The Apartment

So, I'm in Davis California and have been set up in a very BYU-I like apartment, we even have our very own chastity door. But the one thing that I believe that I can complain a little bit about is the shower. I don't know why the people building this complex thought that the only people living here would be five three inches tall, but they did. Perhaps back in the late 70's or early 80's people didn't grow as tall, who knows? All I know is that every time that I want to wash my hair I feel like I'm practicing for the limbo. If I turn on the water and stand at the back of the shower it hits me in the stomach. But I guess I should be try and be thank-full for it. I can take a shower and not wash my hair without even trying, so that's a plus, I think, I guess, ok...

Davis, California

As part of the requirements to graduate with a Biology degree from BYU-Idaho I need an internship. It can be any thing really to do with Biology. As my fortune would have it I was offered a internship in the winter in Davis California. Now, you might thing why is getting an unpaid internship a thing of fortune, ahhh... I will tell you.

If you have anything to do with Idaho in the winter you might already know where I am going with this. Yes, no more snow, or ice, or excessive wind that chills you to the bones. There are palm trees here, that's right palm trees lots of crow and rat infested palm trees and that means no snow. Yeah!

Also being in California means Asians. Yes Asians, and I love it. It's almost like being back in Taiwan with one large difference, they don't care that I'm white. No one asking for my picture just to have it, I guess I'll get over it.

Along with being chalk full of Asians Davis is also one of the most bike friendly towns in the country, so there are rows and rows of bikes everywhere just like Taiwan. They also have Olive, Orange, and Lemon trees lining the streets, it's great.


So Davis is where I am, but what am I doing? I am working in a Lab on the UC Davis campus studying bacterial chemotaxis, fancy, hu? So for the most of my days I am stuck inside a ugly concrete building, pouring agar plates and measuring bacterial
colonies. Uuh, maybe not so fancy.

Music

I have been influenced by music my whole life. My first memories of this love begin years and years ago in the 80’s. My mother, Sandy, has a picture of me sitting in font of my fisher price plastic record player -- it had different songs that toddlers might enjoy, like happy birthday, camp town races, humpty dumpy, and songs from the Sound of Music-- smiling and enjoying myself.

Next came the real record player in the family room where I spent time playing my parents old records, and of course the new thing in our home the CD player and the Wilson Philips CD, the only CD in our home for about 6 months.

We also had a piano in our home that when I was younger would put olives on my fingers and try to play. I remember my sisters bringing home flutes from summer music school and playing with them not knowing what to do. My sister Audrey for Christmas one year got a interactive computer program to teach you how to play the piano. I tried my hand at it but I guess when you are 7 or 8 you don’t have the patience to learn that way, or at least I didn’t. When our family moved to Oregon I tried to teach myself how to play the piano, I mastered a few songs but nothing note worthy. And the piano was Audrey’s thing any way so I moved on.
I would even take my old Walkman and tune to the AM classical music station and fall a sleep to it every night. Falling asleep to the intertwining melodies complicated rhythms and tones and the monotone voices of the classical station DJ’s, till I could no longer find batteries.
I joined the Sunlight singers, my elementary school's choir, when I was in the 5th grade and the school band, I played flute, rather poorly I recall. But I kept it up though the 7th grade when the elementary schools merged and there was a plethora of flutes so I changed to the French horn. The transition was not smooth. I would play in the bathroom to try to muffle the sound, but it ended up amplifying it. I would practice outside and people would yell out their doors for me to shut up. But in those 3 years of junior high and the freshmen year in high school I became rather good, and no longer was I taunted and jeered or locked in the bathroom by my sisters.


When I switched schools my sophomore year, because of class conflicts, I could no longer play in the band. Yearning for some sort of musical outlet I joined the choir. I loved it! Harmonizing, blending and movement, it was joy.
After High school, however, I didn’t have much of a musical outlet except for the music that I listened to and discovered. The years past and just last fall I found it again. I joined the university choir and took piano lessons. Walking back to my apartment after the half an hour lessons once a week I was refreshed and happy. I was for so long denying that part of me. The part where music lived, without it I was not all the way whole. I have always been drawn to music and have delighted in making it and enjoying listening and revel in its passion.

Voices Of The Night: A Psalm Of Life

I read this poem and felt that it needed to be shared. Enjoy

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream! —
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, — act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow; 1807-1882

Foxy: More Memories

I was looking back at my old car and was remembering all the good old times and my first kiss stuck out, so here you go, Foxy and I at it again.

What is a first kiss? Hollywood would have us believe that it should be full of fireworks, love songs, and weak knees. But what we don’t see is the team of pyrotechnic specialists, cinematography directors, sound specialist, and costume designers. And just in case you can’t do it just right they can pull in a stunt double to do the deed. After seeing kiss, after kiss on the silver screen that makes all of us lean in a say, “ahhhh”, our perception of what a first kiss should be is shrouded in lights, camera, and action. We live in the real world and these expectations of grandiose gestures and perfect lighting have made a perfect first kiss a thing nigh unto impossible to achieve. Away from the magic of Hollywood, lets face it, first kisses are awkward.

