The vicious cycle of hereditary geekiness claims another victim.

So I'm teaching my kid brother to play Dungeons and Dragons, and I'll tell you why. When I was a kid, I played a lot of video games, way more than was healthy. But when I was done playing video games, I would take the stories and ideas in the games and do my own thing with them. I've found cartoons I drew in kindergarten based on watching my uncles play Ultima VII, and I'd write little stories about the characters. In my defense, this was before I knew how bad an idea "fan fiction" is.

Anyway, I played the games because I liked the stories. I guess that's a bit like saying you read Maxim for the articles. But if you get me started playing a video game, even if it's really terrible, I have to finish it so I can see how it ends. If I had the same persistence about real literature, I would probably have finished the two books I've been reading intermittently since February.

Here's my point, though: I'm having a difficult time seeing any redeeming creative merit to the stuff Alec plays. He's into the anime thing, so it's all pretty much rubbish. I don't think the Japanese even have a word for "hackneyed" or "hyperbolic" or "nonsensical"... unless that's what the word "anime" means.

So I'm getting him into D&D because if he's going to be a geek, he's going to be an American geek, dang it. And since he can't see the pictures and the game doesn't tell him what to do, he'll have to do something besides mash the "X" button all day.

In seriousness... I asked him the other day what he would wish for if he had three wishes from a genie, and he couldn't think of anything. I asked him what he would do if he had a million dollars, and he looked around the room, spotted his iPod, and said, "Um... buy... songs."

I love... lamp. It was exasperating. So we're going to grow him an imagination. It's going to involve the repulsion of kobold invaders and finding out who murdered the elven high priestess, among other things. I know you won't believe me, but I'm writing a pretty wicked story for this... we're going to tackle concepts like industrialization (they call it "going bad" in Narnia), contradictory moral obligations, individual and universal apostasy, political intrigue... the kids are getting impatient because they want to actually play, but I'm frankly having too much fun getting ready. And just because it's in the context of being a Dungeon Master does not make it stupid. It just makes me stupid for telling you about it.

--Kevin

All dead white boys say "God is good"

My dog is lying on the floor asleep and his legs are twitching.

We believe in something called "the measure of [one's] creation." From my extremely rudimentary and Wikipedia-based understanding of Eastern philosophy, it seems to correspond roughly to the concept of Tao or Dharma: essentially, it's the sum of what we're here to do and be, and carries with it the idea that every created thing has a purpose in the divine economy.

My dog, I've learned, was born to play fetch. He can chase a stick until it falls apart in his mouth; all day and all night if we'd let him. I've never seen anybody enjoy anything as much as he enjoys chasing a stick. So now, because he's stuck in the house and bored, and because he's a good dog, God is giving him stick-chasing dreams. I'm a little envious.

I've been thinking about this, because it's evidence that the happiest things in life are the ones that are filling the measure of their creation--however simple that is. In some ways it's general--we're all meant to keep the commandments, we're all meant to love and be loved, etc.--but it's also very specific. Part of the measure of my Dad's creation, for example, is to work outside with his hands. He doesn't always enjoy it, but it's not entirely about enjoyment. It's just one thing he's meant to do, and another lifestyle would probably be unnatural and ill-fitting.

It leads me to believe that our role as stewards of God's creation (and as stewards of one another, our brothers' keepers) is to help others fulfill the measure of their creation. That's why we become fathers and mothers, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, and children. It's also why I'm going to take the dog out to play fetch when he wakes up.

--Kevin

Brains are weird.

I love it when a CD corresponds to a vivid and specific time in my life. Mom is listening to The Strokes' Is This It, which I bought the summer after junior year. It reminds me of all the crap I stapled to my walls and hung from the ceiling, the cushioned litter I made out of that old shopping cart, driving around back when gas was cheap and you could just drive around. Now that I think about it, between the shopping cart, the bathrobe, and the stringy, unkempt long hair, I may have been doing Derelicte before Derek Zoolander made it cool.

More than any of that, though, it gives me a weird little phantom pain... I remember how I felt listening to this CD and associating the lyrics with my life at the time, but I can't remember what I was thinking about. It's a shortcut in my mind that used to lead somewhere important, and doesn't anymore. But I still remember all the lyrics.

