because sometimes the universe is just right, and it is your moment in the sun.

so last week my intramural softball team won the championships and i acquired the illustrious byu intramural champion shirt one year after graduating and life was good.

and then this weekend nick and i drove to cedar city and went to the shakespearean festival and then to zion and hiked the narrows and camped on rock hard ground and had each other and red rock and high mountains and no one else and life was good.

and then today i started my 7th grade teaching position for next year and opened boxes of brand new novels like the count of monte cristo, macbeth, farenheit 451, anthem, and tom sawyer and i loved my life as i inhaled my most favorite scent in the world and thought in my head "i get paid to read these, and try to make other people love them like i do. paid a lot of money," and life was good.

and then i drove home so happy after opening all my books and smelling all of their pages, and came home to nick passed out on the couch in basketball shorts and tube socks with a book lying on his chest, and life was good.

and then i opened my email not expecting anything of significance and there was an acceptance letter from northwestern, waiting for me patiently to open it, and i did, and i think my heart exploded, and life was good.

and then nick threw me up in the air and told me he was so proud and we felt good, like we were supposed to move to chicago, like maybe there is big things for us to do there or maybe the universe is pushing us in that direction, and we rushed to the store to get tons of jelly bellys to slink into the movie theatre and went to see 500 days of summer for the second time to celebrate, and life was good.

and now nick is in the shower while i type this, while i sit here smiling, and life is so good. not because of all of those things, not really at all, but because sometimes you feel like you are in a good place and your heart and soul and mind and the universe are all aligned and it feels just right, like the universe was painting an enormous picture and it just got to you and put you in in the exact right spot, just when you thought it maybe wasn't going to put you in the painting at all. and this is not a post like my life is so perfect or great or only awesome things happen to me, because very not awesome things happen to me too. and i hope this blog isnt one of those kinds of blogs, because i dont think it is and i dont those kinds of blogs do anything good for the world. my husband is very not perfect, and i am even more very not perfect, and a lot of times i dont get what i want and i cry and i feel sadness and the bad things. but sometimes, after a lot of the big storms and waiting and unsurety and losing of faith and gaining of faith and jolts of reality in which you remember that details arent important and life is pretty much all details except for the big stuff like love and service and sharing your poprocks, sometimes after all of that crazy weather when you get a little shook up, the sun shines. and it feels even warmer, this moment, because it was so cold before. and you know it may get cold again, it WILL get cold again, but for now that is okay. because life is good, and because sometimes the universe is just right, and it is your moment in the sun.

prayer to trust. for the record, i do not have a cat named "ing."

so these last few weeks for me have been quite a rollercoaster nightmare of emotion. i wont go into graphic detail, i will just leave it at the waiting game in life has become panic and i spent an entire night tossing and turning because i forgot to acquire a tour permit from utah parks and recs before i took the bears to cub scout camp and was terrified they would deny us and they wouldn't get to fulfill their little 8 year old boy dreams of shooting bb guns and it would be all my fault for not reading the fine print on the utah scouts website and they would remember me forever as the leader that ruined their lives. but lets be honest, the tour permit was just the tip of the panic iceberg. life has become a stress machine.

being married has taught me a lot about myself, which is funny because i psychoanalyze like its my job, drawing conclusions such as "i love candy so much because as a child when the kids called me fat at school i came home and ate candy and it didnt call me fat and i loved it for that." i constantly diagnose myself with mental illness. i attribute my love for crying to my affinity for the liquid peace of the womb. i am constantly noticing things about myself and then asking why and how and where did that come from. but there is an entire side of me that i didnt know about, and i am unpacking it piece by piece, learning to understand and come to terms with this new part of shannon that i didnt know, or at least used to be merely a distant acquaintance.

this new shannon has come out in light of recent events, and reared her ugly head. then eaten every piece of food in sight. im not going to tell you the grim details of all the things that have transpired, but i will say this: i am crazy. already knew that. and also, i have learned lots of things, but most profoundly the importance of trust. trust like a child. at school i told the kids i had a cat named "ing" in order to teach them suffixes, and the next day little annelisa brought me cat food. they trust. they dont question. they follow. they take your hand, wide eyed and soft mouthed, and they let you lead them, and they believe every word you say as though it came from the window of heaven. it is beautiful. it is real. it inspires you to tell them important things. it makes you feel worthy.

i realize the trust of childhood must be destroyed. chidlren are taught not to talk to strangers, to never accept candy from random people on the street, to constantly be on the defense. i understand why. i understand we need to protect and live in reality and realize that unless we look out for ourselves, we will get taken advantage of and maybe left in a dark alley with bullet wounds. i 100 percent believe that (not the bullet wounds parts, but the living defensively stuff). i will teach my children to keep an eye out for molesters, to never trust charismatic people, to never date psychos as i once did, to spend halloween at a school sponsored event with individually wrapped candy. i will teach them to trust their gut feelings. i will scare them into avoiding dark alleys.

