Second-best weekend of the year

Of all the weekends in the year, I think Memorial Day is my second favorite. (Thanksgiving weekend is my first.)

And I feel like this is my first real Memorial Day weekend since 2017. I always worked Memorial Day at This Is the Place, and of course in 2020 it was always the weekend.

It is the best time of the year for the trails, which are all green and wildflowery. I was on the trails four days this week, which was less than I would have liked at this perfect time of year, but it's better than nothing.

Palmer's penstemon, which are pleasantly fragrant

Tufted evening primrose

Utah sweetpea

mulesear and longleaf phlox

First sego lilies of the season!

Tufted evening primrose

Silvery lupine, photobombed by mulesears

Western waterleaf

And more mulesears, the king of May and June

This week I donated $150 to Everytown for Gun Safety. I don't usually do my alms to be seen before men, but we need to normalize supporting gun safety measures.

Thursday evening, I helped clean the Bountiful Temple. There are paid cleaners, but they have us volunteers help with vacuuming, wiping, etc. The Church could pay for more cleaners (if they could find the labor), but I think this way helps it be more personal. The early Saints had to help build the temples with their own time and money, which was a big sacrifice but made the temples belong to them. I think it's good we no longer have to pay for the temples ourselves, but cleaning them is one way they can belong to us.

As I drove home after midnight, it was officially the Friday before Memorial Day, which is my arbitrary day for beginning the Fourth of July season, which also incorporates Memorial Day, Flag Day, and now Juneteenth. So I started listening to my Fourth of July music on the way home. Yesterday I got all the red, white, and blue decorations up. And, of course, it is now the season for Independence Day foods. Of all the holidays, Fourth of July has a substantial amount of relevant foods, but very few, if any, that are unequivocally, exclusively July 4 foods. For example, the question that has been pressing on my mind the last few weeks is "Are s'mores a Fourth of July food?" I have spent more time thinking about it than any rational person should, and I haven't come to an official conclusion yet.

And my dad's birthday is around (and sometimes on) Memorial Day, so I always make sure his birthday cake has red, white, and blue sprinkles.

Part of me feels guilty for having fun on Memorial Day, because it was originally meant to be a somber, reflective holiday. 

May flowers

 It wasn't that eventful of a week. And honestly, that is entirely welcome—it means I now get a reprieve from all the school stuff I used to do!

I went to the dentist this week. I was supposed to go the morning of my portfolio defense, but the hygienist was stuck in bad traffic on I-15. This was the first time in my entire life that I have ever had a male dental hygienist, as far as I can remember. I have never had a female dentist.

Right now is the very best time for trails, save for late September and early October, so I went out on them five days this week. One night I went (hiking, not running) on Wild Rose with the elders quorum, and I was able to show how much I knew the wildflowers. Then today in elders quorum, someone who wasn't even there announced that he heard that I knew the wildflowers without using an app! Now I hope that people don't think I have exceptional knowledge about plants, because I'm just a novice beginner. 

Glacier lilies

Dyer's woad. I feel guilty when I think noxious weeds are pretty!

The first mulesear of the season. When mulesears are in full bloom, they are the most stunning sight in the entire calendar!

Western waterleaf

Arrowleaf balsamroot, which is second only to its lookalike mulesears

longleaf phlox

Yesterday I returned to the new portion of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail that I went on the day after  Thanksgiving. In six months, they haven't expanded it, though it looks like they've smoothed some of the existing portions. I was surprised at how many people were on this dead-end trail. But it's pretty flat, which makes it kind of boring. I went just over seven miles.

This is where the trail ends. But there are some cut trees beyond the end of the trail, so I suspect that it will continue to North Canyon.

I also had some oddly specific dreams. In one I was singing solos and duets in church, and I even sang a solo of "The Star Spangled Banner." Everyone cheered when I held the last note on "land of the free," even though I didn't go up like many singers do, and I was pleased with myself that I sang so well without voice training. In another dream, I was at a Thanksgiving dinner that also had Mike Lindell, the My Pillow Guy, and I called him out for supporting an insurrection, and he laid into me.

May is just a wonderful month.

Defense

On Monday afternoon, I headed to the University of Utah to fulfill my final official act as a grad student: defend my portfolio.

The University of Utah doesn't require a thesis for MS students (which was me) or for US History MA students (I was also US History). As one professor explained it, students were taking too long to graduate because they were finishing their thesis, and since the thesis took too long, they lacked writing samples as they applied to PhD programs. 

Instead, we have to submit a portfolio, which consists of two annotated syllabi, an annotated bibliography, and at least one research paper. So for me, my portfolio included:

• A syllabus of American history since Reconstruction, as though I were teaching a college class. Basically everyone has to make a syllabus on American history through the Civil War or after the Civil War. I'm more familiar with after the Civil War, so that's what I picked.
• A syllabus about This Is the Place Heritage Park. The second syllabus allowed more flexibility, especially since I don't plan to go into teaching, so my syllabus was meant for employees of This Is the Place but was structured like a college class. It had different topics connected to all the village's sites, with lots of relevant books and articles.
• An annotated bibliography, which is basically a description of all the books I read during grad school.
• A research paper from my first semester, which was about This Is the Place Monument and how it omitted important historical people of color, specifically Green Flake and Wakara, and the ways those people were remembered in the past.
• A research paper from last semester. I compared a thinly veiled anti-Mormon speech by Utah's governor, Eli Murray, on the Fourth of July with a speech that Emmeline Wells wrote for the Twenty-Fourth about the contributions of Mormon women—but she did not read her own speech, because it was somewhat taboo in those days for women to speak to mixed audiences.

