The Infinite Value of Squirrels, Tacos, and Other Such Things

This semester I have learned much about writing in two main areas. One area, is in the method of writing and the timing of it. I learned that, in order to actually enjoy writing, you need to pace yourself. Take it one draft at a time. Let the ideas flow and don’t stress out about what the final product will be like, just churn out a draft and start revising. It’s like sculpting. You start with a fresh lump of clay, your idea, your first draft. You then hack away large chunks, hacking away the clearly unnecessary parts. After that, there’s a little more fine tuning, taking care to remove the large pieces you don’t need, but not those precious pieces that you need to keep. Finally, there’s the fine-tuning, the minuscule details at the very end. You can’t start with those details, they must come after the hacking and narrowing. When done in that manner, writing can be a great joy and even, dare I say, a therapeutic process.

The second area I learned about was the wonderful world of rhetoric! I loved learning how to structure an argument and how to portray ideas in powerful ways. I had a great time writing the rhetorical analysis and the issues paper. It was exciting to gather the information and present it in a convincing way. I learned that the most exciting part of writing a paper like that for me is all that I learn! I learned a lot as I read through the research! I also learned to recognize the rhetoric of others and identify pitfalls in the logic and arguments presented. I see it everywhere now, especially in advertising. It’s a powerful thing to be able to recognize those things and separate the truth from the fluff.

This has been a wonderful semester for English. I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed an English class quite this much. Thank you Professor Elliott for your help and for your love for us!

How's That Paper Coming?

My paper is going a little slow. It’s been difficult for me to construct a thesis and to determine the exact approach that I’m looking for. With my topic (should pornography be allowed in a public library) there’s the danger of crossing over into the debate of censorship. That debate is wide-stretched with deep feelings on either side, but more especially on the side against it. My paper doesn’t deal with censorship however, it deals with protection of minors in a public setting from material that can damage them. Thus, choosing a direction to attack the issue can be delicate.

An Analysis of My Feelings Towards My Analysis

I really enjoyed writing the rhetorical analysis paper. I never really read many of Obama’s speeches because I went on my mission before elections and so didn’t really pay much attention. I did listen to a few. I found the speech quite engaging! My favorite part was writing the paper with as much fun language as possible. I figured if Obama could use fancy words, so could I in the analysis.

Reflections on a Personal Narrative

I enjoyed writing the personal narrative. As with any time I’m given an open topic paper, the hardest part was figuring out what I would write about. I had many options, but some I felt were too personal, some I felt I could hardly remember enough to write about. I finally thought about one experience that I had as a child that I thought was quite funny. I decided I would start with that.

For the first time I sat down and just started writing. I’d never done that before. I had always been the more laborious, painstaking writer who edits each bit as he writes. This new way of doing things turned out wonderful! I was able to write four and a half pages in no time! All I needed to do then was go through, link ideas, edit some errors and I was good to go. First draft in less than an hour. That was unheard of in my history as a writer and it made the process so much easier.

The peer reviews were great! I loved having people read my narrative and being able to read and comment on theirs. I found the advice given extremely helpful in most cases. I enjoyed being able to see what other people had written about and how they had approached the same assignment.

I loved that the assignment allowed me to be casual and really use whatever voice I wanted. I didn’t have to be formal or persuasive. I didn’t have to feel forced or feel like my words were contrived. I enjoyed remembering times past and being able to share those memories with my peers. It was a great assignment and a great start to the semester.

I’m excited now for the rest of the papers that we will write. I feel like I’ve learned writing techniques that will help the next assignments be less laborious and more enjoyable. I’m excited to learn about rhetoric and to improve my writing abilities again and again.

Personal Narrative: Small Children At Large

When I was around eight years old, the thought of a burglary stole away my young sense of security.  I’m not sure what started the idea in my head, but the thought of someone taking all I owned, and myself as well, consumed me. I needed a plan to neutralize the threat.

My family lived in Pennsylvania at the time, and there were five of us: Mom, Dad, Matthew (the eldest), myself, and Joseph (our little brother). Matt and I shared a room on the top floor of the house. The top floor may seem a safe haven to the untrained mind, but the front door opened to reveal a staircase leading directly up to our room. Matt and I knew the burglar’s first move would be to go upstairs. We were targets.

