Ring out the Old, Ring in the New

This year was the first time I really learned that January was named for the mythical god Janus, a deity with two faces. Well, I knew it was named for Janus, but I didn't know who Janus was. But this nonexistent being is appropriate for the New Year, since there are two parts of the holiday--looking back at the dying year (which has already died, or else retired to the Archipelago of Last Years), and looking ahead at the coming year, still in its infancy. I am going to do both.

Here is what happened in 2011.

January. I started my second year at BYU, with my roommates Derek (who had been my penultimate companion, Elder Warren), Zach, and Tristram. I took fourteen credits for winter semester (the minimum amount for my scholarship). I took astronomy, grammar, modern American usage of English, internet publishing, and piano. I got a campus job cleaning up after sporting events; January was men's volleyball and women's gymnastics.

February. I don't think February was all too eventful. It was more gymnastics and volleyball and more studying and more piano playing.

March. My dad at this point was having to work in Chicago, coming home every other weekend. On one particular weekend they came down on a day when I had to clean tennis courts. Toward the end of the month I drove home after midnight while munching on Easter candy to go to my sister's anniversary breakfast. This was the era of Rebecca Black's "Friday" and Lady Gaga's "Born This Way."

April. I finished winter classes. I was so glad to be rid of my internet publishing class--the class was OK, but the instructor was abysmal. On one day my work was putting oil on football lockers (several of us accidentally locked bottles of oil in the drawers). Following finals I flew to California to meet my family and we went to Disneyland, and then we drove back home just before Easter. At the end of the month I got two new roommates, Chase and Nate (I barely saw Nate, and Zach was still around), and started spring classes. I took the history of English and Masterpieces of American literature.

May. I started this blog! My work was mainly sweeping up sunflower seeds after baseball and softball games, and then it ended. I had some bizarre dreams. I got kicked out of the BYU Bookstore for reading on the text level (well, I didn't really get kicked out; they just told me I couldn't be there). My dad was laid off.

June. I finished a book about James Murray, the man responsible for the Oxford English Dictionary, and did a report about Edgar Allan Poe. Spring classes finished and that weekend I went to the zoo with my cousin Jesse and an old friend Lori. Then summer classes started; I took world civilization to 1500 and archaeology--these classes dovetailed quite nicely. All my roommates moved out so I had an apartment all to myself. But at the tail end of the month the air conditioning went out.

July. I ran my first 5k, on the Fourth of July. That was awesome, and in fact that was my best Fourth of July ever. On the night of the Fourth of July the apartment below me invited me to sleep in their apartment since they had an extra bed and I had no AC. In fact, I went the entire month of July with no AC and I believe only one night in July did I sleep in my apartment. When I was home I would eat quesadillas (since they generated minimum heat on my quesadilla maker) and watch daytime television, like judge shows and news. But I tried to spend a lot of time away from the apartment. I did a lot of Google doc test reviews on campus while listening to Lady Gaga Radio on Pandora.

August. What a month! My AC finally got fixed a few days before I moved out. Summer classes ended, and I moved out, not knowing if I'd be back for fall, since that depended on my dad getting a job. I ended up getting my old Church Distribution job back and started there. I was only part time, but we had to get the new Relief Society books, Daughters in My Kingdom, out before September, so I worked a lot.

September. This was the era of listening to Christina Perri and anxiously awaiting days when we didn't need to have the AC on. On Labor Day we had the missionaries over. I told them they could call me, but they never did. I started the Halloween season, and turned 23.

October. October was General Conference, Allie's primary program, and stake conference. My parents and I went to Price and Nine Mile Canyon one Saturday in celebration of my dad finally getting a job--a very good job with good pay. I ran a very muddy 5k that ended up being more than a 5k since the volunteers didn't tell us to turn around. My shoes still have traces of the mud on them. It was a costumed 5k so I wore my 5k outfit when I went with Allie trick-or-treating.

November. Work started getting really busy and we started working Saturdays. I loved having Candy Corn Dots in anticipation of Thanksgiving. We went to a World Market store and bought some pumpkin bark and turkey dishes. I didn't have to work Thanksgiving, but I had to work a lot still.

December. I once worked a 14-hour day. I was a little disappointed that I wasn't able to get my Christmas decorations up sooner. All I did was work until we finished our queue of annual curriculum orders--then it got milder. I got a four-day weekend at Christmas. And this week I had my last day at work and my adorable nephews came. Nathaniel, "Baby," is cuter than I expected.

What will happen in 2012?

That's hard to say. I start school again this week. I'm taking geology, piano, Doctrine and Covenants, English semantics and pragmatics, and editing skills.

The world will end in February, according to the false prophet I met in East Wenatchee, WA, and in December, according to those silly people who put stock in the Mayan calendar.

I have a few goals:

By the end of the year, I want to be able to run one hour straight. I want to go to the temple once a month. And I suppose I should go on a date once a month. (That's not much, I know, but since I don't date at all, it's better than nothing--if it happens at all.) My goal last year was to start a conversation once a day. I did reasonably well at the beginning of the year, and by reasonably well I mean better than if I didn't have that goal at all. I should start that up again. And I should restart doing 300 pushups and 500 situps a week, but hopefully I can eventually do better than that.