[四十七] 同性婚姻

Wow, this is still an issue so I would like to write about it.

Put shortly, some time over our winter break, Utah became the 18th state to legalize gay marriage.  What a shocker.  I assumed some 10 to 20 years from now we would have a sort of Gettysburg-esque march on Salt Lake City during the second Civil War before Utah ever became even the 50th state to legalize gay marriage.  Nevertheless, it happened, and society, as well as all of the government buildings, is up in flames right now.  Just kidding.  People continued to live their lives as before, except for homosexual couples at least.  But there still seems to be some popular resistance from my more conservative colleagues, so I'd like to put the issue in a different light for them.

Marriage is legally-binding contract.  It only takes a sacred form within religious contexts.  The United States government is not a theocracy.  There is a specific clause within the U.S. constitution prohibiting establishment of a state religion and mandating religious practices.  Basically, within the context of the law, marriage is a secular establishment.  Legislation cannot and will not force any church to bless same-sex marriages, but simply allow a state's secular court, and by extension religious groups who do bless same-sex marriages, to legally recognize these marriages and grant to them the benefits that married couples enjoy, namely: health care, joint tax filing, parenting rights, pension, inheritance, FUNERAL LEAVE FOR DEATH IN THE FAMILY, etc. -all the boring non-lovey-dovey stuff we all seem to forget about.  Voting against marriage equality benefits neither you, nor your religious organization, in any way whatsoever (unless you really take pleasure in other people's spite).  It does, however, deny access to all of the lovely aforementioned benefits to thousands of deserving couples.  The law could care less how you or a religious body chooses to define marriage, just like it doesn't care that Mormons believe in the Book of Mormon or that Jews don't believe in Jesus.  If you are Mormon, I hope this example really resonates with you because if the majority non-Mormon population of the country had it their way, bookstores might be legally inclined to sell your religious texts in the "fiction" aisle, or some other horseshit law like that.  The real issue isn't how marriage should be defined, but whether a ruling class should be allowed to set a religious standard on a secular issue.

Now for some common arguments from the opposed:

"Homosexual relations are unnatural!"
     Actually, several species of other animals, including mammals, have been observed having homosexual relations, and almost all credible scientific communities in the world recognize that it is a natural phenomenon.  Monogamy is also observed in other species.  Marriage, however, is unique to humans, so you can argue that it is unnatural.

"But they can't make babies!"
     If procreation was an issue, then why is it just that a sterile man or woman may be married but a homosexual couple cannot (try to take all religious perspectives out of you answer to this question)?  Or, if you're a woman, would it be right by you if your husband left you after menopause for a younger woman?

"The government is waging war on God!!!"
     Uhhhhh, no.  We have yet to have a non-Christian president, most of the country would refuse to vote for a non-Christian president and most opposition to marriage equality is from conservative Christian groups.  I think the faithful are very clearly not the persecuted ones in this case.
     Also, as the government cannot force your church to bless same-sex marriage, a negative vote would only prevent other churches from legally recognizing what they believe is ok.  You would be oppressing them.

"But the Church says..."
     Alot of my friends happen to be Mormon, so I will use this example.  The LDS church forbids consumption of tea, coffee and alcohol.  But would you go so far as to legally ban these things from being sold within the state?  Of course not!  There are still state liquor stores, and if you wanted to open a shop and choose not to sell any of these things, no one should be allowed to force you to.


You want to have your beliefs respected, so please respect those of others.  To those of my friends who are on the other side of this debate, please understand that the goal is not to make you change your views.  I only ask that you make the right choice when it counts for others.  Vote for marriage equality.

"Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you."  Luke 6:31

[四十六] 來

Sometimes everything you could possibly want out of life seems to just fly into your face.  Sometimes it turns out the universe was just setting you up to kick you in the nuts.  To that universe I say: bring it on, is that all you've got?  It will take an army to bring this hopeless optimist down!

..That said, this still kinda sucks.  Hugs would be much appreciated.  :[

[四十五] 問

The heat is unbearable.
I'm shivering.

I just want to press the damn button.
My fingers are frozen.

It's really just a simple question.
Then why does my heart want to bust out of my chest?

Story Time!

