At a Break

Today is the lull before the storm.

Yesterday was a very cathartic day.  I went to Chemistry, as always (every day at 8am!), came home, and saw an email that told me I had won the Freshman Learning in the Light of Faith essay contest.  Guidelines can be found at the essay contest website.  Yes, there is a grand prize of $500.  Winning was totally unexpected!  41 essays were entered.  Here is the essay, written the day before the deadline:

Quandary

It is soot black. Rural Idaho has no streetlights; one would be hard pressed to say the two-rut weed patch meandering around the country is any sort of a road, let alone a street.  No moon shines.

If the outside is soot, inside the garage is soot burned a thousand times over, coated with pitch, ensconced in the blackness of a glistening stallion, and laying at the bottom of a five hundred foot pit.  Black as night.  Blacker than night.

Stumbling through the garage, my toe is stubbed by an unknown solid.  By feeling around with hands I can deduce the texture and shape of a wooden box.  Why is it there?  What purpose does it serve?  I can’t tell in this overwhelming darkness.  Everything seems jumbled up, patternless. 

Secular scientists the world over comfortably establish the metaphorical ground on which they stand and then reach out into the darkness carefully until touching something.  By feeling around the object they may deduce various physical properties about the object or even its identity.  However, there is no illumination.  It is meekness as a disciple-scholar that allows one to bring the lights up and see not only the box but also how it fits into the garage’s overall pattern.

First year biology, Brigham Young University.  Evolution unit.  Nobody is late for today’s class: Discussion on Science, Evolution, and Creationism.  Apparently there are not many people disinterested in this subject; most, like me, are listening intently.  As we read the BYU evolution packet I remember Elder Neal A. Maxwell’s assertion that “Restoration theology is expansive, not constraining” (Maxwell 6).  I must remember to keep an open mind about evolution and the processes whereby organisms adapt.

Scientists have documented natural selection really happening.  During a drought on Isle Daphne Major of the Galápagos, medium ground finches’ beaks increased in depth considerably, heightening their ability to survive eating harder seeds (Freeman 506-08).  Over time, this natural selection leads to evolution.  The process is occurring.  The problem I was left to grapple with is how this process fits into the larger plan presented by the Bible and Book of Mormon, which I know are true with far more certainty than evolution.  How is this reconciliation possible?

The answer is through meekness.  Both Maxwell and Cecil O. Samuelson Jr. cite meekness not as just one of many characteristics of a disciple-scholar, but as the chief characteristic of a disciple-scholar (Maxwell 12-15; Samuelson 44).  Nephi, the Book of Mormon prophet, is a quintessential example of meekness.

While journeying in the wilderness, all of Lehi’s sons lose the use of their bows.  When Lamen, Lemuel, and even the stalwart Lehi murmur, Nephi humbly makes another bow and asks his father, “Whither shall I go to obtain food?” (1 Nephi 16:23).  This meekness is one of the characteristics of Nephi that qualifies him for his glorious vision in chapter 11.  Nephi’s vision sheds light upon the mysteries of Lehi’s dream.  The big picture is shown and the individual events are explained.

At the end of the lecture the only pragmatic statement on evolution was that Adam and Eve are the primal parents of our race.  At first I wished something more tangible could be given out, but perhaps this quandary is best put to rest by the words of a wise roommate on the subject: “It’s not hard.  That’s what faith is all about.  You know the important stuff; you don’t need to know everything yet.”

Still dark.  Almost as quiet.  Unable to get anywhere without running into another quite-solid object, I call out quietly.  To my surprise, the deep baritone tone of my father’s voice rings out strong and true.  “I’ll get the light, son.”

Gradually, light fills the room from the dimmer switch.  A path materializes out of the darkness and confusion melts away.  Noticing my interest at the suddenly clear box, my father reminds me, “That’s our Christmas box I made.”  The box fits neatly into a clear grid pattern.  As I thread my way through the narrow, before-unseen path, my father puts his arm around me and together we walk inside.  I don’t yet need to see what else I could have bumped into.

Secular science explores boxes in the dark.  I would rather explore boxes in the light with the Maker close by, exploring the ones that He tells me about, listening to how the box fits into the larger pattern, and meekly trusting Him explicitly.

Works Cited

Freeman, Scott. Biological Science. 2^nd ed. New Jersey: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2005.

Maxwell, Neal. “The Disciple-Scholar.” Learning in the Light of Faith. Ed. Henry B. Eyring. Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1999. 1-18.

Samuelson, Cecil O. Jr. “The Importance of Meekness in the Disciple-Scholar.” Learning in the Light of Faith. Ed. Henry B. Eyring. Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1999. 35-48.