Remarkably, I don't think my angst at the time had anything to do with a girl. I'm going to listen to this CD and drive around again.

Change You Desperately, Desperately Want To Believe In

I've been resisting talking about (or even thinking about) the election season until I saw anything discernible or meaningful about it. It does interest me that the past two presidential elections, and now the Democratic nomination, have been so incredibly close and contested. It seems likely that the parties have achieved such a mastery of opinion polling and tailor-made rhetoric as to render their candidates qualitatively indistinguishable to the average voter.

But what concerns me more is the personality cult that carried Barack Obama to the nomination. Not so much for what it says about him, as what it says about our national state of mind, and fitness to govern ourselves. A rousing, emotional call for unity, a promise to restore our national dignity, extravagant populist rhetoric and promises... the fact that so many have responded to such easy demagoguery is a little disturbing.

He said something on the subject that I think was maybe more truthful than he knew. Referring to the diverse throng that assembles to watch him speak: "It's like I'm just the excuse."

He's right about that. People don't want Barack Obama; they want to believe. The past eight years have made us so necessarily, heartbreakingly cynical; but we're a nation of idealists at heart. So he hardly had to sell his campaign at all--we're just begging to be persuaded. And maybe Barack Obama is a decent guy, but it wouldn't matter if he wasn't. His playbook will take a leader in any direction he wants to go, as long as the mob is weary and vulnerable enough to swallow it.

--Kevin

All I know is, Katherine Heigl ain't bad.

So I just watched "27 Dresses" with my Mom. We were waiting out rush hour and there was nothing else on. Mom picked it, I didn't.

It was standard romantic-comedy boilerplate, for the most part... women will never get tired of Jane Austen. Ten or twenty interchangeable plot iterations, a steady stream of handsome, disposable actors, and you've got a multimillion-dollar money tree that will never, ever, ever stop producing.

But they got pretty brave with this one... the stubborn, arrogant love interest (this week's Mr. Darcy) actually rants about an unscrupulous multimillion-dollar industry entirely dedicated to milking the sentimentality and romantic expectations of women. He's talking about the wedding industry, but I have to believe this was included as a joke.

The movie did lead me to wonder, though, whether there could really be beautiful women out there who become secretly infatuated with the authors of well-written articles they read in newspapers and magazines before they find out that the author looks like James Marsden. It sounds too good to be true, but one can't help hoping.

--Kevin

Upper Management Potential

Well, my little brother and sister will now be home all day for the next three months. I will miss the quiet. Maybe I can recruit them to do my job for a tiny fraction of what I get paid to do it. I think it might be illegal; if the people in charge find out about it, maybe they will let me do it in the Dominican Republic for a lot more money.

It's been a good day.

--Kevin

It's the same on the weekends as the rest of the days

Scott and I decided that the main difference between Jim Halpert (of The Office) and ourselves is the team of professional screenwriters who keep him unfailingly smooth and charming. So we will move to Los Angeles and start an internship--not a paid internship, of course--for aspiring screenwriters. We will then solicit donations to a scholarship fund (as motivation for our 'students') from which we will skim off enough money to live in Los Angeles and date the women we charm with said creative team. It's foolproof.

It was good to have Scott around; he helped me to be a little more patient with the course of my life. Instead of fighting the limitations of living in my parents' basement with no friends, I have decided to work the advantages of my position: for example, there's very little to hinder me from working ten hours a day, six days a week, and earning myself a lot of financial freedom for college (when I'll actually have a social life to spend it on).

I've been killing myself looking for something with which to fill these seemingly endless days... I've seen it as a terrible burden, when really it's one of the coolest things I've got going. I worked ten hours today, and still had time to go to a Memorial Day party, meet some cool people, and jam with an amazing cellist. That's about all the excitement I need in a day.

On a different note, something pretty great happened this Sunday. So a couple weeks ago, before I had my epiphany about the Blazer scoutleader thing, one of my kids (John-Michael) walked past me in the chapel and gave me the worst stink-eye I think I've ever got from an eleven-year-old. I hadn't figured eleven-year-olds to be complex-enough creatures to contain the kind of loathing his look communicated. Pretty discouraging.

