just write

Sometimes, laughing can feel like looking at chaos from a distance. Each peal of your voice pushes the grief further into the past and you can breath easier. The laughter releases you from complex emotion and pulls you into the amber of the present moment. Suddenly things become clear and simple. Like the autumn sun filtering through the trees. You lean your head back and just let go. The September air slips into the sound and you realize for the first time that things will be okay. For a moment you let the laughter hang there, and it feels like healing.

Slice of Life - Walking the Dogs

Walking the dogs inevitably begins with two tangled leashes and me crouching on the floor trying to reroute the tangled mess through 8 furry, excited legs. After a lot of jumping around from the dogs and a lot of exasperated commands from me, we make it out the door. First we circle the block. The little boy on the tricycle always follows us, never talking except to ask questions about the dogs. I think he just likes to watch them wiggle their tails and explore the neighborhood. We pass by perfectly manicured lawns and some haphazard ones as well. The sounds of kids playing and squealing echo from house to house. Most of the families are young because we live in a starter community. It’s not shabby, but it’s also not fancy. It’s mostly safe, except for that one time in the sixth grade when my neighborhood friend had 14 police cars outside of her house because they had a meth lab. Like I said, it’s not fancy. Things have calmed down now and most of the neighbors look at the meth house as an isolated situation. Now, the community is mostly populated with young LDS families and a few people who have lived there forever (the ones who started the neighborhood). My mom and I aren’t either of those. We’re the anomaly you might say. We’ve lived here for over a decade, but it doesn’t seem like that long. Initially, we moved here so that we could live in a house with a yard. We never moved into a nicer community because my Mom’s a public school teacher and most of the money she makes that doesn’t go to bills, goes to the hundreds of books we own and our adorable dogs, who by this time in the walk, are wrapped around my ankles.
When we finally make it back around the block, the dogs have calmed down a little and have stopped running in circles excitedly. Instead, their noses are pressed to the ground. Teddy snaps a fallen leaf into his mouth and crunches it a bit and then spits it back out on the next neighbor’s lawn. Max strains at the leash because has seen the white cat that lies in the gutter waiting to nearly be attacked by the dogs before it runs away. Every day the dogs and the white cat almost have an altercation, but at the last moment I manage to restrain their excited, inquisitive bodies while the cat darts to the middle of the street and lies down. I have no idea how that cat is still alive.
After the second time around the block we head down the street. We pass by the house of my favorite Sunday school teacher and the house that always has seasonal decorations galore. I feel grateful to live in a safe neighborhood with lots of open space and clean streets. The dogs keep their noses close to the ground and sniff audibly. Dogs that are penned in backyards down the street start to bark and whine as we pass. Teddy and Max just wag their tails and walk/run down the street. Teddy has grown so much since we got him 3 months ago that he’s now bigger than Max and together they weigh over half of my body weight. This means that as we’re walking I have to lean back a little bit and use my entire body weight to keep them from pulling me over. Shaun and I tried to train them to walk like the well behaved dogs on the televised dog shows, but that lasted for about two walks.
As we head home, Teddy and Max bite at a few more leaves and sniff various discarded toys on people’s lawns. They lap up some gutter water (gross!), and they consistently weave back and forth, switching sides. Finally we make it home and go in through the side gate. Immediately they return to a state of hyperactivity because they’re back home with their toys and things they think are toys, but are not. I pick up the pieces of firewood they have pulled across the lawn during the day. The wood has all the bark chewed off and the remnants are strewn across the lawn. Why they like the taste of wood I will never know, but every time we start a fire in the pit, one of them sneaks up behind us and grabs a log to drag away. Now they seem to have claimed the whole pile of wood. I leap up the steps and they quickly pad behind me and wait at the door while I grab their bowls. We finish off the walk with dinner for them and several giant laps of water. Teddy dribbles across the floor and paws at my foot, but I ignore it and sit down to do homework. Play time is over.

Picture: Teddy (left), Max (right).