So I just asked my friend on a date.  Yeah.. That just happened.  Just a couple hours ago actually, so I've regained the ability to sit still by now.  I can't say it went exactly how I imagined, but nevertheless, I am super thrilled that she agreed to go.  I asked her as a friend, but of course asking anyone out implies at least some level of interest.  Thus, my fears for the future are now as follows:

• I really really hope this doesn't balls up our friendship.  Like I said, she's probably my favorite person to talk to and if this creates an atmosphere of awkwardness or discomfort, I'll hate myself forever.
• What will our mutual friends think of me?  I know a couple of friends have had feelings for her in the past, and part of the reason my crush on her has been so on/off is I didn't want them to feel betrayed or anything.
• What the hell do I wear to a contemporary dance performance???  Comments appreciated..

Also..  Goddamnit Justin, asking over text too?!  Have you learned nothing???  >__<

[四十四] 音樂

Kinda Feeling Down

School is about to start in a couple days again (while all my friends in Utah are starting midterms..  xD  booyah) and, honestly, I'm just about having the most shittastic time of my life right now.  I've just never felt like this much of a failure 'till now.  It's been a long three and a half month summer of job applications for minimum wage positions, yet I only manage to land one interview, which apparently went really well, only to be turned down yesterday.  My money situation will only continue getting worse by the day, my focus in school is starting to be affected and now it seems like inexperienced high school kids are more able to land a job than I am.  To be honest, it's sort of depressing!  I'm not a usual moody type, and I can't help but think like this at the moment!   I mean, would it kill the balance of the universe to grant me even some small stroke of good luck this once?

Hell, why not?

I haven't written about my love life for a few months, so I guess I'll post a little update.  I've kind of had this on/off crush on a friend for the past couple months now.  I really don't know what I am to her.  You could say I'm a wimp that's afraid of heartbreak during those periods that I deny these feelings (The "off" part of on/off).  I don't necessarily struggle with confidence issues, I just harbor too much doubt and, thus, tend to assume the worst.  My first impression of her was sort of indifferent to be honest.  She's the type that most guys would chase for looks alone, and for all of freshman year I was very cautious around her so as to not fall for the trap.  hehe  Some freshman drama and unforeseen circumstances later though, we winded up being friends.  Despite my doubts though, I just feel so at ease around her; I don't enjoy conversations with anyone else more than I enjoy talking to her, and having her company sort of brightens my day.  Also she kind of has a really adorable laugh.  ahahaha "kay, that got a bit cheesy right there..  I'm pretty sure all this is kind of an open secret; there's a mutual friend that I'm almost certain has mentioned this at least a couple times.  I just never openly talk about it.  Either way though: god I hope she doesn't read this.. That would be sorta embarrassing.. Maybe it's better just to get it over with and openly admit it?  aiyaaaa Nothing about life is straightforward..

Musical

I've never realized what a sucker I am for music, at least until about a week ago that is.  I've been a musician since the 4th grade, I play four instruments and I spend a good couple hours every day just listening to music.  But never before have I been brought to tears by the opening theme music to a TV show..  (Until last week..  xD)  The animation for the opening is beautiful as is, but only the accompanying music could have my feels explode like that.  Indescribable.  Well I'm sure it's describable, I just need to work on my writing skills more.  That said, this short paragraph I farted out onto my computer screen really isn't doing the music video I'm trying to talk about any justice, so I'll cut it off here..

'Till the next time!

[四十三] 壞運

I'm freakin' out here man..  0__o  I've just been plagued with bad luck.  Some kind of curse, I think..  Either way, there is some supernatural force out there, and I've pissed it off somehow.  All my food is spilling, I'm tripping up staircases, I ballsed up cooking rice on a stovetop, only to have a rice cooker I ordered arrive in the mail only minutes later..  I'm afraid the severity of these instances is gradually increasing.  The next one may be my life.  I'm not paranoid!  ..   There's someone at the door..  I'm going to go answer it now.

...

No one was there..  It seems it was just adlkvwaleknfmlakscmfn lkajfdzoL3QH>CWQE EQHGB:WSL?SHGW;B2jk./DHJSKHJDLSKJBA;JBJV;DALFJKWNHLO BK

[四十二] 無業

It's halfway through summer and I'm STILL looking for a job..  WAT  The best part is I got rejections for 2 of my applications today..  This whole "lacking a job" thing has kept my summer pretty uneventful so far, hence the lack of blog posts that no one really looks for.

I was in the shower last night, where many great thoughts seem to manifest themselves, and thought of a post topic that I thought would be fun to write about:

THINGS I DO THAT PROBABLY FREAK PEOPLE OUT:

1. I like to look around.  Like a lot.  Like I check out my surroundings to an abnormal degree, and I have no idea where it stems from.  I don't suffer from paranoia or any other anxiety disorders and it's not because I often find random things particularly interesting.  I've just caught myself doing it quite a few times, so I'm sure other people have noticed.  What I'm most afraid of is one day someone at the airport or on the bus will tackle me out of nowhere or something because it looks like I'm up to something.  It's also caused more awkward sudden eye contact moments than I'd care to think about..