But I've been doing a lot better with the kids, and this Sunday, John-Michael walked past my aisle during sacrament meeting, gave me a nod, and held out his hand for a discreet low-five. Pretty much the coolest thing that's happened to me since I've been here.

--Kevin

The Good Life

So my best friend since third grade is in town, and we are staying up late, eating junk food and playing video games. Mostly it's the same as it ever was, except for the single Heineken he temperately swallows as we sit down to watch Doctor Zhivago at 3:30 AM. I don't think I've ever seen anyone drink just one beer before. He's always been a temperate sort of person. Or maybe it's just because it's my dad's beer.

And he cusses like I did in high school, idiosyncratically, dropping bombs like they're commas. But other than that it's the same, or better because he's been to college and lived in Europe, and has a lot more to say now--which actually works for him, because he isn't a jackass like most people who have been to college or lived in Europe. It's nice to have a conversation that doesn't feel like playing tennis with a brick wall.

I taught with the missionaries for the first time since coming home this week, and Scott came along. Gave me a powerful feeling of nostalgia for my mission, accompanied by a not-entirely contradictory sense of gratitude that it's over. Scott asked good questions and I tried (and failed) to abridge my answers like Elder Ballard told us to in General Conference. I've never been good at "leaving them wanting more."

Talking to Scott about his past three years makes me so desperate to get through this summer and start that college thing. Mostly because I miss girls. Just having a reason to be around them and talk to them. The singles ward is nice enough, but it's like dying of thirst on a raft in the Pacific... the seawater is beginning to look more and more palatable, but I know if I drink it'll only make me thirstier.

--Kevin

I have cool friends.

Today a friend gave me some food for thought. At FHE we were playing one of those group guessing games like Mafia, and when it came to Peter's turn, he quietly declined. It was pretty clear he was being a "conscientious objector", but nobody asked him why and we kept on playing. Well, he walked out of the room for a while--gathering his courage, I suppose--and came back in and 'wondered aloud' (in a very humble, euphemistic Mormon sort of way) whether we could so whimsically play a game like this if the subject was something like unwed pregnancy, instead of murder.

We hadn't thought anything of it, of course, which may have been his point. Of course it was entirely good-natured--the game could just as easily have been about throwing pies or something equally apropos to the silliness of the game--but we were blowing each other away with shotguns and hand grenades and disintegrator rays, trying playfully to think up more and more over-the-top methods of killing each other.

I'm still not sure whether it was such a big deal (the evening came to a cold, awkward stop after he spoke up), but it's definitely something to think about. I couldn't see Jesus playing our game. Maybe it's because we've all been raised so far away from any real violence... we've only ever seen murder in the context of obviously-contrived entertainment, so that's how we see it. Sex, on the other hand, is something that is very much a part of our world; and certainly closer to our real contemplations than killing anybody. We've seen (at least in the lives of others) that it is extremely serious business. So maybe we're a little more careful how we speak of it.

I think it's probably cultural, too... if I had been playing the game with a bunch of guys, I would be more inclined to laugh off Peter's comments, but the idea of pretending to maim and kill women, now that I think about it, is viscerally distasteful to me. Why? Because violence among boys was rather encouraged when I was growing up... you stick up for yourself, don't be afraid of a fight, etc.; but you never, never, ever hit a girl. (That rule made absolutely no sense to me around about 4th grade when the girls were bigger than us and generally started the fights.)

I admired him for saying what he did, even if I'm still trying to decide what I think of it. He went about it in a very gentle, non-judgmental way... just encouraging us to think. We were having a lot of fun, it must have been a hard thing to do.

--Kevin

President Hinckley, it turns out, has always been incredible.

Added it up this morning, and I've spent about $180 on music since I've been home. How about that. Which means I've spent about ten minutes every workday paying for CDs. Putting it that way, it doesn't sound that bad at all... and in fairness, I've been replacing my decimated CD collection (a casualty of leaving it with my family for two years) and catching up on stuff I missed. And furthermore, it's my only expense apart from burnt offerings to the petroleum gods, so I feel pretty satisfied with my fiscal responsibility. So I don't want to hear it.

