Queen of the Stress Hives

On my high school cross-country team there was a year where we joked that our team sweatshirt/sweatpants combo made us look like bumble bees.  My name being Becca and as I was captain at the time, a friend of mine joked that I was the "Queen Bee"...I never imagined the hives I would reign over.  This past Monday I woke up in a full-blown attack of stress hives.  Yes, finals week is upon us here at BYU!

"Stress hives are caused by too much stress or tension in your life. When you expose your body to excessive stress, whether it be over a short period of time or a long period of time, your body's immune system starts to falter. When your immune system is off kilter, it starts sending histamine into the body to fight off what is ailing you - stress. In essence, your body forms an allergic reaction to stress. Unfortunately, stress can not be eliminated with histamine, so instead the histamine causes hives to appear on your body."  Yep.  That's me...I'm now allergic to myself! haha

This is really a unique opportunity.  In order to endure the present I have to think stress-less thoughts.  I have to take care of my body in a very moderate and careful way.  And I have to learn to rethink what are really the most important things in my life, or else my current approach is going to kill me!

The timing of my trip to Alaska cannot be better timed.  I really love my life.  I love all that I have learned and I love the direction I am going.  However, I want to make some real course corrections for how I live my daily life.  I do live with chronic stress.  I have had many outside challenges, but there have also been a lot of internal ones as well:  I'm a chronic perfectionist who worries too much!  I hope this chance to be in the magical town of Skagway with a summer full of opportunities for adventuring all over the Alaskan and Canadian countryside will prove very healing.  And as I will be with my wonderful David, I know it will be.  :)

Alaska.

Can you BELIEVE it?! I am going to Alaska!!! This will be a summer adventure I will never forget. You know that feeling when you are right on the precipice? You are right on the verge of something. On the edge of the cliff. You know something GREAT is out there. You can't see it, but you can feel it. You're almost scared of it...but somehow, you know it's out there and that it's up to you to take the leap of faith. To jump. And then dive into that unknown with arms open wide. Because either one of two things will happen: you will fall, and there is always someone there to catch you, or you will fly. Between the two, I believe with all my heart that I am about to sprout wings!!! :)

The Journey

May the journey be merry,

though the road may be long.

May the load that you carry

pass away with this song.

May your dreams lie before you.

May your nightmares have end.

May Beauty surround you

and Love be your closest Friend.

May all this dark world be lighted on your way.

Know it shines for you, Love, for all you do and say.

The darkness will die

because you have The Light.

So into darkness you must ride;

On, to end this night.

So be courageous, strong, and unafraid:

I am ever at your side.

And when your heart starts to fail you,

Remember, I've already won your fight.

-a poem by moi-

Change.

I am one of those people who changes slowly, almost imperceptibly. At least I hope so, because that's what I'm banking on! ;)

I volunteered this semester with a women's eating disorder group called Fed Up With Food. It was an empowering group with many beautiful, strong women. Strong because they came up face to face with their weaknesses every day. Battled every day. And overcame, or failed only to rise up again every day. What character! What strength! These women were vulnerable, open, and honest about their triumphs and failures and every time they fell down, they kept getting back up...that takes a whole different kind of strength. I am honored to know them. As a "mentor," I learned so much through their miracles, courage, and positive change. I hope to keep that same spirit of progress as I enter into a new year.

2015 will be a different kind of year for me. 2014 was great, but it was a year fraught with great struggles, great failures, but ultimately great triumphs. However, I don't want a repeat! It was hard. So hard! When it's done it's done. No looking back. No doubts. I will just live and appreciate how far I've come. I am grateful that I get to begin each day fresh with no mistakes in it. I am grateful for a new year and a new beginning. 2015 will be a monumental year. Why? I choose to make it so. I am so grateful for God. For gratitude. For the Atonement of my Savior Jesus Christ which empowers me to repent and make the changes I want to make! That's all repentance is, the opportunity to make a change for the better. And who doesn't want that?! Who doesn't want to be a little happier, a little smarter, wiser, stronger, and everything-er?! In all my struggles I feel so close to Him. I feel His arms around me. I know I am not alone. The witness I have of my Savior Jesus Christ is so real. My testimony of Him is my greatest treasure and my greatest source of hope, strength, life, and light. I am so grateful to be His witness and declare unto the world the reality of His life, His light, and the power of His Atonement. He knows YOU. He knows what YOU struggle with every day and He knows YOU can overcome it, because He already did it for you. He knows YOUR hopes, and dreams, fears, failures and future successes. He wants YOU to be happy. He wants YOU to realize your full potential. And with Him, and with God nothing shall be impossible! But we have to make the effort to come unto Him. That's His commandment: "Come, follow me." That's it. Just start there. That's what I do.