On top of that great news, I took our Chemistry test and was very pleased with my score on the multiple choice section.  What I love about Chemistry is the sense of wonder emanating from our professor.  He truly sparks that natural curiosity about the world in his students.  I was wondering the other day about the hard water deposits on our glasses after we do the dishwasher.  Having just studied about solubility and acid-base reactions I was curious as to how detergent manages to tie up ions in the water.  I learned that the harder the water, the more detergent needs to be used.  Knowing what I know now I can equate that to Ksp and the five solubility rules.  I would be interested to learn more.

After the test I played some Super Smash Bros., which I haven't done for a while.  It was quite fun.  After that I took some soup up to a girl in our ward who is sick, then went to eat dinner at the all-you-can-eat cannon center (or cancer center, as my biology professor calls it).  Stuffed, our Freshman Academy community walked to the Marriott center, where one of our roommates performed in a celebration of Christmas with folk dances around the world.  Very fun.  After that I was privileged to go to the creamery with some friends, then come back and play catch phrase.  Overall, a very, very good day.

Today there is hardly anything going on.  Tests and assignments are mostly over.  It is the slow inhalation of air before the "final" push.  Finals are the week after next and everything is wrapping up in classes.

Furhermore, I got my Elks Lodge Scholarship form turned in a couple days ago and they just notified me that the Byrd scholarship checks are on their way.  These are both beneficial to my financial situation at college and I was excited to hear about them!

Until next time,

Sean

The Here and Now

OK, so it's time for a real update.

Preference was great, both nights.  The first night we took Panda Express food up into the canyon and ate it around a campfire, and then roasted starbursts.  After that we went to the dance, which was either ice skating or an actual dance. We skated until about 15 minutes left, and then danced.  It was quite fun - I love ice skating and haven't been for a long time!  I need to learn to stop though...

On Saturday we made homemade pizzas and then went to a fun dance at the Wilkinson Student Center.  After that it was ice cream!  It was very fun as well.  We danced and had a grand old time.

Rori and I holding our hanger to roast starbursts on on Friday night (7 Nov 2008)

Amanda and I after our date on Saturday (8 Nov 2008)

So preference was quite fun.

I just bought Jesus the Christ, by James E. Talmage, at the bookstore.  So far it's a really, really great book.  I'm only done with the first two chapters though, but I'm plugging away on it.

That reminds me: for mission prep this last little bit we had to talk to 10 complete strangers about the gospel.  It was difficult.  Talking to strangers is uncomfortable sometimes, but it's good practice.

School is going well; chemistry is difficult but getting easier, biology is surprisingly easier than I thought it would be, missionary prep is great, English is my lowest grade but one of my favorite classes, and next semester should be fun.  Signing up for classes is stressing and confusing.  I want to take general ed classes, but I want some fun classes as well.  I want to take more advanced classes in my major but I'm not sure if they will transfer with me if I decide to switch schools.  A fine balance must be struck between fun and hard, general and specific; a academic quadruple point, if you will (closely related to chemistry's triple point).

The weather is very nice.  Today is the perfect temperature - bordering on jackets.  Sunny and bright, the clouds hover high overhead, wispy threads of cotton.

If I think of anything else, I'll throw it up here.

Perhaps the Busiest Week

Warning: Long Post Ahead

This last week has been...insane. I've been to four class periods the whole week - two on Monday and two on Friday. I've slept in my own bed once in the last seven days. Here's the story.

We'll start with Monday. At lunch-time FBLA left for our State Competition. We had a long six hour bus-ride up there, and then stayed up there until late at night Wednesday. We had lots of fun (I guess) in Ogden, where there is nothing to do. Especially by our convention center. However, here are the awards I remember:

• Josh M. - 3rd in Accounting I
• Sarah C. and Kassara S. - 3rd in *Desktop Publishing
• James P. - 6th in Cyber Security, 8th in Computer Problem Solving, 9th in Networking Concepts
  
• Kirsten W. - Was elected as a State Officer - Secretary
• Sean F. - 1st Place in Business Communication, 5th Place in Cyber Security, 6th Place in Business Calculations
• Sean F. and James P. - 1st Place in E-business
  

Remember that these awards are State-wide, and are not broken down into school sizes like sports are (5A, 3A, etc). We compete against the entire gamut of students.

*Desktop Publishing requires the submittal of a production test; our team had to create a logo, calendar, flyer, and other Desktop Publishing creations to be prejudged, then take an objective test at the State Leadership Conference (SLC)

Which means that James and I are going to Nationals, and there is a good chance that both Josh M. and the team of Sarah and Kassarah could be coming as well. Kirsten is also attending as a new state officer.