2.  I talk to myself, and imaginary people.  Like a lot.  I'm not schizophrenic or anything.  At least, I hope not..  I don't see people that aren't there.  It's just how I work out problems in my head.  When I explain every detail of a problem to an imaginary person, I understand the solutions better when my mind reads them back to me from a 3rd person perspective (software engineers do this all the time: It's called rubber duck debugging).  I do this so often that sometimes I don't even realize I'm talking to myself out loud.  So don't worry everyone I walk by on the streets.  That voice in my head isn't actively encouraging me to kill you or anything.  xD

The more I sit here and think about it, the longer the list grows.  For now though, these are the only two I can think of coherent ways to explain.  I'll write about the others in the future.  haha  Off to bed.  Night!

[四十一] 再見我的小朋友們 :(

I probably just experienced the roughest week of my life college career 18-year old life.  So many things just happened to converge to this small amount of time that I was physically, emotionally and mentally overwhelmed.  Looking back, I feel guilty now since I was a total downer the whole week, but that's why I'm blogging about it: to get it out of my mind, thus making myself more productive in doing my research papers.

Physically Exhausted:
All this going on seriously affected my ability to sleep.  No sleep = cranky me.  The end.

Mental Exertion:
I have two research papers due this Thursday as well as my first final exam scheduled for Saturday morning.  I'm nowhere near prepared for any of my finals, yet these papers are holding up my study time.  Simultaneously, I need to start packing since immediately after finals week, on June 15 (我的生日 hooray..), is move out day from beautiful Mesa Court.  I'm also diving headfirst back into the job-hunting process.  If I didn't look at all these step-by-step, I wouldn't even be able to comprehend how I would be able to get any of this done.

Emotional Turmoil:
So many important things are just happening right now that I have to miss out on.  My sister and best friend from high school are graduating high school this week, but for many reasons I can't be there for them.  Really disappointing..  And then I got thinking about my past: bad timing but once there, it wouldn't leave.  On top of that, I still can't help but feel like a third wheel sometimes with a couple of my friends.  I don't know what their situation is, but the past couple hangouts with them honestly weren't much fun.  Then again, the fact that it was a shitty week probably made everything seem terrible..

The biggest thing impacting me at the moment though is the end of this year's term of Jumpstart service.  Jumpstart is the early childhood education program that I work for.  We're basically language arts teachers for preschoolers.  After spending a full school year with these kids, I've gotten so attached to some of them that the thought of never seeing them again blows me away.  Jumpstart has really been a significant part of my freshman year, and I'll be proud of my work with them for a lifetime.  This Thursday, it really will be hard to fight tears when we sing our goodbye song for the last time.  I'll close off this post with what I'd like to say to each of my preschoolers.

Heaven:  You're such a smart girl.  Reading to you was always fun because you paid the most attention to the story.  You're the funniest preschool girl I've ever talked to, hearing your jokes during reading time, or even just hearing you call me names really does brighten my day.  Also thanks for teaching me so much Spanish throughout the year.  I have absolutely no worries for you in Kindergarten or through the rest of school.  Just don't forget me.  ^__^

Cesar:  You are a crazy little kid, but very intelligent and a gentleman.  Self-control is something I bet you'll develop better than everyone else because of how much you get in trouble.  hahah  But having you switched to my group, while frustrating at times, was a great pleasure.  I will miss seeing your well-dressed and smiling face in the mornings.  I really wish I had your game, and the girl to eventually marry you will be a lucky one indeed.  ;)

Monica:  Y R U SO SHY???  You are a bright girl with an incredibly cute smile/laugh.  My favorite part of Jumpstart sessions was playing outside with you and Natali because that's when you let go and let yourself shine.  You will have absolutely no trouble making friends through the rest of your life.  Have fun in Kindergarten next year and be a good influence to your baby brother.  :)

Diego:  You, sir, are a STUD.  It's unbelievable that a 4-year-old is better looking than most celebrities. If I could look as good as you do now, I would be set for life.  On top of that, you're a sweet kid (always pushing everyone's chairs in after reading time) and already so organized (cleaning up after yourself and making sure everything is put away exactly in the right places).  Cesar has some competition coming in the near future.  Don't become too much of a heartbreaker.  :D