Our first line of defense came as an epiphany to both of us. Burglars had a tough job. They needed a lot to drink to keep them going. Therefore, if we were to create a drink for them that would kill them, we would have the upper hand in any confrontation. We began mixing appalling  concoctions. Hot sauce, spit, vinegar, mud, snips, snails, puppy dog tails, and whatever else we  could find all combined together to create a noxious sludge that would surely fool any unsuspecting burglar. Our mother steered us away from chemicals usually, and we knew that sugar, spice and anything nice was out of the question unless calculated to mask the potency of the drink.

These brews were then taken to our room and placed in obvious locations. Any burglar who entered the room to steal us away or prematurely end our innocent lives would see the drinks, be overcome by his thirst, and indulge to his death. It was fool proof, or so we thought.

One night, Matt and I were up late talking together. I suddenly had the thought, “What if a burglar were to realize what the drinks were and get past them? What if they somehow resisted the urge?” Unlikely, yes. Impossible, no. We needed a better defense, and there was no time to waste. The brainstorming commenced. To escape an attack, we first needed to be aware of an attack. A burglar would attack while we were asleep. Not an ideal state of awareness. To alert ourselves to danger, we decided to create our own burglar alarm. Collecting every noisemaking item in our room, we constructed a mound of clutter against the door that would topple at the slightest provocation.

Once the door was rigged, we realized that our device was ingenious yet insufficient. A burglar would be grown-up. He would be able to move as fast as mom or dad would. The thought was unsettling. There wasn’t enough time for us to wake up and get out before he could get to us. There needed to be yet another layer of defense. We needed something that would wake us up before the burglar reached the door. If he were to slip outside the door, that would definitely be loud enough! But how to make him slip? Matt had the perfect answer. We gathered together some smooth, hard-backed books and carefully opened the door without setting off our precarious pile.

By placing the books all over the floor in front of our door we created quite a slippery surface, but it wasn’t enough. There needed to be something else...soap! That was my idea. Soap makes everything slippery! We darted downstairs without waking the parents and grabbed the dish soap from the kitchen sink. Squirting the soap all over the top of those books created a slippery surface that was formidable for even the most agile of burglars.

We felt certain that our door was secure. We would now last through the night for sure. But what about Joey? Our little brother’s room was across the hall from ours at the top of the stairs. If the burglar were to somehow notice our carefully prepared traps, couldn’t he simply sneak into Joey’s room and steal him away? That was unacceptable! We put our heads together again and realized that if the burglar never made it up the stairs in the first place, there was no way he’d get to either of our doors.

Our next idea was ingenious. A simple marble placed in the center of each stair. Easy, inconspicuous, and quite effective in the movies. We felt sure that any burglar who came in the home and began to ascend the stairs would fall prey to at least one of the many marbles, and that’s all it would take. Not only would he have quite the bruise forming, but we would be awake and ready to escape before he could even get up.

Feeling certain that we had foiled any future attempt to burglarize our home, we again retired to our room. Matt and I carefully rearranged the noise pile behind the door, and we were off to sleep.

CRASH! Our last line of defense was shattered before we knew what happened! It was over! Our two lives, so short and incomplete, were about to end! The covers were pulled over our heads as terror shot through our bodies! How could the burglar have breached so many of our carefully laid fortifications? He made it to the door without a single mishap! For all we knew, Joey could be dead and gone by now and we were simply the next event!

“Matt? Tanner? What on earth is going on!?” It was Mom and Dad. The only thing worse than burglars that late at night.

We were dragged out of bed to explain the whole situation. What is this pile of junk in front of the door? To make noise in case the burglars got to the door, Dad. What were the books doing on the floor? To make the burglar slip. Why on earth is there dish soap on these books? To make them slipperier, Mom. Why the marbles on the stairs? So that he couldn’t get up here to get to Joey, Dad. Where did you get all this from? We thought of it together. Don’t you know that these books are probably ruined? Oh, we hadn’t thought of that. Do you realize how dangerous this is? But the burglars would have come, Dad! What if your brother had to go down the stairs to the bathroom? I guess that would be pretty dangerous...