So at 1:00, I showed up at the room in the Carolyn Tanner Irish Humanities Building for my defense. I walked in the room and the three members of my committee were sitting at a table, facing another table where I sat. I had had two classes from one professor, one class from another, and no classes from the third.

They complimented me on elements of my portfolio, such as the length of my bibliography. They asked me some questions that were easy to answer. I was able to explain to them my academic interest in Pioneer Day and other holidays (I had three books about Thanksgiving in my bibliography), and I told them how history was my worst subject in high school and college. But they also asked some questions for which I did not have a good answer. For example, in my US history syllabus, I devoted a lot of time to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, discussing labor unions, suffrage, preservation and conservation, immigration, and Native Americans. They asked me why I devoted so much time to one time. And honestly, I didn't really know why I felt a need to do that. I hadn't even considered that I had done so. For my discussion about monuments, they asked what was going on elsewhere in the nation. A lot of the questions were about the bigger context. And I simply didn't know what to say. I remember thinking, "Oof, this is not going well at all." One of the professors (the one I never had a class from) seemed to function as Simon Cowell on my committee—I felt as though she was deliberately asking me difficult questions. And the committee wasn't satisfied when I honestly told them "I don't know."

They sent me into the lobby while they deliberated. I was sitting there for about twenty minutes, which gave me plenty of time to think about my social awkwardness and my less-than-satisfactory answers. I thought it was unlikely that they would withhold my degree just because my defense wasn't going well, especially since I had devoted so much time to the portfolio (not to mention all my classes). But I did wonder why it was taking so long. I began to wonder what would happen if I didn't pass? Would I have to take classes again in the fall? I did have to remind myself that it is easier to point out the shortcomings of a book than it is to praise its strengths. (Two years of grad school, and ten years of editing, taught me that.) So while they had lots of questions where I could have done better, that didn't mean the whole thing was bad.

They invited me back in and told me that I passed. Phew! They told me my Pioneer Day project sounds interesting, and they encouraged me to look for bigger context. Noted. And the difficult professor even invited me to follow her to her office so she could give me a book about holidays—it was written by her friend (and even was personally autographed), but she was trying to get rid of books. And this book was already on my Amazon wish list. So that was very generous!

So after my defense, I went to the university store to buy a University of Utah t-shirt (I thought I should have one now that I had a degree from there). And I've kind of been in a low-key celebration mode since then, being pretty relaxed about eating treats and other things. 

It's so nice to be done. I feel a level of freedom I haven't felt in a while, since I no longer have assignments to worry about. And I have a satisfying feeling of closure about my schooling experience.

Pomp and circumstance, again 🎓

Eight years after graduating from BYU, I am now also an alumnus from the University of Utah.

On Thursday, I left work a little early to take the bus up to the U for my commencement ceremony. I donned my master's robe (which had weird sleeves), my hood, and my cap. I lined up in the spot for humanities master's students. I was surprised that my fellow history grad students didn't show up for commencement; only one other was there. I mean, I kind of understand that it's expensive to buy a robe you only wear once and sit in a meeting. (BYU just had us rent our gowns, so I don't know why the U didn't do that as well.) But for me, it was nice to have an official ceremony to end my schooling career.

We all went into the Huntsman Center to hear speeches and awards. The keynote speaker was Doug Bowser, the president of Nintendo. Yes, that is his real name. Yes, the joke writes itself. He likened life to a video game, with barrels and bananas that come at us, but we can do things to level up. (I'm not a gamer, but Mario is like the only video game that interests me, since it aligns with my preferred family-friendly, happy aesthetic.)

Then on Friday, my mom took pictures of me in my grad garb before we headed to the humanities convocation ceremony. 

I made this my Facebook profile picture, but I guess the algorithm no longer puts this in people's feed.

Doug Bowser spoke again. They read off our names as we went to pick up our diploma covers, and I made a mistake as I headed back to my seat and went on the wrong side. I felt dumb about that. But then I remembered that at work this week, one of the senior missionaries accidentally pocket dialed a nonsense message, "Mm211m2m2222m1," in a reply-all email—to the entire department, including general authority seventies, managing director, department managers, etc. So me going the wrong way was just a little thing compared to that embarrassing email gaffe.

My experience with the University of Utah really is vastly different from BYU. Of course, the universities themselves are very different, and I'm glad I got to experience both. At BYU, I got to hear different perspectives from people with the same worldview. At the U, I got to hear different perspectives from people with different worldviews. I think there is value in both experiences. 