but i think there is something to be said about trust, a lost art form in this day and age. i think there is something to be said about really truly believing someone would name their cat "ing." i think there is something to santa claus and the tooth fairy and all dogs go to heaven and completely believing your dad really can beat up anyone and knows more than the encyclopedia. santa claus may not exist, but i dont think that matters, not even a little bit. what matters, i think, is believing. trusting. the act itself, not the outcome. there is something extraordinary about trusting that something magical exists, that the universe is in harmony and things work out, even when child molesters and poisonous candy bars exist. there is something about trusting in the future, in trusting that things will be okay and that the good will always outweigh the bad, even when the bad is weighing down your soul. there is something miraculous about trust, because it is ultimately just another version of love. isnt falling in love the ultimate example of trust? hearts are broken everyday around the world, but we keep going back to it, putting our trust in someone new, going against the odds and putting ourself in that vulnerable squishy place again. and then one day, it is worth it, and all the times you trusted when you shouldnt are made up for by the time you trusted when you should.

i have learned this, and i have especially learned the beauty of trusting in people, especially the ones you love. because sometimes you just have to let go, and believe, even when you really dont want to. sometimes you have to take their hand and follow, because if you love them, you will trust. and maybe they are leading you astray or telling you santa clause is watching you and will give you coal if you steal your sister's barbie one more time, but it doesnt really matter. thats not the point, and it never will be.

so heres my pledge to trust more. to believe in those i love, and allow them to lead me. to calm down, and breathe. heres to being a better follower, because heaven knows i love to lead. heres to steps into the darkness, illuminated by nothing other than the hand holding mine. heres to realizing that in the end that hand in mine is my real destination, and that tiny fact in itself is why i trust. anywhere else we end up is all gravy.

prayer to the summer. how i love you.

really i just want to say: hallelujah for the sun, for youth, for barefeet, for shorts, for stunna shades, for driving around in nicks sauna of a 1984 volvo singing to lady gaga, for flowers (have you ever been to pikes market in seattle or whatever its called and looked at their flower selection? it is the most incredible thing i have ever seen, ever), for loose tees, for road trips, for water, for bbqs, for the beach, for all of the secretssurpriseshappinessesjoy that comes with heat and light and being able to go outside barefoot in the morning to get the newspaper (even though nick and i dont have a newspaper subscription). summertime is magical.

ps. summertime has made me realize all of the requirements i have for a dream job: be allowed to wear tshirts and flip flops to work, be allowed to see the sun midday, be allowed to wear a messy, chlorinated bun, be allowed to wear my stunna shades at all times. which leaves me with one option: wild rivers lifeguard.

prayer to waiting. and eating my feelings.

so i feel like people feel similiar to me in a lot of ways--not sure what their path is in life, whether it is the road less traveled or the road more traveled or not even taking a road but just hacking at the trees off the beaten path and creating their own road, and ive been thinking about it a lot. how we all live little lives and have little worries and try to do the right thing and sometimes feel nervous we dont know what that is, or that somewhere there is this lifechanging thing we are supposed to be doing, and somehow we are missing out, accidentally eating little ceasars pizza and watching the outsiders on dvd when in actuality we are supposed to be obamas foreign policy advisor or writing a novel that will change the world. and then you look back on your life and gasp and think if i hadnt made this decision this wouldnt have happened or if my mom hadnt gotten sick and i had taken a year off school to go take care of her i would have never met my together, nicholas floyd cottrell, because i would have been gone from the state of utah, and sometimes you see how all these puzzle pieces fit together to form your perfect puzzle of the eiffel tower, and you get nervous that maybe the pieces wont fit so well together next time or oyure picking up the wrong pieces or youre missing one or something. or maybe only i feel like that.

so nick and i have been trying to make these decisions and things keep cropping up and different surprises show up and then we end up not sure where we are supposed to be or what exactly we should be doing. and though sometimes it makes me cry and sometimes it makes me sad and sometimes it makes me eat a lot of jelly beans, it also has taught me a beautiful concept that i had never really thought about before: waiting. waiting can be a beautiful thing, and i think it is something i am learning slowly. to look before i leap, to ponder before i go for it, to pray before i jump. to be still. to hold on. to wait until an answer comes my way, or to wait until it feels right to make a decision, or maybe just to wait. i am not saying staying in a constant state of indecision is a good thing--limbo makes me crazy. insane, actually. but sometimes it is important to wait.