So that's where I will start with my new year. I feel like this year I've come a long way in really shifting my paradigm of what I consider success. In how I view myself and others. In how I strive to live from day to day. But this is not enough. I am not content with a little change. I feel a great measure of happiness and life awaits me! I know I can be happier! Live more fully! I know that I can beat down the demons which rise up from time to time. But I know that I cannot do this alone. I don't really know where I want to begin. I don't really know what needs to change yet. But I know that as I simply move forward trusting in God that the way will be cleared and the answers will come. I know that because that's how my life has been thus far: a journey into the light through the dark! So onward and upward I go! :)

Heartbreak Hurts

I love love. But sometimes it hurts so much.

Sometimes a relationship doesn't work out. Sometimes there's no way to end things without both of you getting hurt. Sometimes there are things to be said that cannot be sugar-coated or friendly because there is no easy way to say it's over, we won't work out. And that hurts. It hurts to be hurt and it hurts to hurt others. I hate it. So does that mean I hate love? No. It just means that I love something so much that it is worth the hurt. Worth the pain. And worth the inconvenience, time, and vulnerability. It's worth it! And in the end it will always be worth it!

So keep on loving.

I'm Back Again!! :)

Long time, no see!!

Why, you may ask?

1. No one actually reads this blog.
2. It's been years since I've written in it which is because
3. I was serving a full-time mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!!!

Just in case anyone comes across this blog who does not know me, let me make a little introduction:

First off, I am weird. That's what my friends tell me and I'm sticking to it. They're right. I'm a little different. And that's why I tell you up front, because I want you to know me. The real me. So if you're not scared off by my honest account of myself than I guess we can keep going.

I grew up on Long Island (that's in New York), don't have the accent.
My family now lives in Jersey, still no accent.
And I am now going to school and working where I served my full-time, Spanish-speaking Mission: in the capital of all things weird and Mormon, UTAH!!! :) Why, because I am a crazy, life-loving Mormon Girl, that's why!!! :D

I am catering my remarks to many I heard all growing up. I've used the word "weird" to describe myself, and my faith, and "my people." But really, aren't we all just ourselves? And isn't being ourselves just normal? If the ability to just be my normal self is weird, than I guess weird I am and weird we are because we choose to live authentically.

There is nothing about me that isn't genuine. I'm not trying to be someone I'm not. I'm just trying to figure myself and this life out. So please take me as I am. :)

This is a picture of me with my family after getting home from my mission. My mission was my first and greatest dream come true:

The second is a mini-collage from when my little sister got married right after I got home in December (and after I played her the song I wrote for her on the occasion):

So this is the beginning of me.

What comes of this blog we'll continue to see.

:)

for all my fellow Jerseyites...

don't judge a book by it's cover.

I don't know why I like paperback books.

Hardcovers are so durable, so protective, so beautiful (when the book has been bound and printed in a fancy edition). And part of me would like to have a pretty library, with volume after volume of fancy editions to display and have at hand for use...in certain cases, as in encyclopedias, dictionaries, the classics, etc, this is the better format. But in my everyday reading, the hardcover presents an exterior that is formal and foreboding. Large and cumbersome. For many books, I want the softcover. The paperback cover, which is no more than another page of the book, another page of the story. It invites you to become more intimate. To curl up comfortably as you canvass from cover to cover. And when the things we love are fragile, it forces us treat take especial care and treat such treasures as we ought to.

Each cover has it's place.

I love both and am glad I don't have to choose between them.

It's what's inside the covers that counts.

p.s. I was wrong,

I do know why I like paperback books. :)

life's little lessons: laundry.

life is a strange teacher. to some she speaks through the sages of the past (aka-books). to others she speaks through parents and other influential figures (like Snoop Dogg). still others choose experience, or experience chooses them; some lessons can't be learned in any other way.

unfortunately for me, laundry is one of these.

don't you love learning lessons that can't be undone?

my last laundry mistake was about seven or eight years ago when i put a red shirt in with my whites. i learned that red+white=a whole lot of pink!

today i learned that when soaking sheets in a sink, the sheets act as a kind of linen water slide. or chute. i left my sheets draped from the sink to the floor this morning. tonight, all the water from the sink is now on the floor.. and everywhere in between. so is the stain. lovely.

this is basically what happened. minus the snow.

...oh. and there is also a fourth group:

people who never learn.

moi.

I'M BACK!!! :D

It has been quite a while, my friends. I don't know why I went on hiatus for so long. I just stopped. I even began to hate blogging because I got out of the flow and never wrote. When I did, it was crap. Oh well. I'm here now.