The other day I listened to a talk that President Hinckley delivered at BYU, back when he was a young apostle and the Vietnam War was still only six years in, with six more to go. It was a telling artifact; I, like most people my age, haven't heard much about that conflict except the shameless punditry we read in the history books... the predictable lamentations, 'if only they had known what we know'. But here was a brilliant, deeply compassionate, inspired man, speaking on the subject without the benefit (or maybe the prejudice) of hindsight.

He spoke on the conflict in exactly the way I can imagine him speaking on ours... refusing to pass judgment, just reminding his audience of the horror of war, and the humanity and brotherhood of all the involved parties--including the enemy, and the arguably-culpable politicians. He watched President Nixon speaking before a firing squad of cameras and microphones, wiping the sweat from his forehead, and said he felt a sudden compassion for the man so terribly accountable for so much. No appraisal of the man's leadership or decisionmaking, or useless speculation as to whether he "deserves what he gets". Just sympathy for a human being in a really difficult position. And how terribly ironic that the mess was made by Kennedy (whose teflon-coated 'legacy' has yet to wear through), while Nixon--the one who actually got us out of there--is one of the most famously despised presidents in our history.

Politics can be so dehumanizing, but the next time I see President Bush, I'm going to see flesh and blood. A child of God deserving of compassion, even if I think he's ridiculous. Or maybe especially if I think he's ridiculous. There's my brother on live television, and he's doing a really hard job, and the whole world hates him for screwing it up. And maybe he's not a good person... maybe he's an incompetent, greedy, selfish crook. So much more reason to feel sorry for him.

But the most interesting thing about the talk was his description of the ambiguous feelings of the people for the war:

"I have spoken quietly in private conversation, never publicly, some rather trenchant criticism about some of the things I have observed. I have been in situations where I have tried to comfort those who mourned over the loss of choice sons. I have wept as I have turned away from the beds of those who have been maimed for life. I think I have felt very keenly the feelings of many of our young men concerning this terrible conflict in which we are engaged, but I am sure we are there because of a great humanitarian spirit in the hearts of the people of this nation. We are there in a spirit of being our brother’s keeper. I am confident that we have been motivated by considerations of that kind, and, regardless of our attitude on the conduct of the war, of our feelings concerning the diplomacy of our nation, we have to live with our conscience concerning those whose freedom we have fought to preserve. We are there, and we find ourselves in a very lonely position as leaders in the world, criticized abroad as well as at home."

I've always resisted the comparison of our war to Vietnam, but there it is. All the moral uncertainty, the struggle of conscience, the terrible feeling of responsibility and loneliness. And here we are, the media and the government and the public playing the exact same roles as if from a teleprompter, and all of us making the exact same mistakes. It was so enlightening to see a view of that conflict that allowed for the possibility that intelligent, informed, compassionate people could have supported it (even as their misgivings grew about the way it was conducted).

It's ironic... because our culture tends to assume that we are intrinsically wiser and better-informed than all previous generations, we feel little obligation to learn anything but the most obvious lessons from our history... so when our present turns out to be a lot more complicated than those silly, elementary problems that our grandparents faced, we find ourselves totally unprepared--and we end up doing all the same dumb stuff.

It's a great gap in our study of history (at least in every class I took). We learn the facts, the events, the consequences... but I suspect it's at least as important to understand how the people in our history books felt about the history they were making; to have at least some degree of empathy for them, if we're going to learn anything from them.

"And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse." (Malachi 4:6)

--Kevin

I didn't lie and I ain't saying I told the whole truth

All at once, I fell back in love with Modest Mouse tonight. I was driving home from church in the dark, and listening to "Black Cadillacs", and suddenly I remembered a night more than three years ago: I was at work, sitting in my cubicle in the dark after everyone else had left, and talking to a girl who it still hurts to think about, a little. I have to tell myself there's another girl like her somewhere, but I'll believe that when I see it. We'd just finished a pretty terrific fight... or maybe we weren't quite done, I can't remember.

