Derik is in Boston now.

As is Austin. Tonight's dinner conversation included, but was not limited to: The Villa, grandmas (particularly Betty Jo), depression era survivor's averseness to throwing anything away, Tom Bell's averseness to that averseness/his willingness to buy cereal costing $10 (or was it $15?), yoga, fast food/restroom camaraderie between Native Americans, Derik claiming to be a Navajo Rebel, Navajo folklore, which, according to Derik's parents, is all true, hammer pants, bowl cuts, Austin's father tragically denying him his elementary school desire for said bowl cut, pogs, L.A. Lights, and business dinner etiquette. All in all I'd say it was an insightful evening.

I am a child of the west.

The house where I was raised. Notice Hyrum and Joe's basketball hoop: still standing.
The street where I was raised.
Liens!!!
The goods:
Olsen/Hunt reunion.
Nevada.

Returning to the place where I am from.

Where I was a baby and a small child. For a funeral, and also for myself-- to redeem my past, my feelings, and my heart.

I was greeted by the news of my aunts death when I got off of the plane in Salt Lake City. My sister preemptively hugged me, then told me that while she hated to be the bearer of bad news, I needed to know. It had happened just hours before. My aunt had been battling brain cancer. In the same breath my sister told me that our granny was in the hospital, from blood clots and other complications from a surgery of which I was unaware.

It was too much for me. All of this new information. I was so tired, and couldn't internalize it--couldn't take it in to feel the things that I should feel. And in place of proper feelings I only felt remorse, remorse for crying over a burning building just days before, but not over the death of a relative whom I loved and admired. I felt frustration that my family hadn't told me about my granny's poor condition or antecedant surgery.

And so a few days later I found myself in my parent's van accompanying them the 13 hours to Oregon.

There several things struck me. One is my mother telling me that she feels the pure gospel is taught at funerals. Another is my father actually speaking at the funeral. Still another was my uncle's profound sadness. The way he spoke about my aunt with such tenderness and devotion, how he kept calling her "his gal", and my mother leaning over to me and whispering to me to marry someone who loves me as much as Walt loves Donna. Later my cousin standing and expressing that same wish for herself.

My mom stepped out of the room, and I walked silently to the front until I stood over the open casket. I gazed at this women who had once been so vivacious, with her youthful blonde hair and constant tan, who had loved me, and who I had loved. The cancer had destroyed so much of her body. I felt nauseous and sad and had to turn away. It wasn't her. It was just a shell. When my mom returned she asked me to come with her. I shook my head and told her I couldn't.

My cousins wore her gaudy jewelry. It was fitting somehow. The large gold hoops and bangles.

I found myself surprised how their memories were also my memories, but I should not have been, for they hinged on candy drawer, candy dresser, candy closet, candy room. Then swimming, and swimming, and swimming.

Every other time I looked at my mom that day, and even the next, she had been crying. I would wonder what she was thinking, then, more often then not she wiped the tears away and shared a memory about Donna. But once it was because of a tender story my sister-in-law, Sarah, had just told her about my niece Sienna.

And while there were tears, there was also laughter, and quiet remembrance. Stories and pictures proving that Donna had the best legs in Parma, Idaho, etc.

Then there was Klamath itself. I was amazed by how much I still remembered, and wondered if the memories were only memories of memories. Either way. I knew names. Of people. Places. Streets. A store where I would buy candy and where Hyrum would bribe me when he made me cry, back when my nickname was Cryer Patch Baby. I think it was usually nerds. I went there that day.

When I could finally internalize the fact that my aunt had died I felt that a large part of my childhood had as well, since so many of my memories from that time were centered around her and her house. But in going back, to that city, to that place, part of them were also restored and I felt peace.

My thoughts on the fire, or how the fire made me feel.

Sad. Sad and also stirred. Stirred by this reminder of how fragile everything is. How quickly things can change. Then surprise by how sad I was, how I couldn't get the fire out of my head. I was in New York with one of my best friends, but that was all I could think about. I imagined my ward friends being evacuated to watch the flames engulf the building where we worshiped every week, to see the roof collapse onto the chapel where they had been sitting only 15 minutes before. I wondered how they felt.

