A Night to Remember.

Or some other cheesy theme like that.

Ah, prom. After high school, I liked to think that I always was too cool for prom, that I knew better than to get caught up in the excitement of it, like the cool artsy kids in the movies. But, if I'm totally honest with myself, I kinda really enjoyed it. The dresses, the photos, the dancing, feeling a bond of unity or something with all of my classmates. It really did feel like a night to remember, and I'm sure in some high school journal I spilled my feelings of the night with some lines like "I love my friends SO MUCH! They are the best, and I am going to miss them TONS when we are all at college. I'm SO GLAD that we had prom, because it seriously felt like the best night of my life. I LOVE dancing and especially with my best friends."



I went to seven proms in high school. Before you go thinking that I was cool or popular or possibly even slutty, let me assure you that I was none of those things. I just happened to go to a really small high school and have friends from church in other really small high schools in surrounding towns. I was a fan of dances, I was friendly and could get along in groups of strangers, and I cleaned up fairly well when I got out of the field hockey pads and put on a fancy dress. It was fun. However, after high school, I started to feel ashamed of going to so many proms. I was in college and prom was a high school, immature thing. All of the friends I made really had been the too cool for school artsy types who had shunned this torturous rite of passage. And so, I stuffed the pictures into boxes, wrapped up my tiara in a scarf, and audibly mocked the teenage drama of going to prom. One day soon, those excited seniors in high school would also realize how pathetic their expectations for prom really were.

It's been 10 years since my last prom, 10 years since I was a fresh faced senior, anxious to move on, yet melancholy over leaving behind all these people I'd known for year (and suddenly became friends with only at the very end). Proms have become a blip on the radar for me, when a younger sibling is preparing for their turn to pass through this gateway.

And then grad school happened and it is prom season all over again.

We had Wagner Prom a few weeks ago, right in the midst of all the papers that were due. And just a few nights ago, i went to BAM prom (Brooklyn Academy of Music), which was the opening event for their Sundance Institute at BAM. They showed this documentary called American Teen, which, unsurprisingly, is about 4 teens growing up in suburban Indiana. When it makes it to the indie theaters, i recommend that you go see it. It was hard to think of the kids as real people, because they were such stereotypical teen characters: the mean popular girl, the jock, the arty creative type, and the geek. I had to keep reminding myself that these kids were real, and when I remembered that, I kind of choked up also remembering the awkwardness of that age and how my life seemed so important and my thoughts so unique and grand. I went with a bunch of Wagner kids (Melissa, Melinda, Kathleen, Alexis, Rachel, Andrew, Sindri, and some other friends) and we all kind of sheepishly admitted to tearing up. We made our way to the prom upstairs, decorated exactly like any other school dance would be. My 10 years of self-trained prom-mocking kicked in, and with the cheesy music playing I was ready to make a quick exit. But it was BAM, and it was ironic. And because it was ironic, and because we were all dressed up, and because people were actually of legal drinking age, and because we'd all just been reminded of the awkwardness of prom, and because we were there together as good friends from school, and the music wasn't that bad, and there were some cute boys to hit on, and the dance floor cleared up, and Melinda has some moves, and we had to ham it up for the cameras, and and and and and
it was a night to remember. i love you guys and don't ever change.

Dani and her baby bump!

Since I call my blog "Tales of the Summer Child", I figure I should be a slightly better at blogging now that it is finally summer again.

To celebrate the beginning of summer vacation, I hit the road and went to Boston. I didn't mind the 7 hour Chinatown bus ride too much, since I was completely brain dead after the semester and spent the trip reading "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" (reread it since I now live in Brooklyn-- I had no recollection of how good that book was. It was moving, and it was also really exciting to recognize some of the streets and landmarks she talks about. I'm on a New York kick with my reading). Finally, I arrived, and spent the night at the Ward's house-- old family friends in Medfield. Ah, Medfield. The town I grew up. It smells so nice there; it smells green. And oh! how i've missed all of the trees! While I complained about it at the time, I have to admit, I am a pretty lucky kid to have grown up in such and idyllic place. I spent Saturday gardening at the Ward's and at the grave (we'll see how long these plants last), visiting a friend with two babies (yikes!) and then met up with Dani, who was the main reason for the trip.