We both popped in "Good News For People Who Love Bad News" on our respective CD players, and hit play at the exact same time to listen to "Black Cadillacs" together. I had spent a good week telling myself she wasn't worth the trouble... I'd even found a beautiful, insipid placeholder to give myself something else to think about. But that song almost kept me following her around until graduation. I wonder if she remembers it.

--Kevin

"She laughs at everything you say. Why? Because she has fine teeth."

I went up to CSM this morning with folks from the singles ward, to help students move out of their dorms for the summer. I encountered a captivatingly attractive brunette who told me her major was civil engineering; to which I replied, "That's amazing, I was way good at Sim City back in the day." Maybe she only laughed to keep me enthusiastically hauling her TV and mini-fridge down the three flights of stairs to the parking lot, but she had the prettiest laugh I think I've ever heard.

I discovered that her mother was a less-active member of the Church, which led me to lament how differently it all could have gone. She would have been lovelier, really, without the tiny shorts and spaghetti straps, and I could have met her at church a month and a half ago. I was tempted to make it my business to right this wrong, but I neglected even to get her name.

And then I went home and filled a spreadsheet while watching old Star Trek episodes pretty much all day. I know I need the money, and part of this mortal probation is "eating bread by the sweat of thy face"--though in this case the metaphor is so loose as to be a little ridiculous to me--but it's hard to sit there all day, listening to my heart beat and wondering how many more are left in there.

--Kevin

Spitting out that freshly-bitten bullet

I had my first date post-mission! And my first real "first date" (like, asking out a girl I don't know, having a plan, picking her up, taking her to dinner) ever. I couldn't eat all day, so I just paced around trying to busy myself with preparation; but it turns out there isn't that much preparation involved in taking a girl to dinner. So I just paced around, trying not to feel sick.

I found my paralyzing anxiety much more surprising than you probably do. I'm not an irrational person. I'm not even shy, really (he said to himself). I understand perfectly that I know how to have a conversation. Nothing serious. Just eat something expensive, open the door for her, and talk to her like she's a human for two or three hours. No big deal. I get that. But there's still this scared kid inside me that doesn't.

Well it was almost perfect. The Lord answers prayers, even silly adolescent ones. Had I been possessed of greater faith, I would not have lost my way to the parking garage, and then lost my way inside the parking garage (from which my date extricated us), and accidentally driven down the wrong lane on the way home when I missed our exit and had to get on the service road. Couldn't find the restaurant either. And then, even better, I had to explain to her that the prospect of asking her out actually terrified me, and I had guiltily hoped that she would be busy. That she was my first real date ever, and I was scared out of my mind.

I can't help it. I say what's on my mind, and it only gets worse when I'm nervous. So naturally I explained that to her (one of those terrible, inescapable feedback loops). But she responded like she knew the real me... recognizing that I wasn't necessarily on my A-game, and I would probably be a cool person if I could just relax. She ordered some extremely adventurous Mediterranean dish and ate the whole thing (while I thought to myself, "How can you eat at a time like this?"). I got this delicious penne pasta with italian sausage and could barely even pick at it. But other than the dumb stuff I did and said because I was nervous, it was perfect. She was funny, and she laughed when I tried to be funny, and we were honest, and had a real conversation about things that really matter.

And it's no wonder, because I found out early on that I was dealing with a professional. My new friend has been on 62 first dates (I forgot to ask whether I was number 62 or 63). She pretty much knows how this works.

At the end of the night, I completely forgot to open the car door for her (which I explained to her for the reason I've already mentioned), and walked her to her doorstep. She said, "Wow, you've never done a door scene before!"

And I said, "Wow, I guess I haven't..." and silently panicked. I had no idea what I was going to do. A kiss on the cheek or even a hug was too much, but a handshake would just be ridiculous, so I choked and just kind of... said goodbye. I thanked her for a nice night, said I'd see her at church, and just sort of... walked away. But that's better than a handshake, right?

Miraculously, my body waited until I got home to freak out; but the moment I set the keys down on the coffee table, my intestines made a fist so tight that I was up for two hours, just rolling around in the bedsheets, praying desperately and nursing a Pepto Bismol nightcap.