The next day there was a special ward family home evening. I got off the bus from New York to Boston and went straight there, despite the fact that I was weary, and hungry, and hadn't eaten since breakfast. Katie came too. Straight from her own travels on the west coast. So neither of us had been present for the fire, but wanted to be with those who had. The family home evening was somewhat reminiscent of a girl's camp testimony meeting in its sentimentality and sensationalism, but was strangely powerful, and extremely meaningful to me.

I listened to my fellow ward members speak about that day or that building--memories they formed there, or testimonies, as well as their personal relationships with God and with each other. I realized that I knew not all, but most of their names. I cared about their sorrow, and the loss they felt. This was important to me, this caring, because while there are many good things to say about the east coast, this transition has been a hard one for me, and this experience suggested that I had a place here, not only in the church (which was a well timed revelation in itself), but in Boston.

Some words shared that evening that left an impression on me:

"How interesting it is that we can have sorrow for a building...what is a temple? What is that building? ... It's the ordinances that make it of value." - a girl I don't know.

"That no one got hurt at all." -Luke Stoddard

"At first I thought it doesn't matter, its just a building. If we keep it or not its going to be okay in the long run... after going to work today and receiving condolences, got to the place that other people started. I'm really sad that we lost this building... I'm sadder today than I was yesterday... I am glad I could help last night. It reminded me of my mission which was hard too but I got through it... the first time I stepped foot in that building.. (how he didn't feel like he had a place as a member. And how he didn't think that he changed but in coming to Boston he saw that there were others like him.)
... I said a prayer a couple of months ago that if I needed to be here He needed to pull me back." -Jared Mooney

"Something good about being misplaced." -Allen Stoddard

"We're going to bloom where we are planted. I love those tulips because they're not where they belong. The Lord gives and the Lord taketh away. He moves people... Things that are strong and so fragile but stayed there (about flowers)." -Evie

"A really profound sense of loss. My spiritual home. My relationships haven't changed. I still have the memories that happened there. I still have the testimony I strengthened in that building." -my roommate Erin

Jared Mooney's words were particularly poignant to me. A few tears escaped my eyes as I listened to him describe some of my own feelings. I was left with a desire to try again. To pray a real prayer and ask for God to help me.

Other words, my own. Ones I quickly tapped out on my ipod when still consumed by this, days and even weeks later, less articulate, but still capturing something:

May 31 10:27 pm
"This gathering place for the saints. It wasn't arson. It wasn't a mob. It was just old. So why does it matter? Why do places or things matter? Because of what's inside. The people. The words spoken. The truths taught. The faith shared. Where I stood at a pulpit and testified of heavenly mother. Where I made a friend because of that testimony. Memories associated with it.

But we still have that. We still have everything that matters.

The building that we love is burned. It is no more except for the brick wall and the steeple. They saved the steeple."

My church building burned down today.

I am somber.

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.

My bedroom is a photo booth

and a movie theater, and other things.

Friday night two of my friends and I gathered on my bed to take these pictures

and to watch this movie.

My friend Jon had his mac book with him too, so we were taking pictures with both of our computers at the same time which made it ultra ridiculous.

I watched The Fall just once before in Salt Lake at The Broadway, but knew that I loved it enough to want to own it, which I do now. I still think it is so beautiful and also sometimes sad. What I love best about it is the striking cinematography, the little girl that is so charming, and the man that is so handsome. I am also fond of the words "googly googly, go away." Katie and I want to make bandit Valentines now, because of their masks. I hope we do. I love evenings like this one that help me me feel good about being in Boston.

Fall Happenings III: I heart New York

Stepping off the bus into Jendar's neighborhood on a Friday night the first thing I noticed was the conglomeration of people outside. The second thing I noticed was the hip hop music. With that fitting introduction, Jendar said, "Welcome to Harlem." I dropped off my bags. We ate good sushi and good chocolate before meeting D.C.'s Kristina at her arrival.

Despite our lack of sleep, we all woke up early the next morning and took a train to get tickets to Legally Blonde: The Musical.

While I didn't initially share the same enthusiasm as my friends, I'm glad they convinced me, for the production turned out to be incredibly funny and entertaining.

Afterwards we had tea and treats at this charming shop for the curious and curiouser.