i think about all of the people that have waited, patiently, quietly, and with hope and faith, or even have been forced to wait against their will--the pioneers in missouri, thinking it was the time of the second coming, the world waiting for Christ to redeem them, those who have a hard time getting pregnant, my mom as she waited for her life to end, the people on the titanic as they waited to live or die, the jewish people in the holocaust that waited in hiding until it was safe for them to come out and be seen, people who wait their whole lives to fall in love, people in world war 1 and 11 and every war there ever has been for the people they love to come home, waiting waiting waiting. sometimes the waiting ended up despair, or heartache, or the waiting never ended, or maybe there are some that are still waiting. i have reverence for these people, for their patience, for their ability to wait, especially for those forced to wait. i admire their dignity, and ability to pause.

in no way am i comparing my situation to any of these waiting situations. i am not being forced to wait. my life is not in danger. i am not waiting for my fiancee or brother to come home from war. but i do have reverence and appreciation for the people who have come before me, and waited. and i hope i can learn from their ability to wait, and be inspired and ready when it is the right time to make a decision, and remember their examples of fortitude and patience. their endless waiting, maybe never fulfilled. i hope i can learn to be still.

until then, i will be consuming vast amounts of jelly beans.

prayer to small inspirations, preferably in a pop-punk format.

when it rains, it pours. maybe ill post every day in june. im just that surprising.

so this morning i went on a run. during this time i tried to think about everything except for "when is this going to be over?" so naturally i spent the duration thinking "when is this going to be over?" i used to be able to run 15 miles no sweat (well, a lot of sweat actually, but you know what i mean), but i spent the winter teaching school and eating little ceasars pizza with my husband, which is really unfortunate now that i have gallons of free time in which i prefer to be hiking, swimming, running, endangering my life in exhilarating ways, and doing anything in the beauty that is utah in the summer. so i was going to run 3 miles, the first 1.2 miles of which i blamed my discomfort and shrinking will to go on on my ipod music (too slow, too boring, not getting me pumped enough), and then on my outfit choice (these shorts give me wedgies, my winterwhite midriff is being exposed every time i take a step), until realizing that the real issue was my entirely out of shape body. which made me laugh, because isnt that just like life? when you are unhappy with yourself, you tend to blame it on others, or if you are as entirely human and flawed as i am, you tend to see what you hate about yourself in others. when i had that realization, that it was not that beyonces your loves got me looking so crazy right now or ace of bases i saw the sun that had lost their energy, but me, i felt slightly ashamed that i had been so hard on these poor inatimate objects. and then i felt bad for all of the times i have taken out my frustration or anger or sadness on someone else. because, ive said it before, but ill say it again, i really believe that the only thing you can control in life is yourself, and the sooner you figure that out and stop trying to help perfect and change and criticize those around you, the happier life becomes. which means, it is not ace of bases fault i am a slow and sucky runner, or even little ceasars pizza. it is my own.

anyway, when i am running is usually when i have my greatest breakthrough moments or thoughts or ideas or whatever. that is usually when i am in shape though and not counting second by second until my run will end. so i reached mile 1.2, and decided i would turn around. i cant do this anymore, my legs are burning, my lungs are collapsing, i have become those people we used to see at mcdonalds that would order 2 large fries and my dad would shake his head in disgust and say "this is what has become of america." and then, a miraculous thing happened. the last thing i would expect to help me forge ahead came along and got my legs pumping: "mr brightside," by the killers came on my ipod shuffler, and all of a sudden i was hauling. the killers helped me keep going. the killers.

the killers is a band that stars on nick and is regular sarcastic banter, as in, we dont listen to them and often make fun of them in mean spirited ways. but there was mr brightside, and all of a sudden i was running, arms flailing, singing at the top of my lungs inappropriate lyrics that i will not post on this blog, wind in my hair, and i believed in myself again. it would take work, dedication, and admitting that i was out of shape, but i could do it! i could be the physically fit person i once was! and mr brightside is what made me believe.

i think there are a couple of lessons to be learned from this: a.) you never know who might come along and help you along when you really need some help b.) dont judge, because those things you judged may end up being your inspiration, c.) you can do it, and maybe listening to the killers mr brightside will motivate you, as it did me.

maybe you dont want to be able to run 15 miles. maybe you want to be able to sew a dress or sing like mariah carey or make really really good omelets. maybe you want to star in a movie. i dont know what it is, but give it your best shot. the killers believe in you, and so do i.

p.s. the best part of my run was when i passed by a middle aged group of jolly, pot-bellied men fitness walking together, weights in hand, discussing their favorite types of sees candies. life is good, people, its very good.

and just to lighten this tension filled mood,

the husbands g-chat response to my boring post:
3:26
good post, looks like you and i are in the same boat

just so you know, this is a boring post. but its my blog, and i want to be boring right now.