But at BYU, I lived just off campus and got a true college experience, living in Provo for more than four years. But at the U, I lived at home with my parents, and I wasn't immersed in the lives of college students.

But also, you know, there was COVID. So my entire first year was remote, just going on Zoom in my chair. My first semester consisted of long runs in the morning, then attending virtual classes and spending most of my free time reading and writing papers. My second semester, I also had a remote freelance job. In fall 2021, I got to go on campus. I commuted to school four days a week on the bus, and I enjoyed taking the bus. And then for this last semester, I just worked on my internship, without actually going to campus.

Part of me is sad that I only had one "real" semester. But it was out of my control, which makes me less sad. I never used my UCard to get free admission to the university museums, but COVID and everything else made that complicated. So it's reasonable that I didn't have a normal experience.

Before I started, I was worried that it would be really hard. A friend told me that grad school was easier than undergrad because they just want you to work on your thesis. I remember thinking that she couldn't really know what my experience would be like, since she had a different major and a different school. And for me, grad school was at least as hard as undergrad. I usually had to read two or three books and six articles a week, and I had to write lots of papers. In many ways, it felt like a very expensive book club. (Speaking of expensive, here's a shoutout to my parents who let me live with them at a low price so I could graduate debt free!)

As for a thesis, my program didn't require a thesis. It requires a portfolio, which took a lot of my free time this January, February, and March. And I still have to defend it tomorrow morning since one of the professors on my committee was in Italy. So I'm not entirely finished until tomorrow.

And to celebrate my (almost) completion, last night I decided to attend a Mat Kearney concert. I have superficially followed him the last few years, and last August I bought his last album, January Flower, because I still buy music. A coworker from This Is the Place saw him last summer and recommended that I see him when he came around again. So I took my sister to the Union Event Center, and it was a great show! He is one of those singers who is just as good live as he is on recording, except the acoustics weren't the best. It could have been worse but it could have been better. I find I get bored with a lot of these male singer-songwriters, but Mat Kearney is one of the better ones. I love his latest album, and I was a little disappointed he didn't sing every song from it.

Though I have some wistful feelings about graduation, I am glad I will no longer have readings and papers looming over me all the time. Now I'm starting on a new phase of my life!

The last eleven years

Exactly eleven years ago today, which was also a Sunday, I began this blog. And in those eleven years, I have not missed a single Sunday or a single May 1! (You might look at the dates of my posts and see some discrepancies. They have changed the timestamp process over the years, so there are some that might show up as different days because I started writing them on a different day than they were published. And there might have been a few times when I posted after midnight, so technically it was Monday. I can't stay up that late anymore!)

Sometimes I get a little sad thinking about that young, confident yet also insecure college kid. I don't think that 2011 Mark would have expected 2022 Mark to be in the same place as I actually am now. But I guess that can be said about pretty much anyone. Have I accomplished much in my life since 2011? Because sometimes I think I haven't.

But, when I stop to think about it, I have done things. So here are things that I have done since I started this blog back in 2011.

I got a bachelor's degree in English linguistics and minors in editing and geology. I learned a lot about words, rocks, and fossils, and I have cherished memories of geology field trips.

And I got a master's degree in US history. (Well, almost. I submitted my final papers this past week. I will have my commencement and convocation this week and defend my portfolio in a week.)

I moved out of Provo and back with my parents...and stayed...and stayed.

I got editing jobs with BYU Studies, the Church History Department, and the Sundance Film Festival, as well as a non-editing job at This Is the Place. I coedited not one but two books with my name on the cover, and I helped edit a great many more.

Beginning in 2014, I switched from street running to primarily trail running, thereby making running more of a hobby than exercise.

Yesterday I went back to North Canyon for the first time since December, but it was too snowy for me to make it to the top.

I formally added Pioneer Day to my holiday canon in 2015. And now I'm publishing on its history, and I hope to become the world's expert on the day (and I might already be).

I said goodbye to two cats and adopted two cats. (That adds up to four, but it's only three because one of those is both a goodbye and an adoption.)

Jenny, Jimmy, Reggie

I was interested in seasonal foods in 2011, but it has become an all-out obsession in 2022, including becoming a reviewer for a junk-food blog. And part of that is because I think there was less of a selection in 2011.

I made it an effort to finish my 20s strong, so I did many fun things like buying a car and visiting every county seat.

Though people buy less music in 2022, I generally buy more music than I did in 2011. Streaming services help me find what I want to buy. And I'm pleased with the content I have added to my personal holiday playlists.

To borrow a phrase from Mr. Sheeran, I've "made friends and lost them through the years." (More emphasis on "made" than "lost.")

I made it through a worldwide pandemic. Fortunately, when you're single and still live with your parents, you don't have many expenses, so I was able to enjoy many months of free time. But it also disrupted my life in many ways.

And there are lots of other ways my life has changed. Some of them are not significant enough to mention here, and some of them were more gradual and imperceptible, so I don't think of them. I hope that I will continue to make the decisions in my life that will keep me in a happy place over the next eleven years (and beyond).