortality. i always wondered how it was possible that this life was meant as a trial and challenge for us but, at the same time, we read in the Book of Moron in 2nd Nephi 2:25 that "men are that they might have joy". Seems contradictory doesn't it? it did to me until i realized that those two principles could not only coexist in a beautiful and progressive way due to the reconciling power of the atonement of Jesus Christ but that they are reliant on one another in this mortal trek. 

Frolicking, Banana Cookie Dough and Debriefing

                               
I hope you have a friend like this. All day long I get caught up in my thoughts, thousands of times a day i find myself pondering important things (today: the connection between our bodies and are spirits) and not-so-important things (yesterday: pudding voice (next time you take a big old mouthful, try talking and you'll see what i mean)). At the end of the day all those important and not-so-important things are jumbled up in my brain, accompanied by to do lists and thoughts of basic self preservation and survival (you know, sleep?), they just kinda bounce around and unless i get them out or solidify them in some manner, they're lost. What's the purpose of thoughts if they're wasted? We would never progress and personal creativity would be tossed out the window. So what do i do with said thoughts? i debrief them, cover them in banana cookie dough and frolic around outside with them and sometimes i even add a game of four square. There's something about that ritual that makes it possible for me to make sense of my days. You know what it is? it's my friend Katie. I throw my thoughts out to her like verbal vomit (excuse the mental image i just chucked at you) with maybe a small disclaimer "just hear me out, as soon as i spill, i'll fix it" and then there it comes, pouring out like a deluge of rain all over the place. Sometimes this process takes some clean up work, some revamping of thoughts or complete retraction but most often it provides a chance for me to solidify my thoughts to make them into something real, tangible and worthwhile instead of fleeting and vague. You know what else? My joys are multiplied and my sorrows divided. So, i hope you have a friend like Katie so that at the end of your day you can toss those thoughts around and make something of them. 

My New Study Buddy

This Week's Top Pick: Living up to our true potential

Facial expression mastered this week: chunky monkey

This week's top pick...(pun intended)

Katie-Katelyn+traditional Sunday photo op+neurotic-hypoglycemic-delirium induced by Fast Sunday= delightful, flattering photos

This week's top pick: Llama Lovin'

Bachelor #3

True Love and a Necrotic Talus

Q: would your love for me diminish with the loss of my left leg?

Happy Almost Fourth of July- There are giant pigs in the sky

Garrett's text this morning: "Bunch of hot air balloons plus giant pig outside". I apparently misread this and my sometimes overly imaginative mind snapped right to some terrifying images of over fed, leptin lacking pigs. This image now turns my stomach as my excessively random train of thought leads to me to scarring images of Grandma Roller's dietary fettish: pickled pigs feet adorned with hooves and all (it's a wonder i still love pickles at all). Back to my initial purpose of this blog: Happy fourth everyone! I love you little, I love you big, I love you like a bunch of giant pigs. Lucky you. Lucky me.

adventures in mona

small town. one stop sign. a lake. a rope swing. good times.

Chief complaint? Soar Throaught. Do you also happen to be lack toast and tolerant? oh good.

The last several months I've had the opportunity to work at the BYU Student Health Center and the Missionary Training Center Health Clinic. These are a few of my favorite things: playing medical charades with foreign missionaries (one time i guessed hyperthyroidism), making so much gatorade it matches my body weight (and having my gatorade making technique critiqued by dr. brown about 5 times), positive ID strep tests (I live for that little blue line), learning how to do UA dips, well baby checks, desperate attempts to avoid being leaked on by little boys, putting together scrub outfits, telling missionaries my Kleenex joke, reading my astrological report in Bulgarian, watching bizarre news clips with my favorite nurse Connie, fake arguments with the radiologist Skip, picking all the good flavors out of the DumDum bags, sneaking letters into the MTC post office, talking to missionary converts, learning random phrases in Russian, teaching elders how to say "what's the hap" in Japanese and "I am a pineapple" in French (both extremely useful), winning a medal of honor from Elder Yarrington, popcorn Fridays with Ellen, mastering the art of taking blood pressures, improving my weight estimating skills, the tedious job of filling many many many plastic baggies with salt (i try not to lick my fingers...), malaria prophylaxis check ins and the patient who thought I told him to "shut up" (I actually said...shoot up and not in reference to drugs, in reference to his blood pressure).

Cupcakes, kissing frogs, adventure in IKEA, and a yellow crab (that one's for you sara)

20!