That night we danced our hearts out 80's style at Club Pyramid.

Sunday afternoon I loved New York, and Jendar, and the picnic we had on this blanket, on this grass at a park near her home. The weather was the epitomy of fall perfection.

Sunday night found us at NYU's library. We sadly both had homework.

Monday morning I met up with Hediyeh on the steps of the Met.

We intended to go inside, but talking was better. Just being together was better. It had been so long, and was so easy because she knows the people and the context. She also gave me the kindest, most meaningful compliment. After explaining a recent choice I made, she said simply, "I think Kierkegaard would agree with you."

Eventually we walked to a nearby restaurant for lunch before I boarded a bus that would bring me back to Boston.

Fall Happenings Part II: Past visitors/past visits

Francesco and Evelyn visited from New York. We saw Drew play at BU. I loved Drew at BU. It made Boston feel like Provo. Some of our new Boston friends came too, which was great. The next morning we walked around Cambridge and pretended to go to Harvard, except for Max who really does go to Harvard. We kept making jokes about playing frisbee on the quad. We watched conference at the Seawrights. Betty came back from her own trip to New York with yummy cupcakes from her favorite bakery.

That night I enjoyed my first professional soccer game.

On the ride home, the phrase "Boston! No parents!" screamed out the car window is one of the reasons, but not the only reason why I love Francesco. Other reasons why I love Francesco: his penchant for story telling, his loyalty to a Salt Lake soccer team, the fact that he still calls me Precious Rachel, and his love of clapping, 80's dancing, and Evelyn. On the long drive we also played the ipod game, which I wouldn't so much say is a game as it is an organized way to take turns choosing music, except for the fact that there are rules and they are well enforced.

Soon after that, Rachel and Dave Eastin came from Provo. After debating the offerings of Rhode Island and Maine, a secret vote was cast, and we went to a Portland that wasn't in Oregon. There we saw grown men dressed as lobsters and fell in love with creepy masks. Elizabeth sadly dropped her phone in a toilet at the Whole Foods.
On Halloween Courtney and Quin came from D.C., Virginia to see Bane play their hometown. It was my first hardcore concert experience, and I somewhat surprisingly didn't hate it, but just thought it was fun and funny.

I also fell in love with fake meat, went camping in New Hampshire, and made friends with a lot of thoughtful married people at Outstitute (think a more liberal version of Institute).

Fall Happenings Part I: DFAC

I heard a crowd of Bostonians decked out in Red Sox paraphernalia chant "Utah! Utah!" in a crowded t station, and wondered if that was what they were really saying. I asked my dad, who was still in town with me, and it really was. It was the day Utah upset Michigan in football. Max called me one of my first weeks in the city and asked if I wanted to get vegan ice cream with he and his wife. I said yes. He then asked if I wanted to get dinner after.  I said yes.  And with that, Dessert First Adventure Club (DFAC) was born. We had weekly Thursday meetings for awhile before school/life got too crazy. Early club meetings included exploring the north shore and walking around Walden Pond before eating the largest and best sandwich. The pond was beautiful and peaceful just as I suspected.  It was also warm and large, which I didn't suspect. 

One night we heard Juno Dias speak at MIT with Lisa before heeding the call of a strange man on the street to check out a somewhat disturbing scientology exhibit damning psychology/psychologists, which had a questionair at the end asking, "What did you find most disturbing?" We had a sleep over where I heard the history of Max's life, or at least the years since his mission. We ate so much delicious vegan pizza, usually at Veggie Planet, and so many delicious vegan brownie bites, always at the Seawright's. In the month of November, affectionately dubbed "Pizza Month" by all involved, we had hour long philosophy discussions about the nature, form, and definition of pizza, which usually ended with one or all of us asking rhetorically, "WHAT is Pizza?!"

Club members:
Max
Betty
Me

Ultrasound done. Its going to be a boy.