I'm back in Jersey! I was in Utah from August until Christmas. Since then I have visited my sister in Kansas and my Aunt in Virginia and am now back en mi casa con mi familia. :) ("in my house with my family")

Being "en mi casa con mi familia" is AMAZING! I LOVE IT. :)

Not much is going on just now, just rain and reading. Life is good. :)

p.s. Happy Birthday Grandpa!! :) He was born 1.23.23. He was always a man of numbers.

A Little of the New in the Now.

I moved to Provo, Utah at the end of August. I am currently working full-time and am saving $ for school, mission, and other ambitions. I'm not great at it, but am learning! I hope to begin school here at BYU (Brigham Young University) in either the winter or the spring semester.

There is quite a lot of newness in my life right now. New home. New family (roommates). New haircut. New shoes. New ward (church people). New location for work. New boss. New friends. New boys...it would suffice to say that I am adjusting to many changes right now. Along with the ever-present struggle of becoming a new person every day. Every day coming a little closer to who I want to be. Permanently.

Right now, there is no permanence. I am in transition. For the next many years of my life I will be going from one transitional stage to another. Mortal life is all about the transitory vagabond. And that is what I am. That is where I am. In the now.

SONNET 116

VS.

I just came home from the showdown football game between infamous rivals BYU and U of U. It was epic in all the wrong ways...we were steamrolled: 54 to 10.

From the beginning of the game I was little disappointed in many of my fellow Cougar Nation fans. I am all for rooting for the home team...but not so much for booing or trashing the other team (or your own when they are losing). It is awesome to become involved in the game, to care about the outcome, to be fully engrossed play by play. But I will never forget the revelation I had when advised by Steven Covey book to not allow yourself to become overly emotionally involved in something that is out of your control. I have tried to take this advice to heart...and it helps. So even though I was sad we lost, I am not going to jump off a bridge. It was just one game. There will be others. I still love my team and know they will rally.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

--Old Billy Shakes--

Flecks of Gold

http://lds.org/pages/flecks-of-gold?lang=eng

Excelsior!

The shades of night were falling fast,
As through an Alpine village passed
A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice,
A banner with the strange device,
Excelsior!

His brow was sad; his eye beneath,
Flashed like a falchion from its sheath,
And like a silver clarion rung
The accents of that unknown tongue,
Excelsior!

In happy homes he saw the light
Of household fires gleam warm and bright;
Above, the spectral glaciers shone,
And from his lips escaped a groan,
Excelsior!

"Try not the Pass!" the old man said;
"Dark lowers the tempest overhead,
The roaring torrent is deep and wide!"
And loud that clarion voice replied,
Excelsior!

"O stay," the maiden said, "and rest
Thy weary head upon this breast!"
A tear stood in his bright blue eye,
But still he answered, with a sigh,
Excelsior!

"Beware the pine tree's withered branch!
Beware the awful avalanche!"
This was the peasant's last Good-night,
A voice replied, far up the height,
Excelsior!

At break of day, as heavenward
The pious monks of Saint Bernard
Uttered the oft-repeated prayer,
A voice cried through the startled air,
Excelsior!

A traveller, by the faithful hound,
Half-buried in the snow was found,
Still grasping in his hand of ice
That banner with the strange device,
Excelsior!

There in the twilight cold and gray,
Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay,
And from the sky, serene and far,
A voice fell, like a falling star,
Excelsior!

--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Come What May...and LOVE it!! :D

There's not just 'one way' to be happy.

Let the pieces fall...fall where they may.

You can't catch them in the air--

Nor plan your course 'round who knows where.

You know your end, so experiment along the way!

--me, just now. :)

Okay. So if you couldn't tell...I'm not asleep yet.

I've been thinking. a very dangerous and wonderful thing to do.

For the past couple weeks I have been going through several boxes. Boxes which I have not been able to go through for years...and not for lack of effort, but because I wasn't ready to let go.

I have a past. Everybody does.

It astounds me, just how hard it is to let it go. Sometimes there is needless guilt and shame. At other times the siren sings her sweet song of happy memories and nostalgic "better times." This is like poison for the would-be-baggage-free sailor of change. The pain of certain recollections can also act like quicksand, spiraling you down into an abyss of tainted memories. There is confusion. Uncertainty. Fear. An unwillingness to let go. Not knowing how.

It is hard to let go.

But I am on this voyage of change. I am taking a chance. The chance to live.

I am leaving for Provo, Utah in a week. Hopefully to attend BYU-Provo. My plans have not settled yet. I am exploring possibilities. SO MANY possibilities. (even more when you are an insomniac with a predilection to planning and re-planning your life every night)

I don't know what my life will hold...but is Really is WONDERFUL!! :D

Even when I don't believe it.

A Little of Life

• Earthquakes, fires, Steaks...just not here.

• We've had car crashes, sunburns, rashes, and only hamburgers...here.

