In Which I Am Alive

Hey, guess where I want to go? ....Everywhere.

Things I would like to do this spring/summer, in no particular order: Tube the Provo River Climb Y Mountain Climb Mount Nebo Get a library card Visit the Springville Arts Museum Go to Llama Fest at the Krishna Temple (update: I'll be in California. Maybe next year). Visit the Living Planet Aquarium in SLC Go to a fair, where I will ride the most vomit-inducing ride I can find, eat a funnel cake, and get a henna tattoo.  Go to the Sheepdog Festival (It sounds silly, guys, but this is one of the cooler events I've been to in Utah) Rooftop Concert Series! (update: done! Thrice over!) Go to Boise for Jenni's wedding! Hooray! (update: couldn't get a ride. But a visit is in the works) Meet Gail Carson Levine (update: done! She's really short!) Go to the rope swing in Mona (update: done! And I went off the highest platform) Go to the natural waterslides in Alpine (update: done! Highly recommend) Actually make use of my Pass of all P...

Often when I go running, not much running actually gets done. It all started when I lived in Vienna. I discovered quickly that if I went on my run through the city, I ended up stopping every few minutes to look at a beautiful piece of molding on a facade, or a group of workers setting up a giant tent for a traveling theatre company, or sign saying that Mozart once spent the night in this or that building (between Mozart and Beethoven, I think just about every building in town has been historicized in that manner). So, I decided that if I ever wanted to get any actual running done, I would need to stick to the canal road by my apartment. No fancy buildings to look at, no distractions. Right? Wrong. Because, as it turns out, the Danube Canal is a hub for graffiti artists. Not just punks with spray paint cans, but actual artists . In fact, the canal wall is one of the only places in Vienna where graffiti is actually legal. So I got to run by stuff like this every day. Needless ...

It's been two months since I last went to class.  The summer solstice was nearly two and a half weeks ago. In recent months I've wandered Europe, lounged on a beach in the Caribbean, and logged enough hours at my job at the pool to give me a permanent odor of sunscreen and chlorine.  And yet somehow, it's only been in the past couple days that it's hit me: summer is here.  Maybe it was the nights this week that were spent sitting in the patch of cement in front of my apartment, the patch of grass in front of Panda Express, and the grassy knoll behind my complex's pool. Have you noticed how real summer nights have a different quality than any other kind of night? Not only is the air warm, the light is different somehow...dark without really being dark. And something about it feels not quite like night. Which might be why I've been doing my share of staying up "wayyy past midnight." Maybe it was wakeboarding for the first time this summer. Or lay...

Um....hi. So, I'm going to the other side of the world again tomorrow...I'm beyond excited. And also I feel a little guilty...what kind of spoiled brat gets to visit Europe twice within a one-year span? This one, apparently. I've been very very blessed with these opportunities to travel, and it wouldn't have been possible without the help of many other people. Parents and grandparents who have offered me financial and emotional support, professors who have helped me prepare academically, Uncle Sam for giving me a fatty tax return, ORCA for giving me a grant...I am one lucky girl.

Someday, when I am rich (or at least...out of paycheck-to-paycheck range), I will: Eat things besides pasta and granola bars. Have my own room again. Go snowboarding every weekend (and even some weekdays, since I could afford to miss work) Go rock climbing on days besides "Bring a Friend Friday" (where I can get in for free, because I have friends with season passes). Buy all of the music I ever loved. And all of the books ever written, even ones I don't love. Have a car. Own my own camping gear. Travel. A lot. Things that I do now, instead of being rich: Get really creative with my food sources, so I can eat things besides pasta and granola bars. These include: attending social/church functions just because there will be free food, try to date as much as possible, and go to my grandparents' house for every Sunday dinner possible. Bond with the two other girls who share my room, and pretend I'm a pirate when I climb up the ladder to my little bunk. (...