My Name

My name flip-flops around. It can be bent and plied into so many forms. Camille. Cami. Cam. Cams. Millie. Each of these names represent me. You can even alter my name to sound like similar things. Like the time in second grade when my classmates called me Camel for a month.
Camille is the name of many male, French artists. I'm not sure how I feel about the gender swap that occurs somewhere over the Atlantic. It's cool from an objective point of view, but I don't really like sharing my name with the opposite sex. Girl names should look and sound like girl names and the same goes for boy names.
My name also sounds different depending on the language you speak. The double ll turns into a y sound and the e turns into an a sound when you say it in Spanish so that my name sounds more like Camiya. Sometimes people alter my name to revert to the more common, Camilla, which has more frill. Depending on my mood I might just adopt Camilla for a while. It sounds more elegant, more refined. Camille is like a pair of old sneakers, comfortable, but not very dignified.
Another way in which my name can transform in front of your eyes, or in your ears, rather, is if you tack on something to the end. My sister and I have special names that we use for each other in this way. She calls me Cami-Sue and I call her Jenny-Lou. Sometimes this breaks down into just Sue and Lou or Soodle and Loodle. My name is like a piece of gum, ripping apart and remolding into new forms with every bite.

Writing Process

My writing process is generally slow and tedious. I write about things that have happened to me or things that I've heard about or seen. To start out I usually sit down in front of a blank piece of paper or a blank computer screen and I start writing or typing. I prefer handwriting things like poetry and letters, but for essays and longer pieces I use the computer. Usually I write and revise at the same time which makes things messy and sometimes means I have to go back and rewrite what I wrote originally because the revision is worse. On occasion (like this one) I don't revise after I write. I just write and revise simultaneously and then I'm done with it. Those are the pieces I don't like to go back and read once I'm done because I know I'll find errors. The writing will make me feel like I could have done better; a self perpetuated slap in the face. When I'm writing poetry I revise, a lot. I'll write something and then take out lines and rearrange them. Poetry is like a puzzle to me. You have to find the right words to fit the emotion and then you've also got to arrange them in the right way. I think words matter more in poetry than they do in other forms of writing. If I am writing an essay or something that takes more work I usually sit down to write with some sort of outline. I start to write and inevitably get stuck, so I pad up to the freezer and get a bowl of ice cream. I stand there and think about what to do. Sometimes I'll go do other things: weed the flower bed, walk the dogs, clean the house, do laundry, talk with Shaun or someone else, etc. Then I'll come back to my piece and finish it. I usually never talk about what I write unless I really need help with it or I want someone to revise it. All of the creative writing that I do, though, I don't show anyone. I always write in private at my desk or in a carol at school. I don't usually like to talk to anyone when I'm writing unless I'm really stuck. If I'm really focused on what I'm writing, the world falls away and it's like the paper or the computer is just an extension of my brain. I'm so centered. I am writing. That's when I'm really successful and prolific, but I need clean and quiet. I need my own space both physically and mentally. When I'm done it's like waking up from a dream. Everything feels a little bit fuzzy and distant. I feel separated from the world, like the writing has drawn a line between me and everything else. I move through the world and everything feels just a little bit different.

What's Happening?

On the page, I can see a boy and man with a top hat riding on top of the bus. I can see people coughing due to the steam coming out of the train. There are other people waiting for a train to come. Many others are walking around on the train platform and around the train station. One man is reading the train schedule. There are cows riding on one of the trains. One man has his hand stuck in the train door, his briefcase dangling in his crushed hand. The train with the cows has a driver and another man standing on the front of the train, who looks like he's supposed to be there. Some of the cows have escaped the pen on the train and are trampling people and causing a fright.

The image on the page is all about the craziness of the morning commute.

In the tiny circle, I can see a man trying to hold back his dog. The dog is pulling hard on the leash in order to reach another man. Obviously, the dog is attempting to bite the man's pant leg. The man being accosted by the dog looks surprised and affronted. Another man stands in between them with his arms up, seemingly talking to the man with the dog. Why he is not trying to help, I don't know. The man who is being attacked by the ferocious dog has also let go of his suitcase in surprise. It is flying through the air towards the train tracks. The dog seems very excited as he appears to be wagging his tail. I can just hear him growling in delight.

I hope my spanish professor never reads this...