Life is pretty typical right now. So much to do, so little time. Except for our favorite car, the Honda Fit, being totaled, and my Grandma breaking her ribs, chest, and neck...life has been relatively uneventful.

Well, this is not quite so.

My sister, Sarah, is here with her darling little girls!! It is WONDERFUL!!! :D

D.C. Zoo on Monday. Cousins on Tuesday. Beach on Wednesday. And that's as far as we have planned. Which is all you need. You only ever need to plan one step ahead...as long as you know the end goal.

Let's hope I can sleep. Taking naps with children is wonderful, but it has it's drawbacks. Like being up at 3 and 4 am!

Overdue Update.

It has been quite some time since last I have rambled.

Life has been happening quite a lot lately.

So what's new?

-my family has two foreign exchange students this summer.

two boys:

DavId (pronounced daaveed), 13, from Spain,

and Andrea, 15, from Italy.

-two real-life australian visitors.

-a weekend with 13 people under one roof.

-40 mosquito bites all at once!

-dogsat Princess...the sweetest black lab you will ever meet.

-been to the beach twice:

once with the fam...surfed, wiped out, surfed;

once with the amazing ondricek girls...where...

I was buried alive in the sand.

attacked and stung by jellyfish.

and pummeled by the waves all day.

...9 and 12 year old girls are the BEST!!

WONDERFUL DAYS :)

-wiffleball wednesdays

-bowling on monday nights

-institute

-BBQs

-sister time

-cousin time

-SWIMMING POOLS!!

-haircut

-midnight showing of HARRY POTTER 7.2...I have his glasses!! :D

(best friends make everything possible)

AMAZINGNESS!!!

AND

GRAND FINALE:

-I went to Long Island for the first time since I graduated high school! One of the people I love most in the world, Elise Marie Pereira has changed her last name to Urhan.

(because she is now Rich...ha.ha...lame joke :/)

I had the honor to play music during her wedding ceremony.

Two of the songs I wrote last summer just for the occasion.

Just for her.

And him.

Them.

sigh.

I <3

weddings.

:)

-that is all.

or enough

for now.

p.s. there has also been work. a lot of it.

p.p.s. I am moving to Provo on August 23rd!!

gasp.

that story is to be continued...

War. What is it good for?

Somewhere is South Jersey there is a mosquito. Or there was a mosquito. For you see, somewhere in South Jersey there is also a trampoline, a girl, and the said mosquito which takes advantage of nighttime jumping tourneys.

There was a war:

The mosquito won forty battles,

but now lives to fight no more.

The girl won none save one

and lives to pass on this lore.

SERIOUSLY. FORTY!!!!!!

So much for my summer-time goal: "no sunburns, no mosquito banquets."

Both have already been accomplished with the addition of jelly-fish encounters.

I am one busy girl! ;P

K-Knock

This is a joke I made up at work the other week when I had a little mental time on my hands:

Knock. Knock.

Who's there?

....

....

....

Nobody's there!

ahahaha...

Yes, it only took me 23 years to figure this one out.

The Brave One.

I have three sisters and one brother. My brother being so much younger than myself, I was designated as "the boy" of the family for quite some time. Being the strongest of the sisters. The bravest. The most impulsive. Having the most masculine haircut (in sixth grade...oooh. painful memory). Anyway, it was I who mowed the lawn. Who got the tool kit for my birthday. Who was always given the "boy colors" while my sister got the pastels.

Haha. If you can't tell, being considered as "the boy" caused some identity crisis. To be sure, I loved being athletic and outdoorsy. I loved being strong. I loved being adventurous. I loved loving life. But I wanted to be very feminine. I wanted to be delicate. I wanted to have pastel suitcases. I wanted to be a damsel. A lady.

The other day at work there was a spider on the security monitor at the front door. I did not think that customers would find it at all palatable to be welcomed by an eight-legged, hairy, door greeter. The boys in my building were unwilling to conquer themselves and face the spider, so I determined to again, "play the boy."

I surveyed the scene cautiously so as to examine the extent of the spider's web and possible roommates. Upon discovering the web, I stupidly reached up to swipe it down with my hand. The result being that the spider came five feet closer to my head.

Retaining some of my feminine delicacy, I squealed and jumped back.

Dylan, who must have been feeling ashamed by his cowardness, had come up behind me to watch my progress when I reacted very strongly to the spiders movement. In my jumping backward I jumped right into Dylan, landing on his foot and having to be completely caught by him so as not to fall.

If you do not know this about me, I will face to admit in full blush that I LOVED THIS! :)

I am a romantic. The kind who watches the Princess Bride. Believes in fairy tales. And dreams of chivalry.

I try very hard to be a rational person. In my nature, I don't really want to be. I mean really, Dylan's heroic impulse won the affection of my heart for several minutes. Who doesn't want to be the damsel in distress?