On Thursday the day was devoted to Sterling Scholar Region. Long and boring intervals were interspaced with brief moments of heart-attackish type adreneline rushes. We practiced the awards ceremony, broke for interviews, had lunch (hamburgers), had dinner, then had the awards ceremony. We had one Sterling Scholar Region Winner (Jordan H. in Mathematics) and about five runners up (I got runner up in General Scholarship). The winner of the General Scholarship competition had a 33 ACT score and had been out of the country for several weeks helping poor children in Cambodia or somewhere.

Friday was the day I went to school for half of the day again. The other half was spent decorating for Prom. At about 3:15 I left the Prom decoration event and went to the high school to travel on a bus back up north for the State Jazz Festival. Strangely enough I got the same bus driver I had for the FBLA trip, so I spent more than 25 hours in that exact bus. Big time waster. We played That's Cool by Shelly Berg, In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning, by I'm not sure, and Mongo's Mood, by I'm not sure (a different I'm not sure). We received a II, another II, and a II+. Pretty good considering this is the first time we've even qualified for State Jazz in approximately ten years.

We got back from our trip on Saturday at around 5:00 p.m., just in time to go home, get ready for Prom, then attend the Priesthood Session, then go pick up our dates (Jerry R. took Sarah C., and I took Whitney S.). We ate at Olive Garden, then attended the dance. Jerry and I were both at State Jazz, which means that we were not around on Saturday to do any sort of "day date" thing, so we are planning a cool date for next Saturday, which I'm looking forward to.

Prom was generally awesome. All three of the others in my group, including my date (Whitney, Jerry, and Sarah) were fun to be around. The only complaint I have is that the picture line was too long; we only were actually on the dance floor for about an hour and fifteen minutes. So I was pretty annoyed, and when I'm annoyed I'm edgy, and so I probably wasn't the most fun to be around in the line ;). We had a bunch of fun though. Swinging is always a fun dance style, even if your flower falls off. (That reminds me...a quick note...I learned how to make corsages from Jerry's sister, and we both made one for our dates; it's so cheap and easy I don't know why we don't do them all the time ourselves) I was elected as Prom King, a great honor that is nice to have and boosts self-esteem, but it was an award I would rather not have received (at least in front of everybody at the dance). I am not built for publicity and stuff, and then people come up to me in the hallway all the time and say stuff like, "Congratulations on being Prom King!" and some try to be sneaky and come up and say hi and then under their breath breathe, "Prom King," like I'm supposed to say, "Oh, thanks" rather sneakily and give them a big fake wink. I never know what to say when people say stuff like that. I thank them, but I'd much rather everybody forgot about the whole deal. This kind of stuff makes me uncomfortable. Natalie H. was the queen, Cody P. was the prince, and Tanya H. was the princess.

The best part of the logistical side of the dance was the music; because we picked all of the music beforehand ourselves, and because we spent the little extra money to hire a good DJ, the music was awesome.

We sold out of Prom tickets beforehand and then sold some more at the door. We sold about 175 tickets, which means about 350 people at the dance. After the dance we stayed to help clean up, because I'm on the Prom committee, and then we went to Tia B.'s house to eat crepes. We did get a picture of the Prom committee, but not of the royalty.

Sunday we left again, this time to watch general conference at my grandparents house in St. George (we don't have T.V.). Hectic. More posts coming soon.

Preference

Preference was pretty awesomely cool. I'll relate events here.

First, the group. Tiffany Seegmiller and I, Josh MacDonald and Whitney Spendlove, and Stacia Pederson and Chance Steglich. (I bet I spelled somebody's name wrong...apparantly this blogger interface thinks so too)

The day dawned bright and early, and lucky for the three of us, we were already awake. Our respective dates had woken us suprisingly at 6:00 A.M., dragged us to Stacia's friend's house, and cooked us breakfast. We had eggs, pancakes (both regular and blueberry), bacon, apple juice, and hash browns. Yum!

The Guardian was next on our agenda, a movie which I found to be quite interesting and very good. It was about the elite of the coast guard.

So then we went home at about 11:00 A.M.

Later that night, we were individually picked up by a LIMOUSINE! A limo! It was awesome. We then drove IN THE LIMO to the Pasta Factory, then we were picked up and drove IN THE LIMO to the high school.

We proceeded to the picture line, then to the dance. The dance took maybe about a half an hour to pick up, and then we had a great time.

It was quite fun.