But she was fantastic, and I'd do it again. At church the next day I showed up late (because I got lost, again) and she came and sat by me, and sang a pretty harmony (but got the words wrong), and we chatted and it was nice. I don't really get it, but God is awfully nice to me.

--Kevin

Got central heating, and I'm all right

My perennial and general lateness apparently extends to pop culture trends, and I can't entirely blame that on my mission. Still, I almost always show up. I have become a genuine Youtube addict. Mostly because it is cheaper than buying music and safer than stealing it. Still, I have disciplined myself to use it (and Facebook, and every other innocuous waste of my time) only while I am working. That sounds screwy now that I put it in print. But as long as I'm required to sit inert and unfocused for eight hours at a time, I may as well enjoy it.

Peter recruited four other people to go with us to the top of Table Mountain, and we piled into somebody's 15-seater van after breakfast this morning, and hiked up there. I discovered that the girl I was (mostly) there for is moving back to Arizona on Tuesday. So I have to find her before that and buy her dinner... if for no other reason than that she was so darn cool to me & there ought to be some compensation, don't you think?

--Kevin

Barack Obama is not the Messiah.

I admire audacity. Not like "the audacity of hope", that is for sissies. Audacity like a criminal mastermind. Those guys are always getting away with the most ridiculous crap, and it's not like they're that much smarter than anyone else, they just have the cojones to try something totally insane, which is why no one expects it, which is why it works.

I suspect that the world would be a much more disordered place if most of us weren't instilled with a deep fear of failure and punishment. Our justice system doesn't even take care of all the stupid criminals, let alone the smooth ones. I'm pretty sure most of us can (and would) get away with a lot more than we think, if we just had the audacity.

Maybe it has to do with motivation. No one understands their potential until they have a good reason to test it... when the dread of the act is overpowered by some stronger compulsion. I've never been hungry, never been in love, never had my ideals demand that much of me. I'm not a megalomaniac, as far as I know. I'm generally pretty happy. What do I want to be audacious for?

Maybe for fear of being dull... or for the sense I have that my life would be better if it were more exciting. But what's the price? People who make the news seem to be almost universally unhappy... and the most driven, bold missionaries I knew in the field were generally the most miserable, because they were driven by fear: fear of shame, fear of disappointing their families, fear of their great-great-great-uncle Willard Richards... It looked like righteousness, but any slave can work himself to exhaustion. You didn't have to look much closer to see the malice and selfishness in it... like they were so afraid of missing heaven that they didn't care who they had to trample to get there.

But then there were those elders who were just as bold and driven, but driven by faith; and those were the ones who loved the work. They trusted a promise, staked their claim on it, and always came out on top. That's the kind of audacious I want to be. Now I just need to find some wild exploit to which there's a blessing attached. I'll let you know when I think of something.

You kids and your video games.

I think Babylon spent the last two years hard at work to screw up everything that used to be cool. This girl I had a crush on from kindergarten to senior year is now one of those college girls. She was so smart, and so funny, and so painfully attractive... the kind of girl for whom my feelings were almost idolatrous. She wasn't ever into me anyway, but man! To live in a world where mixed drinks had never been invented. Would she still be on the arm of that sleazy 28-year-old with the salon-styled facial hair?

The miserable thing is how unremarkable that transformation was... really, I'm surprised when I talk to old friends who haven't wholeheartedly plunged into "college life." And you can't go anywhere on the internet without facing a soft porn assault, and the shows that I catch my kid brother and sister watching are as vulgar as they are inane. I sound like an old man. I don't have any illusions that the world was much better before I left... maybe it's always been like this, but it still sucks.

I guess I just miss being oblivious. I can't wait to get to Provo... it'll be like a cold morning when you get out of bed way early on accident, but you catch yourself in time to curl back up, and the blankets are still warm. A return to the sweet embrace of monastic disconnect from the world at large. Who am I kidding, I will probably hate Provo. But it's fun to imagine myself enjoying it.

--Kevin

Life is good.

My first FHE at the new singles ward tonight, and it was pretty much amazing. Everyone is just cool... and maybe in a weird sort of way, but I like it. Example: on the way into town I saw a little rocky mesa that I thought would be cool to climb, so I asked Peter if that was Table Mountain (for which the Table Mountain Student Ward is named). He said yes, and I was like, "Well, is it a good climb?" And he said yes, and I said, "Cool, because I'm thinking of getting up there after the Dead Day breakfast Friday morning."