Dear 2011, You have been my most intense year yet. You've brought me some of my happiest times and greatest adventures. You have been a year of romance, of friendship, of hiking, of random dance parties with roommates.  You started with me slaving away at the piano preparing for my sophomore recital, which I somehow managed to prepare for and perform. You brought me new friends and reminded me how much I love my major, even when I feel insecure about it. You took me to Italy, Austria, the Czech Republic and Germany. I learned how to survive in airports by myself, how to deal with homesickness, and how much I miss my family when they're far from me. You haven't been the kindest year. You took my brother and my best friend from me, replacing them with letters and weekly emails. You gave me scary and exhilarating questions about my future, which started full of excitement and optimism, led to confusion and doubt, and eventually ended in heartbreak. But even then, 2011, you ...

Stephansdom Cathedral, 25 June 2011 Gothic cathedrals don't make me feel small. Or rather, they do, but they make me feel as if being small isn't a bad thing at all. I follow the lines of the arches and vaults and my soul expands to fill the entire space, joining with hundreds of other expanded souls, reaching, spilling upward to Heaven, to Our Lord. I do not feel small because I do not feel any size at all. I feel my being melt and merge into a Holiness full of souls, where each soul is unique and precious, and all are filled with the light and love of Christ.

I scribbled this down while awestruck in the Rembrandt room of the Kunsthistorisches museum in Vienna I think art, in its best form, is a way we share ourselves with each other. A way of saying, "This is how I  see the world, please let me show you." All truly honest painting, writing, musical composition, tries to do that. And I think that sharing of souls, of perspectives, is so important. "Here is what I think is moving, touching, beautiful, sacred, frightening. Please share it with me." And the sharing is never perfect. Everyone interprets each artistic conversation according to his or her own experience. But I think the communication is often more clear, more perfect than with verbal language. And I think it's wonderful that I can sit in front of these paintings, and maybe feel for a moment how Rembrandt felt about his son, or understand how he envisioned the Apostle Paul, or what the lines on his mother's face meant to him.

Things Austria does better Ice cream (Zanoni and Zanoni's, baby....) Chocolate Bread (I would seriously kill for a loaf of Wienersopft right now) Kebabs!!!! (Ok, this isn't really something Europe does better. This is something Europe has that America doesn't. I think we need to get more Turkish immigrants here so that we can have kebabs...I miss me a good Doener). Cows (Austrian bovines are some of the most beautiful cows you will ever see). Green frolicking hills Architecture (even the dizzying rococco architecture that made me want to vomit is more beautiful than anything I've seen here) Museums Street performers. (Honestly, listening to street performers was possibly the best part of my entire trip to Europe. I should post some of the videos I took..) Mountains Things America/Utah does better Pizza Mac and Cheese Milk Cereal Having Karissa's friends and family be there Slot canyons That is all for today.

So, you may not have known this, but I recently made the move from little old Utah to Vienna, Austria, to study German and Humanities for the summer. And I feel like I'm supposed to be documenting that somehow. But documenting my life...that's never been the purpose of this blog. I thought about making this into a travel blog, updating about every week with what I've been up to. But I'm already writing travelogue-esque emails on a pretty frequent basis to my parents and to my boyfriend, and keeping a detailed journal. I don't really feel like writing out all my adventures in yet another medium. I'll hopefully be putting a big load of pictures on the book of faces pretty soon, for those who truly need to live vicariously through me. So this blog will stay what it's always been. A place for me to share my thoughts and feelings when I feel like it, hopefully to the enjoyment and edification of those who read. (There will however, probably be more pictures f...

I feel as if I'm stagnating. No learning, no progress, no new-ness. I clamber out of bed, clean dorms, eat lunch with Michael, accompany for a few voice lessons, and then clean toilets. Day in and day out. I'm so ready to leave for Vienna. For new countries, new languages, new foods, new people. I'll miss my roommates, my family, and of course my Michael. But beyond that? Not much. I'd be gone today if I could be. It all feels like...drudgery. Like I've lost that talent I had for seeing the beautiful in everything. For finding new ways to progress and grow. Where did it go? How do I get it back? Because, like it or not, I have two more weeks here in Provo. And so I'd better make the most of them. How though? Go running in this beautiful weather (I think I will do that as soon as I finish typing.) Read all I can about Vienna so I can be even more excited. Smile more. Reach out a little more to my coworkers and ward members. Play the guitar a lot. Read ...