I got that in a text message today from my brother Hyrum, and all I can say is awesome. While I love girls and love my nieces, I am thrilled that I will have another nephew and thrilled because he'll be the first boy baby with the Hunt name. Hyrum will be the sweetest dad--he is already so cute with Bella and Az. I am excited for him and excited for Pegah. Last I heard their boy name of choice is Henry. I like it, so hope it sticks. This name would also be awesome since the middle name, which I can't remember, but know starts with a K and is after Pegah's father, would result in Hyrum's initials: HKH. I'm pretty sure this is part of the appeal, but if Henry fails there is always Senator, which name I genuinely love, and also Cheeseburger, which name Hyrum has tossed around since childhood.

The proud parents to be.

Braving the cold

Recent things worth going outside for:
vegan pizza/veggie planet with Dana
Lisa and her house
Elizabeth and the cambridge public library
Lisa again, on her birthday
visiting my vintage friend at his cool vintage store
curry fest 2009, which thankfully had lots of vegetarian and (some) vegan options.
whole foods for much needed orange juice and vitamin c.
school

Book ends.

I finished a book today, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. Though it is very small, it took me days to read instead of hours. Elizabeth checked it out for me when I visited her and her library last week. When I thanked her she told me it's what she does. I could only read a few pages at a time. I was unable to escape feeling some measure of how much this book cost, how much the author had to give.

I already want to go back, to reexamine the words Bauby chose to write, the words that he formed and manipulated in his mind before blinking them into existence, before blinking them into another's pen because he could not lift a pen to write himself. Once a distinguished editor, this man could not move at all, except for the fluttering of a single eyelid and a sideways turn of his head. It's clear that he wrote to prove something, to do away with the Parisian rumor mill's deception that he'd shrunken into a vegetable. Though his body is lifeless his mind is strong.

"My diving bell becomes less oppressive, and my mind takes flight like a butterfly. You can wander off in space or in time, set out for Tierra del Fuego or for King Midas's court." Later, "I need to feel strongly, to love and to admire, just as desperately as I need to breathe.."

My favorite part describes his letters. Those most serious in nature, the ones focusing on existential questions, were written by people he barely knew, or knew only on the surface. "Their small talk had masked hidden depths." He wonders if it takes "the harsh light of disaster to show a person's true nature." Other letters describe very simple things, "small events that punctuate the passage of time: roses picked at dusk, the laziness of a rainy Sunday, a child crying himself to sleep," but for him these are the most meaningful--the most beautiful and also the most sad. "Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than all the rest."

And while I am working on two other books: Life of Pi and Existentialsim: a Very Short Introduction, I took another from my shelf. Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. I have come back to this book many times--each time to read the same letter, the same meeting--but this time I continued reading, continued turning pages until the very last. I read every line I previously marked, every page I dog-eared, every word scribbled in cursive pen along the margins and in between the lines. When I finished I asked myself what I was trying to find, what I was trying to discover. I'm not sure anymore. I'm not sure I knew when I took the book down, or when I opened its pages. I only know that it came up in a conversation last night, in a car driving from Boston to Cambridge. Its likely I wanted to remember the words I was trying to explain, to understand why they often seem so relevant to me. Maybe I wanted to find myself in the stanzas, or the person I was when I encountered them for the first time, when I held the pen that made the markings, when I bent the corners and scrawled my own handwriting beside the perfect type. I used to think I was like Tatiana in this book. I don't think that anymore. Or maybe I am like her, just early her. I'm not yet as calm as she becomes or as reposed.

Things I loved today.

Lisa on her birthday. Delicious vegan cupcakes on her birthday (courtesy of Elizabeth and Newhampton). The cauliflower curry made for us by the birthday girl. The company and conversations in general. Elizabeth's very clever movie synopsis in Beyond Balderdash for a movie called The Big Operator, that I knew was hers, but had to vote for anyway because it made me laugh so hard that she deserved it. The smelling game we played afterward that was fondly reminiscent of an activity I might have done in the 4th grade when studying the five senses. Dan gathered items from their household and held them up to each of our noses while our eyes were closed. Chapstick, cologne, orange, money, cough syrup. It is remarkable that this was fun for me, because I have a cold and couldn't smell anything, but still it was. I think it had something to do with the fact that we text Dan our answers to keep them top secret.

The fact that I actually did some of the things on my "to do" list, i.e., went grocery shopping, cleaned my room, hung a clock and picture frame purchased from Urban months ago, etc. etc.

I did not go outside yesterday

and I might just stay inside again today.