Dani is having a baby any day now! She is the first non-LDS high school friend of mine to have a baby, first on in the little group that we had, and so this is a momentus occasion. We're still waiting on the baby, but it was fun to get together for the baby shower and pat her belly and think of what a darling little Tristan will be. Adorableness.


Em and Megs
Dani and her mom and sister
Dani, Megs, me and Em. We missed Lil!
Baby bump!
Em and Dani (em is getting ready to steal Dani's belly)

with all of these babies popping out, Emily and I have decided that we are going to steal one and put it into our closet, which is just the right size for a baby.

Word of the day is: PLENIPOTENTIARY

Plenipotentiary (from Wikipedia):
As a noun, it refers to a person who has "full powers". In particular, the term commonly refers to a diplomat who is fully authorized to represent their government as a prerogative (e.g., ambassador).

When you are sending a letter to an ambassador, that is what you must include in the title. This is something that I have learned at my summer job.

The other day, Leila and I went to drop off some dresses that she had borrowed from the wife of the Filipino ambassador. She convinced me to go along by telling me that this was the house that Imelda Marcos (of the thousands of shoes) had lived in. We went to the door, which was answered by a little maid in sweatpants, and were escorted to the sitting room. The ambassador's wife came to greet us, and we expected to simply thank her for use of the dresses, steal peaks around the corners of the house, and be on our merry way. However, when an ambassador's wife invites you to sit down and look through the scrapbooks she is working on, what can you do but comply? So we sat there, with orange juice and muffins, looking at her scrapbooks, one of the teas she's been to with the other ambassadors wives (which she confessed to us were rather boring) and the other one which made her eyes light up, full of the Broadway plays that she has gone to here. It is her favorite way to pass an evening while her husband fulfills his plenipotentiary duties. We chatted about plays and life and then went on our merry way. As we stood on the bus, Leila and I kind of looked at each other with this expression of-- was that for real? Yes, indeed, we had just spent an hour with the ambassador's wife.

Now, to some of you, that may not seem like a big deal, but to me this is such a trip because I've always wanted to be in that diplomatic world. She is such a cute lady, and so normal. However, as nice as the house was, as nice as it would be to go to fancy balls and teas and plays, I don't think I'm interested in the ambassador's wife role (sorry Jackie). I want to be the plenipotentiary myself-- I want the full power.

Now it's just a matter of which government I would represent-- my fingerprinting appointment for my U.S. citizenship application is next week!

Tag

Thanks to frances, i've now been tagged.

1. what were you doing ten years ago?
Ten years ago I was a senior at Medfield High School, getting ready to graduate and realizing that I would actually miss the people I went to school with. I was dating Kevin Boyko and excited to go to BYU. I drove around a Toyota Corolla which later went up in flames. I shopped at thrift stores and rode around with friend's in lil's convertible.

2. five things on your to-do list today
- cook for the potluck picnic!
- Email the women's ngo I work with about all the meetings i've been attending
- Set Chris up on friend-dates in washington D.C.
- Plan Vilja's bachelorette party
- Download pictures

3. five snacks you enjoy
- carob covered raisins (this is brand new for me and I love them!)
- sun-dried tomato wheat thins
- ice cream-- any time, any place
- cashews
- banana pudding

4. what would you do if you suddenly became a millionaire?
I would say "I HIT THE MONEY!" like a cute old lady at church did today. Grad school loans would be done for, and I'd of course take a good chunk and invest it properly for a retirement account (i know, boring, but I actually get kind of excited about having a 401(k)). I'd buy a MacBook air and a membership to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens. I'd go to a spa and get the works-- my first facial and a really good massage and seaweed wrap (mostly because it sounds cool). And then I would set off traveling to all sorts of fun places and do volunteer work. Really, I think I would save a lot of it to use for future travels and donate a good chuck of cash to worthy causes-- like become a member of Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch and the Sierra Club and go to charity auctions and that kind of stuff that I can't really afford to do right now.