this post is just going to be a mish mash of whatever has been on my mind lately, because i don't feel coherent enough at the current time to figure out what the theme is or how it all matches or how to make some sort of sense of everything, which is i think is okay, and im trying to be okay with that. but i do want to write, because i havent in weeks and weeks and weeks, and because sometimes writing it all out helps me make sense of the puzzle in a way that i cant seem to do in the hollows of my own mind. but be forewarned, this is all enormously boring.

the purpose of this blog is not a personal diary or play by play of my lifes events, but instead small prayers to those beautiful things that make my heart keep beating (as ee writes, those times when the "singing reaches of my soul spoke the green"). for me it is those small moments of clarity, those prayers to a greater force, those "poppies in october" (slyvia plath) which are "a gift, a love gift, Utterly unasked for By a sky," and it is these moments or poems or flowers or blue sky or handholds or perfectly written sentences or perfect mountains, moments of ultimate beauty, that make my insides cry out "O my God, what am I, That these late mouths should cry open In a forest of frost, in a dawn of cornflowers." To translate into mormonspeak, these moments are tender mercies in the middle of the forest of frost, miliseconds when my spirit seems in perfect harmony with the world's spirit. As Goethe once so eloquently wrote in his masterpiece Faust, "Art is long, time short."

the reason i write about these lovegifts is because they keep me sane, and they keep me believing that the world is more beautiful than ugly, and because i think in the hustle and bustle of real life duties we tend to ignore these small moments in which the heavens are opened and the Universe makes himself known, . that being said, i can tend to be the opposite of normal--the partaker of love gifts and the shunner of real life, which is a doomed way to live when life is composed of an endless cycle of everydays, and love gifts may feed the soul but they cannot feed the mouth.

i guess the concept of everydays and practicality has been on my mind because nick and i are at a crossroads of sorts, trying to figure out which path is ours for the taking. ive been thinking a lot about robert frost's poem the road not taken, especially in light of its generally accepted misinterpretation. I will post the poem here for your reading pleasure:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

The general public has pegged this poem a beacon of inspiration, a tribute to taking the road less traveled. in actuality, the tone of the poem is probably ironic, a jab at the tendency of humankind to rationalize their decisions and in all likelihood is probably hinting that taking one or the other will not end up making an enormous difference. but we still worry and worry about which path is right, and then once our minds are made up, we think of all of the reasons we are right. i dont know why this poem has been a scrolling marquee in my bogged down brain, but it has been. maybe because i wonder if in the end the road less traveled is over-rated, or what my personal path should be. we're in the middle of some serious decision making--staying in utah is the practical choice, we would be turning down a big chunk of change not to, but i dont want to be in utah, and dont plan on being here for any extended period of time. but sometimes i feel idiotic in the middle of a recession to turn down promotions for the sake of following my heart, when i know following your heart is not always the most correct principle. ive always been one to chase the adventure--i want to live in kenya, or uruguay, or anywhere not in the country. i want to do crazy things. i want to see everything. i know the greater purpose of life is to serve others, to serve God, and to become internally the person you are meant to become, but what is the purpose of life on a day to day scale? i think it is probably different for everyone, and unique for everyone. but its hard when you hear that you should be buying a house and thinking about the future when really you just want to be living in a big city and giving homeless people lollipops.

i could wax philosphical all day long. i could even throw in a dozen or so philosophers to help me figure out this conundrum. in the end, i think which path you choose does matter. i strongly believe there is a divine plan for me, and i was born thinking im going to do amazing, world-changing things (my mom said i was born with confidence you've never seen). i think everyone has this capability and amazing, world-changing things to offer, if they choose to follow the right path. my dad says most choose the path of least resistance, which i try to avoid so carefully sometimes i arbitrarily choose the path of most resistance. maybe there are a series of right paths. who knows. all i know is, i dont want to be in utah, and im deathly afraid of settling or not getting advanced degrees or not choosing something, but just ending up with it because i happened upon it, which makes sleeping at night rather difficult.

this is a boring, rambling, ridiculous post. but i told nick last night that in most general, daily conversation i never really say what im thinking about or what i wish to be saying, because i know the other person isnt interested in a discussion of aristotle or a debate on gun control, and sometimes i just want to say what i say.

OKAY? SO THIS IS ME SAYING WHAT I WANT TO SAY. GET OVER IT.

if anyone has guidance on the topic, or can help me figure out the right plan for my life, let me know ASAP. i also want you all to know that this is a more specific, daily worry, but that overall i am confident God or the Universe or whichever higher power you believe in, will lead me the direction I need to go to accomplish those big, world-changing things. and i keep reminding myself of that.

okay everyone, the boringness is over. please excuse when the enormous, overanalytical, nose-in-a-book nerd inside of me pushes her way past the skinny jeans.