Today was rather frustrating. I missed Spanish class this morning for the first time because I have the flu. I spent the morning working on homework and I didn't eat anything so I could still go to my other classes without getting sick at school. Although we're allowed five absences in my Spanish class, I still felt guilty for missing because I have been supplying the computer for the class. Every day as soon as I get off the bus, I go to the Spanish classroom and set up my computer for the professor to use. I offered the second day of class to let her use my computer just to show us how to do the online homework. It turns out she doesn't know how to do the online homework, and so I got roped into explaining to the class how to do it (even though I'd only used the website once). Then she told the class that I was the teacher for the online homework and to come to me with questions. She then proceeded to use my computer for the rest of her lesson which heavily involved a PowerPoint presentation. All was well until I went to get my computer at the end of class and she said to me, "you'll be here tomorrow with that, right?" I kind of laughed and said, sure. I was being nice, which is good, right? Wrong. All of these things should have been a warning sign that she was going to utilize me in whatever way she saw fit.
For the past three weeks I've allowed her to use my computer every day. Yes, she has said thank-you and that is nice but it doesn't stop there. Over the course of the first week of class I spoke with her about her computer situation. She told me that she does have access to a laptop, but that it really belongs to her husband and it's so old and heavy, she hates to carry it around. I understand that, my computer is about 8 lbs. and I haul it to and from Provo on the bus every day. Then, the second week of class I ordered a tablet which is only 3 lbs. Very nice for me, but not so great for my Spanish Professor because the tablet doesn't have the right port to hook into the projector in the Spanish classroom. I was concerned about leaving her in a lurch and so I let her know last week that I would soon be switching computers. Before doing this however, I talked to my Dad, who happens to work in BYU's IT department. I told him the situation: that I was supplying the computer for my class and asked if BYU could possibly lend my Spanish Professor a laptop. He assured me that they could and even found the contact information for the IT guy assigned to her department. I took the information to my professor when I told her about not being able to supply the computer for the class starting sometime in the next couple of weeks. She seemed very excited about the prospect of getting a computer from BYU. I explained to her that it would just be a rental and that she would have to return it when she was no longer teaching. She said that was just fine and I offered to have my Dad contact the IT guy for her department if she felt uncomfortable doing so. She said that would be wonderful and so I dutifully called my Dad and asked him to call Mr. Humanities Department IT guy. So he did. He called and e-mailed. He even talked to the IT guy's student employees. I spent time trying to get her a computer and so did my dad.
Finally, the IT guy responded in an e-mail yesterday and assured us that he could get my Spanish Professor a computer. I told her this in class and she seemed ecstatic. I told her that the IT guy would be contacting her and she said that would be okay. Everything seemed golden to me. That is, until I opened up my e-mail this morning to see a forwarded message from my Dad. Mr. IT guy had done some research and some calling around and he sent an e-mail to my Dad informing him that my Spanish Professor ALREADY HAS A COMPUTER FROM BYU!!! What?! I reread the e-mail again. That's right, her department has already issued her a laptop that she won't use because she has complained that it weighs too much. I couldn't believe it. Here I am hauling my giant, rather heavy laptop on the bus an hour each way every single day of the week so that she has one to use. I come early to set it up every day. I help her in class when she has computer problems. And now I find out that she really has access to two different laptops and has instead been using mine. That is a little frustrating, but I can handle it. What bothers me even more is that she let me waste my time, my Dad's time and Mr. IT guy's time trying to get her a laptop when she already has one. I don't understand why she didn't just tell me that she already had one. I also don't understand what she thought would happen. Did she think she would get issued another laptop? She repeatedly told me that she wanted a small laptop and I told her that I would do my best, but that the department decided what to issue her. She knew all along that she already had a laptop from BYU. She could have asked to trade it in for a different one, but instead she decided to not bother telling me at all. Now I have to go to class tomorrow and I know she'll ask me about it, just like she does every day. What am I supposed to say? No, you can't have another one. I'm stuck in this awkward situation where I have to, in some sense, call her out on the information she withheld. I don't know what to do. I'll just try to be as polite as I can and let her know she won't be getting another computer.
The good news (and sort of bad news at the same time) is that this situation has answered a question I've been puzzling over lately. I generally try to be as nice as I can to people. I offer to help when I can and I always follow through with what I say I'll do. Recently I've found myself in a few different situations, the one above included, where my kindness has landed me in a rut. Which makes me wonder, is there such a thing as being too nice? The old me would have said no, but now I'm not so sure. I guess my rose-colored glasses just fell off.

Superpowers

If I could have any superpower, I would have the superpower that allowed making anyone laugh at any given time. I know, I know, at first this seems like a useless superpower. Who cares if you can make people laugh if you can fly or read minds, but I am telling you the laugh-maker superpower is the best one out there. Just imagine meeting up with an evil villain. No need to break out those karate skills you learned when you were 8, you can just tell a joke. Then while his overwhelming, evil laugh makes him bend over and clutch his stomach, you can save the day.
Another thing you can do with the laugh-maker superpower is to make a lot of money by writing a tv show that's funny or writing a funny book. You could even be the world's greatest stand-up comedian. Everyone will think you're funny and by extension they will think your writing and/or performances are hilarious too. You could write the next Southpark, or The Office and it would run forever because you'll never stop being gut-wrenchingly hilarious.
Can you see now why I would choose the superpower of making anyone laugh whenever I wanted?