5. three bad habits
- leaving piles of things (books, clothes, papers, cups) all over my room
- sitting with my feet up on the chair at formal functions
- talking too much about boys

6. five places i've lived
- Medfield, MA
- Copenhagen, Denmark
- Zanzibar, Tanzania
- Salt Lake City, UT
- Tucson, AZ

7. five jobs i've had (I've picked the ones I don't really like to talk about much)
- shoe sales person at Timberland
- gluing call numbers onto library books
- travel agent
- catering
- Copywriter at Overstock.com

8. five things people don't know about me
- I made a ring out of birch bark when I was 13 years old and wore it for a whole summer in Finland, and then gave it to Juha, the first boy that I ever kissed when I left at the end of the summer. I put it in an envelope and dropped it off at his house when I was supposed to be doing something else. He never mentioned the ring and I felt embarrassed for showing so much emotion.
- I am terrified of running out of things to talk about with people, which actually leads to that happening. It makes me so sad.
- I think collar bones are incredibly sexy
- I harbor dreams of one day being a rock star.
- Once I hid in a dark field hiding from someone who was chasing me. It was scary, but ended up being okay.

-------
so I am supposed to tag 5 people to fill this out next on their blogs. Since I haven't been writing regularly, i think I've lost some readers, but I'll try anyway. I tag you, Aaron, Art, Cammie, Sarah Jones, and Vilja.

Half-Master!

I'm done and done with school for the semester! Congratulate me!

So i had a minor major meltdown on Friday, and ended up abandoning my computer whilst I wandered the rainy streets of Brooklyn and the crowded aisles home accessory aisles of Target. I brought home, yes, on the subway, 100 votive candles, 4 large glass jars, a curtain rod, and pop tarts. I'm not sure what was going on in my head; perhaps it was more that nothing was going on, I just needed some sort of sensory experience to get detach from the dread of the end of the semester. Luckily, Emily was very understanding when I dissolved into giggles and tears when trying to explain the shopping trip and set things right with an evening of candle light and singing the entire soundtrack to South Pacific. Good times. Best roommate ever.

I took off Saturday (mentally and physically) and made my first trip out to Coney Island. Hot dogs were eaten, arcade games played, freaks stared at, and a baby walrus oohed and aahed. It was exactly the sort of day I needed, since it resulted in four very productive, committed days of paper writing in the law library. Wish I could say that it resulted in the meeting of some cute law student, but alas, the only person I talked to was Leila, and we were all preoccupied with thoughts near-panic. It did, however, result in two beautiful, completed final papers.

And life is good again. Why hello New York, i didn't even realize you were there. been here long and I just didn't see you?

any recommendations for me for my what I did on my summer vacation essay?

6 days...

and then I'll be a half-master.

Why am I up at 1 am blogging when i should be either frantically writing or sleeping so I can e productive tomorrow? I have no idea. This is what happens when you abandon all friends and only interact with your computer for days on end. I've taken up blog-stalking. And looking at people's pictures on facebook. Because that's what you do when you have a policy memo to work on.

only 6 more day and then I'll start trying to be normal again. maybe call people back. maybe.

Loving v. Virginia

Since I'm working on my final papers in the NYU law school today, i thought I'd share a little bit about the law with ya'll today. Enjoy! Now back to studying for me...

Found on Slate.com

Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving* grew up as friends and neighbors in Caroline County, Va. In June 1958, Richard got 18-year-old Mildred pregnant, and the young lovers decided to get married. Ordinarily, that would have been the respectable thing to do. But Mildred was black, Richard was white, and the Commonwealth of Virginia and 15 other states still had laws on the books prohibiting miscegenation. Mildred and Richard had to travel to Washington, D.C., to get married in a civil ceremony. Then they returned home to Central Point, Va.

A few weeks later, the local sheriff literally burst into the newlyweds' bedroom and arrested them for violating Virginia's Racial Integrity Act. ("If any white person intermarry with a colored person, or any colored person intermarry with a white person, he shall be guilty of a felony.") The Lovings were convicted by a judge who wrote, "Almighty God … did not intend for the races to mix" but agreed to suspend their one-year jail sentence provided they left Virginia and didn't return for 25 years.