So he says, "Hey, that's a great idea! Let me think, is there any reason why I shouldn't commit to that? No, I'll be done with finals then. You know, I bet there's a couple people that might be into that. I'll see what I can work out."

Of course I was planning on doing it alone, and hadn't really even insinuated that I wanted anyone to come along... but why not?

Everyone seemed to be that way... totally uncomplicated. Like when Shasta meets the Narnians for the first time in The Horse and His Boy: "You could see that they were ready to be friends with anyone who was friendly, and didn't give a fig for anyone who wasn't." We had a really good spiritual discussion at the beginning, and then just joked around and got to know each other for an hour after that. Jokes were funny if they were funny, and there was none of the Pharisaical posturing and "top the mission story", and nobody trying to demonstrate their righteousness by how easily they can be offended.

So it's been a pretty rockin' weekend. I got my first paycheck, a cute girl took my tie off in Sunday School (kinda weird but kinda cool, once again) and I'm excited to climb that dang mountain.

--Kevin

From Modest Mouse to John Mayer in one night.

So this is funny, given yesterday's post. I went to a dance tonight (a luau actually, how dumb does it sound), and I actually had an amazing time. A bunch of people from the Golden singles ward--the ward I'm supposed to be going to--totally took me in, like I've been hoping someone would for the past two months. Even without the obvious counsel to go where you're assigned, I think that's where I want to be. I went up there last Sunday to speak, and before the meeting started, this guy Peter walked up to me and told me he would pray for me while I spoke; and the whole time, I could feel it. Then Annie, an excitable, happy, pretty redhead came up to welcome me to the ward, just in case I decided to stay. Just solid, cool people. The real deal.

So tonight I found Peter hanging out by the drinks, and we talked about how awkward these things are, and how dancing "just ain't me", and he introduced me to some friends of his, and dancing just wasn't them, either... so that was cool. We just talked for a while, joked about how the music hasn't changed in the eight years since I've been to a dance... and then Annie and this little short girl Esmeralda dragged us out and got us to fake it. Couldn't even figure out the electric slide and the chicken dance, but it was fun!

After a while, I felt like I was finding my groove, starting to enjoy myself, and Esmeralda said (in the nicest way possible) "Hey, at least you're dancing!" Lest I should be exalted above measure. All the girls were really good--like, half the time I wanted to just step back and let them do their thing--but the cool thing was that none of the guys knew what they were doing, and we all felt stupid.

Started talking to this one guy (don't think I got his name)... the basics, how weird the RM thing is, how awkward church dances are... and he doesn't dance either; but then he sees these two girls standing by themselves, grimaces, and says, "All right, I'll take the one in the white, you take the one in the brown," and I grimaced, and we did it, and it turns out Jennifer in the brown was pretty cool.

There was a really pretty dark-haired girl across the floor who was just getting down... like, almost too much. and I said, "Hey man, do you know her?"

And he was like "Nah... you should go ask her to dance!"

As much as I don't believe in girls being 'out of my league', I declined. Well, he kept bringing it up, and finally the last slow dance came on, and he said, "Look, dude, you better ask her or I'm going to."

So I did. Turns out she's pretty cool. Lives downtown, studying nursing at CU. She didn't say anything mean or try to kill me.

It was like all my weird social anxiety fell apart, and all of a sudden nothing was a big deal. Just a couple cool people was all it took. I almost didn't go tonight... and I remember now my first interview with Bishop Christiansen, who said, "Follow the Spirit, elder... if He tells you to go to that stake dance, you be obedient and go."

I almost laughed out loud at the time, but tonight was a big deal! Everything feels different. A friggin' luau; go figure. But I really, really needed it, and it almost didn't happen. Life is so good.

--Kevin

Your morning cup of neurosis.

I stayed up late last night and read over my old blog entries, and decided I really miss having friends like in high school. The mission is kind of anomalous because you're rarely just 'hanging out' with people of your choosing... it's been almost three years since I've just called somebody up and went out and did something.

