What I love.

Veggie Planet.

Grasshopper.

Friends being in Boston.

Valentine's games.

Creepy basements.

I need to see Coraline.

I say need instead of want because I just found out it's set in a city, in a state that I love. A city that I once drove 85 miles an hour on windy mountain passes to try to get my younger brother there on time to see a Shakespeare play for one of his classes. A city that I threw up in a downtown trashcan in when I was very, very small, and had gotten car sick on the way to see my older brother run a cross country race with my mom. In general, a city that has green trees, rain, and mountains. A city that looks and feels like home.

Ashland, Oregon, I love you.

I've got some friends I barely see

but we're all planning to meet.

Meg comes on Thursday with Jonah and Sarah Payne. Then Jendar and Jessica on Friday. The weekend after is Hediyeh, and the weekend after that is Chris Rees and Ammon.

I am the luckiest.

Breathing just to see my breath.

For the pleasure of it, and also the wonder.

I remember being amazed by the sight of my own breath as a child, on the first really cold day. And for some reason, just today, for one small moment while standing at this bus stop, that feeling of awe came back. And so I breathed, heavy breath after heavy breath.

It's always 6 more weeks.

Dear Punxutawney Phil,

I hate it when you see your shadow.

Sincerely, Rachel

25 things.

25 things you may or may not have previously known about me.

1. Russian literature owns my heart.

2. I am naming my first son Soren.

3. I can't do cartwheels.

4. When I was little I was really sad that my name wasn't as interesting as my sisters/from the Book of Mormon like my sisters.  It bothered me so much that when I was 15 my mom let me read in her journal about when I was born and why they decided to name me Rachel.  I felt a lot better about it after that, and like my name now, but sometimes still wish it was Eliza, which is sort of my middle name.

5. I was elected Vice President of my elementary school when I was in 4th grade.  My winning campaign posters had a picture of a ketchup bottle with the words: "Catch up with Hunt".

6. Over the course of my life I've wanted to be the President of the U.S., a senator of Oregon, a lawyer, astronaut, ballerina, librarian and philosopher.

7. Nicknames over the course of my life include: Little Peanut, Rapunzel, Rach E. Bob, Bobbie, Ray Charles, Rackel, Rachie, Rach, Ray Ray, Precious Rachel.

8. I grew up on Bob Dylan and The Band, Indigo Girl garage dance parties, and Weird Al.

9. One summer my younger brother and I played ping pong every day, and had a rule that whoever lost the game had to jump rope 100 times.  I wasn't very good at ping pong, but ended up beating my high school's record for jump roping in the Presidential Fitness Test the following fall.

9. During English class in 11th grade my friend Matt Grover told me that all I thought about was boys and track.  I remember being offended, but it was probably pretty close to true.

10. Around that time my friend April and I were obsessed with Much Music, Canada, Our Lady Peace, and the Moffatts.

11. I was voted "biggest daydreamer" my senior year in high school.

12. I am the only child in my family that went to only one high school.

13. But in the last six years have lived in five states: Oregon, Utah, Washington, California, and Massachusetts.

14. My sophomore year in college I was an Intramural Wallyball champion.

15. I can probably beat you at boggle.

16. There are few things I like more than books and bikes, although communities, cheesy go around the circle things, parachutes, and crepes come close.

17. I used to want to live in a cottage in the woods and spend my days gardening and reading philosophy and my evenings sipping lemonade on porches.  In fact I still want this.

18. I always want to hear the same old song.  For example, the weekend I painted my bedroom I listened to Magnetic Fields' Book of Love 81 times.  My younger brother does not love this attribute about me.

19. When I was 17 I was the queen of my town's summer festival, Bohemia Mining Days.  My mom made me try for it.  When I won my grandma told me she was glad I learned there was something more to life than sports.  I was so mad, and thought, "As if beauty pageants are any better."

20. Two summers ago when I rode public transportation to my job in American Fork I had the biggest bus crush on a German boy who was not my type at all.  For instance, he wore gaudy jewelry but because he was European I figured it was okay.  It took me the courage of two dragons to say hello to him.  The day after I finally did he sat beside me.  It was one of the most awkward conversations of my life.  We never sat by each other again, but politely nodded from thereon out.

21. I spent last summer getting paid to read and write about Heavenly Mother.

22. I want to be married in the Sacramento Temple.

23. I have a picture of my first kiss.  It is both embarrassing and awesome.

24. In college my friends Spencer and Davis made a club called Club PB & J.  We would eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches together and go around the circle saying our names and what kind of peanut butter and jelly was on our sandwich and what kind of bread we had.  We would also say our motto, which was, "I eat PB & J all day, every day."  Official minutes were taken.

25. Sometimes I get anxious.