Mom and dad talked to us for a while that night. They explained that the Lord was there to take care of us. They did what they could each night to keep us safe by locking the doors and leaving some lights on. We didn’t need to worry about burglars because we would be protected by the house, by mom and dad, and, most importantly, by God. I hadn’t considered any of that throughout the night. My fear of a burglary had simply taken me from one idea to another. Their testimony that night of the Lord’s power to protect eliminated my fears.

Cleanup lasted a while. We had to wipe the dish soap off the books, clean up the marbles and clean up our room. But needless to say, there were no burglaries at the Christensen home that night.

What My Heart Desires To Write About Today

“First gradually, then suddenly.” That was an interesting concept that was brought up in class from out readings and it reminded me of something I learned just before I left on my mission. Life is all about the concept of things going gradually, then suddenly. We gradually learn things until suddenly we graduate. We gradually prepare until suddenly the day of the test comes. We gradually make plans until suddenly we are at the temple to be married. At each stage of our lives there are sudden events that we are given time to gradually prepare for.

The way I began to think about it was like a series of locks in a canal. A boat is at sea level on one side of the canal as it enters the first lock. The water level in the boats current lock is then increased until it matches the water level of the next lock in the series. Once the water levels match, the next set of doors are opened and the boat then proceeds. The doors are then closed again and the water level raised in the second chamber until it matches the level of the third chamber. The doors open, the boat proceeds, until finally it is at the correct level to continue its way on the other side of the canal.

In life, there are some doors that we open in our own time, there are others that open at specific, set times. When we turn eight we have the opportunity to be baptized. The time for our preparatory water to rise is over and the doors are opened. If we are not prepared, then so it is. When I turned nineteen, the time for my preparations to serve a mission were over and suddenly the time for the doors to open had come. I was either ready, or I wasn’t. Fortunately, I had spent a good teal of time preparing, gradually raising my water level through prayer and scripture study, so that I was not taken by surprise when suddenly the doors were opened. After returning from my mission, I had the opportunity to prepare for the next step, marriage. This door was one that I could open somewhat at my own pace. I was able to choose the day when suddenly I would be sealed to my wife, and thus, give myself a set amount of time to prepare.

Throughout life our doors open at different times. We can be ready for those moments by constantly raising the water level of our preparation, or we can allow each transition to overcome us as a wall of water crashing across the hull of an unprepared boat.

Leaving Home

The only question I would have when speaking about leaving home would be, which time? I’ve left home so many times. Each summer for things like Especially For Youth, or Scout Camp, or later in life for college, or for my mission. Each time I was half a world away from my home and my family. I suppose, however, that the most difficult of these would be when I left for college.

We lived in Maryland for my senior year of high school. I enjoyed the school, was on the wrestling team, and was accepted to Brigham Young University. I was excited to go! My parents and I decided that the easiest way to get to college would be to drive there in the family minivan. As in me drive there in the family minivan. Alone. It would be the first road trip I’d ever been on where I was the driver, since I had only obtained my first license earlier in the school year.

I had a good friend named Stephanie Miller and she needed to go to BYU as well. Our parents talked about things and decided it would be great for us to drive across together. So my dad taught me how to change a tire, we packed up everything and get ready to go. My family had just been given the assignment to go to Hong Kong for my dad’s work, so they left to the airport a few days before I was to leave for Utah. I was then alone.

I was largely unaffected. I was excited to be taking the road trip. I loved to drive and I was ecstatic that the minivan would be mine for my freshman year of college. It was great to know that I would have a car!

On Sunday I went to church in our family ward. That was when it really started to sink in. I had never really been in church without my family before. That had been a constant throughout my life; when you’re at church, your family is too. I sat there thinking of how much I loved my family. Tears came to my eyes as the congregation sang, of all hymns, “Families Can Be Together Forever” as the closing hymn. I realized that I missed my family very much, but I was happy to be on my own. I felt the Lord letting me know that everything would be okay, that I was doing the right thing. I left the next day for college, had a great road trip, and everything was wonderful.