My first kiss consisted of nothing that could have been made into a made for T.V. movie. If anything it was something that could have been a first take of a cheesy teen movie before they sent in the pros. The summer after I graduated high school I dated a boy that I had, in no uncertain terms had been, “crushing on hard” for three years. We had been going out for about a month before the “magical” night came. He invited me over to his friend’s house, which happened to be in a trailer park, to watch movies. An innocent enough beginning to a lazy summer night, one would think. I rolled on over to the house in my leprous red VW Fox. It was leprous because the paint was slowly chipping, exposing the steel underneath, like a leper whose body is slowly decomposing as he still lived. Well, the Fox fit right in as I parked in front of the double wide.

He met me at the door and gave me a hug, and the movie night proceeded.
Sitting on the couch, snuggling it up and holding hands is a bout as far is it ever went, but this night I could tell he had a plan. He would very slowly sneak nearer, and nearer and by the end of the night he had his arm around me and his head leaning on my. But this strategy took to a long time, and by the time he had gotten me right where he wanted me it was 11:45 and I had to scurry off home. I slowly and almost unwillingly untangled my self from his arms. I looked into his face saw the crest fallen look of frustration mixed shame for taking the whole night and still not have had done “it”. He walked me to my car and we hugged and said our good byes. But right when I was about to release form the embrace “it” happened. He closed his eyes took aim and, well, he missed. He did get a piece of it though, the out side 2/3 of my lips.

Before I had realized what had happened, I heard hoots and claps from behind the house. His friends were watching. I don’t know who was more embarrassed him or me. He took off after his friends leaving me to puzzle what had just happened. Did he mean to do that, or was it an accident? I sat in my car trying to figure out if that counted. Did it have to be premeditated to count, or could just be a happy lip bumping accident? My mind was running in circles by the time he got back.

I don’t know what he and friends did, perhaps a contractually high five, or butt slap( he was a football player after all). I don’t know what happened, but when he did show up again he just stood there looking rather pleased with him self. We said good night and I drove home still contemplating. Did have to be the whole lips or is part considered a legitimate kiss? Someone really should have written a handbook on that and passed it when I hit puberty, it would have helped clear up what was going on in my head at that time.
And that was it, my first kiss. No fireworks or “Such Great Heights” from the Postal Service playing in the background. No, they were only awkward teenage boys, a very confused girl, a trailer park and a car that was lucky to make it home. Come to think of it, that could make a great movie.

Summer Time( Remembered)

As you might have seen I had a bit of car trouble a few months ago and Foxy has been retired. Fortunately I have a new vehicle, Pedro. He is a wee bit older but still has plenty at miles left on him.
Pedro and I had many adventures this summer here are a few to get you caught up with.

The first week I was home a job was presented to me that I couldn't pass up. Spend 4 week at my Grandparents place to work on their house. They live with my Aunt and Uncle and their two kids. With no extra space I could have slept on the couch for a month, or find my own space. I took the latter. I placed a futon pad in the back of Pedro, and made it home. It was like camping:falling asleep to the sound of the crickets and the chirping of the frogs, and some nights hoping that the cougars didn't eat me.


So I worked. I built stairs, and part of a deck. I pressure washed the house( beware of the exhaust it get hot! yikes),
and painted the front. I mowed the lawn, chopped down trees, and bushes. But the best part was swimming at Papa's swimming hole after all the work was done for the day. Leo(Papa) says that jumping in the river feels like resurrection morning, and I think I believe him.


Other than working, I spent time with my little sister, once even going to a Timber Festival( only in Oregon, right).

But like most I spent a most of my weekends at wedding receptions. In 7 week I went to 8 wedding receptions. If that doesn't make a single girl feel just a little bit lonely, I don't know what will.

The last wedding I went to was for my good friends Steve and Kristen in Salt Lake. In Salt Lake I went to a craft fair and drowned my singleness in pie. Ummm pie.

Foxy: In Memorandum

My dear old car, was born Dec 1989 to German parents in California. She left her family but still kept her German heritage close to her heart for the rest of her life. She found a life in Logan Utah where she lived for quite some time. In 1990 she was living In Medford Oregon with a family that did not see her many talents. She looked for a way out of that situation but the way did not appear until 2002.

In 2002 a tragic accident happened where a Dodge truck was burnt alive in a pear farm. The cause is still unknown but some believe that spontaneous combustion was the cause of death. The family that lost this truck was so stricken by grief that she( Foxy) was given to the family as away to console them in their time of loss.

The Folsom home was a good home that lovingly took care of her.2002-2003 she left home for a foreign exchange to Sweden. During this Betty the Volvo from Sweden stayed with us, her sweet spirit was a welcome guest in the home but Foxy was still sorely missed. 2003 Foxy returned home but continued her wanderings around America.

She when to Seattle, Portland, Logan and Rexburg ID. During this time she began to feel her years, braking both axes and springing an embarrassing leak in her fuel line. But at the end her pump would be the thing that did her in. On the crossing from Rexburg to Portland the gas pumps broke and she could no longer get her self started. So on July 27 2009 she died a peaceful death on the quite streets of Portland. She will be sorely missed by many. She is survived by her owner, Jessica.

Instead of flowers, there is charity that will be accepting donations in her name, The "Jessica Needs a New Car" Foundation. Contact Jessica for more information about giving to this excellent cause. If you have any fond memories or stories about Foxy leave in the comments below.

This tattoo was found on her after her owner was gone for a year. We think was a show of rebelling,and an inward longing for affection.