The couple moved to Washington, D.C., and Mildred, hoping to end this exile, pleaded her case in a letter to Attorney General Robert Kennedy. Kennedy referred her to the American Civil Liberties Union, which agreed to represent the Lovings. In 1967, Loving v. Virginia reached the Supreme Court. Citing the 14th Amendment, the court overturned the Lovings' conviction and ruled that all anti-miscegenation laws would henceforth be null and void (see the opinion below). "Under our Constitution," wrote Chief Justice Earl Warren, "the freedom to marry or not marry a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed upon by the state." At least two subsequent Supreme Court justices have Mildred Loving to thank for the legality of their own interracial marriages.

The Lovings returned to Virginia, but, sadly, they enjoyed only a few years together before Richard was killed in a car accident in 1975. Mildred survived the crash and lived an additional 33 years. She died yesterday at 68.

Sometimes, even ambassadors like to dance

Well, i think so. I'm not really sure who was an ambassador and who wasn't, since Us Weekly isn't full of their pictures.

Leila

So, thanks to my friend Leila (fellow Mormon Wagnerite, who also happens to work at the UN), I volunteered at the Ambassadors Ball that the UN Hospitality Committee hosted last week. Ambassador's Ball, surely you jest, I'm sure you are thinking to yourself. Well, believe it. It was at this amazing place called Cipriani, a former bank (and not like the Washington Mutual on the corner) right across the street from Grand Central Station. Paris Hilton had her 21st birthday party there (and fyi, it is way too fancy for her). In any case, it was amazing!

I had to dress up, and luckily I had that fancy bridesmaid dress from meghan's wedding that suited the occasion perfectly.


Lovely ladies, leila, me, and Ellen, all gussied up to greet the rich and famous.


Leila showing her philipino side in this darling dress with the biggest sleeves ever.


My partner in crime in selling raffle tickets, a lovely Iranian woman. but focus on the two classy dames behind us. They were definitely my favorite characters. We think they are Russian, and very hoity-toity.


At a ball, of course one must get a picture with a distinguished looking man. This is me with Babak, another new Iranian friend and fellow volunteer.




Dessert. Yum. So much for my no chocolate diet.

summer tax holiday = bad idea

According to a New York Times article, for the first time in years the sale of compact cars has exceeded those of S.U.V.s and light trucks, due to the high gas prices. While I'm sure the auto industry and oil companies are concerned, I think this is GREAT news! Finally, people are making better decisions for the environment and economy. With any luck, this upward trend will actually lead to people driving less and the creation of innovative technologies for more fuel efficient vehicles, or better yet, alternative sources of energy (and not biodiesel, which has led to rising food prices in developing countries. Can I just point out that producers are growing corn so we can fuel our vehicles instead of growing food crops for millions of people worldwide? This is so incredibly wrong.) As for the McCain proposal to eliminate gas taxes for the summer, well, this just makes me so angry. It is just a ploy to appeal to low- and middle class voters by claiming to be giving something back to them. But what are they encouraging people to do? Go on vacation, spend more money in the economy, not save, and make sure that the oil industry continues healthy and keeping us in their iron grip. Sure, it'll save people a few bucks when they fill up their tanks, but enough? No. And McCain is under the impression that as soon as the kids are out of school, the family packs up the minivan and drives cross-country to Yellowstone or someplace. Nice idea, but in many communities, this is a fantasy because parents have to work (to be able to afford gas at all), and a vacation costs more than the tax on gas, especially in the weakened economy. and then Hillary has jumped on as well! People, the tax cut is 18.4 cents per gallon!!! You can't even get a slurpee with what you'd save on filling up at the 7-11!

Here's what Obama is saying about it. He has some good economic advisers.


We need leadership that will push for a sound energy and economic policy. The current administration (and the people proposing to continue the policies of the current administration, ahem Mr. McCain) are set on the destruction of the nation and oblivious to the environmental realities that we face.