Three years... that's crazy. I can't wait to get settled at school and not be in this weird in-between place anymore. Guys like my grandpa can just be alone and do things they like to do, no problem. I need a social life, and Facebook isn't cutting it for me. Cool as it is.

So I go to all the singles stuff that the Church does... I still draw the line at dances, but everything else. I had been optimistic that the return-missionary thing would make it easier to feel normal around Mormons; but if anything it's more complicated. People have expectations about what a mission is supposed to make of a kid, and I always get the feeling that I'm not meeting those expectations. I'm probably just being paranoid.

I'm getting a renewed understanding of what President Hinckley said about the needs of converts... how members of the Church are "more different than we often think we are," etc. and it's difficult for converts to fit in without help. I don't think I've ever connected that to my experience with the Church, but it fits perfectly. I know the gospel is true, and I consider myself to be pretty orthodox... but I still feel like a visiting anthropologist at church.

Here's what I need: I need someone to validate all the weirdness I see, and confirm for me that it is in fact really weird and I'm not crazy for thinking it's weird. And the longer this goes on, the crazier I actually sound. I should go to bed.

--Kevin

This is the good life.

I got out and made it HAPPEN this week. I cleared a new pasture for the horses (with a tractor), I helped build a fence, I climbed a mountain (twice), I learned to play five new songs on the guitar, I started a conversation with a girl I didn't know at church, and I beat FOUR viderogames and we had a Quantum Leap season 4 marathon. I didn't work very much at all, and it was very good.

Oh and I got the cops called on me! See if I don't do things right when I think to do them, they won't get done. So when it occurred to me to vanish into the mountains for a couple hours, I didn't think to tell Dad or leave a note or anything, I just left. So when he saw my truck pulled over on the shoulder down 285 toward Denver, and the keys left on the seat and the passenger door unlocked (whoops), he assumed I'd been murdered or something. By people who leave the keys on the seat and the passenger door unlocked, I guess. So he called Morrison's finest, and they showed up a minute or two before I did; and I said I was sorry and I'd leave a note next time, and they said it was refreshing to see a concerned parent, etc. and tore off in search of traffic offenders.

And I was a little sorry. I should have left a note. But something happened! I didn't just sit inside watching the clock all day! He always got on my case about wasting my life on the computer, and I finally feel like taking his advice, and it's baffling. Kevin? Outside? On purpose? Surely not, this must be a 9-1-1 emergency. So it was a little cool not to be so predictable, honestly.

He'd be so much madder if he knew how long I was sitting at the cliff edge, occasionally glancing down and wondering what he was doing down there, and then shrugging and going back to my book. Had to have been a good hour... he said he was waiting for three hours, and it wasn't that long of a climb. But I definitely made it known the next time I went for a hike.

And the place I found is pretty much perfect. Level enough to climb without equipment, but steep and rocky enough to be scary and fun... like, you probably won't die, but you could if you weren't paying attention. And I'm still a little afraid of heights, so the peak is a rush... it's probably about ten feet square, and always windy, and you can see straight down almost 360 degrees, nothing but pointy rocks all around for a hundred yards.

So I got some good praying done (especially on the way down), and I brought my scriptures and tried to imagine what it was like before the temple, to go up into the mountain for sacrifices and prayer. I tried to study up there, but I think I'll have to hike a little farther to capture the experience. From my perch I could still see (and even hear, which was strange to me) the rush-hour highway traffic coming out of Denver into the mountains. It was even more distracting than it would have been on the ground; the loudest noise being the one you're trying hardest not to hear, I suppose. This last time I was probably a hundred yards higher, and it was still impossible to pay attention. But across the valley there's a ridge of higher, broader peaks, farther from the road. A longer climb, but probably an easier one. Will definitely have to remember a water bottle next time.

There's so much to like about this way of living. Being free to disappear for three or four hours whenever it seems like a good idea; never having to shave or wear shoes unless I want to; the scope of possibilities: like, I can have a really productive and amazing day, or I can play Xbox if I feel like it. I can wake up at 6:30 or sleep in until noon. Life is good!

--Kevin