Utah Again?

Why is my vacation hot spot Utah of all places? When I started thinking about writing about this past weekend, it occurred to me that in the last six months I've visited that place three times. Now I find it incredibly lame. Hopefully I can go somewhere cool before school starts, if it starts...still waiting to hear about that.

I spent President's Day weekend in Utah. Of the three times, this one was probably best just because I went with the primary intent of going snowboarding. Weatherwise, it couldn't have been better timing because it happened to dump about a foot in the local mountains the day before we headed out and then got pretty clear and warm (at least for Utah) by the time we arrived there on Friday. Dave and I went up Friday night to Brighton, and then returned again the next day.

My senior year in high school I was so all about snowboarding. I probably went about 15-20 times. I missed a lot of school that year. Sometimes I'm surprised at how little I actually went and that I was able to get good enough grades to get into BYU, let alone graduate high school. Dave likes sharing this fact about me, but let's have a show of hands of who has received their high school diploma? What's that? Nope. I'm not raising my hand. That would be because of the more than several and less than ten detentions they wanted me to serve in order to receive the diploma. What did I care when I knew that I'd be graduating from college? Who didn't even bother walking with his graduating class in college? That would be me again. I'm not so much about the ceremonial things. Plus I think I still have my eye on graduate school. So by the time that happens I will do the two-fer where I actually collect my diploma as well as walk with my graduating class. I've done both, but not at the same time. But I digress...

A couple of things about this trip...I just love muscle memory. It's been about two years since I've gone snowboarding, but it's so nice to be able to pretty much just pick up where I left off from last time. I love the feeling of getting so comfortable on the board throughout the session, and having that comfort revealed through my ability to incorporate my whole body into the action. I start off using primarily my legs to switch my weight from heel to toe and vice versa, then as the day wears on I lean with my full weight to guide myself down the mountain. It's so fun to pick out my line and charge down so quickly that the air I'm cutting through actually starts to hurt my ears because it's passing by me so quickly, or I'm slightly scared of avoiding the trees that I'm steering around. It's just so great. Everything about it.

Girls are funny to me. This is about girls in general, so I'm not picking on anyone from this trip, but it's funny to me that girls get excited about shopping and getting cute clothes when if given an honest choice about what they'd really like to wear, they'd probably just opt for a t-shirt and pajama pants. I'm sure I have my dumb crap that I do too, but that one makes me laugh.

We saw Across the Universe over the weekend also. The more I think about it, the more I love it. As my good friend Karen put it, to really enjoy this movie you should probably be doing acid. Visually, a lot of it is just plain weird, but I just loved the music. I kind of forgot, but like most people I went through my own Beatles phase when I was a kid. My brother had Beatles tapes and I remember listening to them for an entire week when we went skiing on a family vacation. I just loved Jude - his character, his look, and above all, his voice. He did sound a lot like Ewan McGregor, but I was just mesmerized anytime he sang. My biggest worry about the movie was that it would be turned into primarily a political club to beat the viewer in the head into believing that war is just wrong. It turned out, however, that they did a good job of softening that message and had the movie revolve around the love story. My favorite scene was when Jude had just met up with JoJo and they're both lamenting losing their girls and Jude says, "she's probably out fighting for the cause." To which JoJo responds, "looks like you've been fighting for it too, huh?" And then Jude counters by saying, "I don't have one. That's the problem." It sets up the ending of the movie perfectly because he's so lost until the very end when he figures out that his cause was his love for Lucy. It sounds a little obvious and trite when I write it all out like this, but the movie does a wonderful job of leading the viewer in various directions. I liked it a lot. Again, the music was wonderful.

I also got a chance to go to church at a student ward in Provo. It was the first time I've ever gone without a tie, and that's counting when I went before I was a member. I forgot my church clothes, but I did the best I could with a sweater and collared shirt. It's amazing to me how self-conscious I was about all of that. The talks that were given were very thoughtful, doctrinally sound, and bold. My memory had faded a little bit about how cut and dry people can be in an environment where everyone is immersed in the church culture. One guy gave a talk about clothing and it obviously could have applied to many of the members in the congregation, but he didn't back down from his main point that clothing should be mostly about functionality and not its form. It just made me realize that I'd probably never hear that talk with that kind of tone outside of Utah. And that can be good, but it can also be bad. It reminded me of how one time a guy had complained about one of my friend's attire while she was a TA in the accounting lab and I was just completely shocked because I've never once that she dressed immodestly. Remember that? Only at BYU. I know it can be good too, but I won't go into that here.

We ate at pretty much all of my favorite places, and I didn't even put on any extra weight. I'd have to say it was a good trip, but I hope that's the last time I go for any reason other than going back for school.