Josh:  I love all of you in the class equally, but I will miss you the most Josh.  The way you connected with me this year (by virtue of your initial proficiency in English) is incredible.  Even though you were sometimes just as troublesome as Cesar, you always behaved when asked (not forced) and always took a deep interest in the books I read to you.  I'll miss answering all the questions your curious mind had to ask: you will have no problem completing your education because you always have such a drive to learn new things.  I wish I could just adopt you and be your older brother ( I haven't heard great things about your brother..).  Don't follow in those footsteps.  I really hope you grow up to live a wholesome life away from bad influences.  Please stay away from trouble and continue to do as well as you have this year.

I hope we all cross paths again sometime.  Maybe someday I'll be one of your high school teachers or college TAs.  Or maybe one of you will end up helping me in someway.  'Kay gotta close this off now.  The tears are coming, and I really need to make progress on these papers.  For now: 再見我的小朋友們.  :')

[四十] 氣死了

Yay time for my monthly blog post!  ...  Ok so no one probably reads this, but it keeps my thoughts in order.

Title: 氣死了.  

I've mentioned before that I've felt out of the loop here at the dorms, (imaginary?) troubles with other residents, etc.  However, I assure you this one is real.  It's an example of a perfectly good quirky friendship gone bad over what should have been something small.

Let's get to the point.  The exact story doesn't belong on a public forum such as a blog post, so in the simplest terms: uncontrollable circumstances resulted in a situation where said friend did not get what he wanted.  Now most people have an internal system that allows them to come to terms with situations like this without becoming a detriment to their social groups, but not in this case.  Since that incident, this friend has only become very inconsiderate, increasingly unstable and extremely prone to bouts of pure rage.

For the most part, I've tried to stay in the middle ground, although his roommate was the only true mediator.  This weekend he finally broke through my patience bubble and I called him out which sent him into another destructive rage.  The next day, he defriended my facebook account (which admittedly takes a lot of burden off my mind) and I've resolved to talking to my RA about it because I am genuinely concerned for the safety the others in our friend circle.

NEW TOPIC!  I want to move on to something happier: Love Life!!!  <3

Oh wait, no that's still sad.  LOL  </3

Here's what's going down.  I'm interested in a girl again, but I feel like a total ass because I've thought I liked about 3-4 girls in just the past two or three months.  How I feel towards this girl isn't exactly a crush..  None of that matters anyway though because I'm not even looking for a relationship for three main reasons:

1. I'm not sure how I feel about her.
   
   I don't even think I could call it a "crush".  If I had to put it on a scale, I'd say it was well below a crush and more towards "admiration."  I'm not really sure how to explain that.  I don't open up easily to people, so to say I have a crush on someone I've known for just a few months is pretty weird to me.  I guess it's admirable how she's handled everything that's gone down in the past couple months so calmly (situation explained above).  It's also admirable that the reason all of that crap has gone down lately hasn't inflated her head.  So I have a lot of respect for this person, but is it a crush?  I don't really think so, which I think kind of ties into two:
2. I don't even think I'm ready.
   
   I think I've written about the end of my last relationship before.  I'm glad she moved on, and last time we talked, I felt like I could talk with her comfortably again.  Sometimes though, I still catch myself thinking about what it would be like if I chose to stay in Utah.  In short, I still miss her sometimes, and it really scares me.  I'm scared to go back home this summer because I'll likely see her.  I'm scared that if I do find someone here, my mind will wander to the past, which could hurt the new girl.  And I'm scared to lose one of the few good friends I did make here.  My friendships with many of the people I met here have since fallen through (the most recent one described above), so the links I have left are very valuable to me.  Plus, the last time I rushed into a relationship, said relationship lasted only four months (three if you don't count the last few weeks that we couldn't even look at each other) and came to an anticlimactic text-message end.  To be fair though, that probably won't happen this time because:
3. She's likely not interested anyway.
   
   Disney fans beware: there is such thing as "out of your league."  It's not really a confidence issue.  I don't mean to brag ladies, but I speak four languages and play four different instruments, one of them: the manliest in the land.  That's right!  I've played the flute for 10 years!..  oh wait...  So maybe flute isn't the most impressive sounding instrument and one of those four languages is "Music"; the point is, I don't have confidence problems.  Some things simply are, and this one is probably out of reach.  This has been at the top of my head for most of the year, so while all the other guys have been infatuated with this girl (and another, but that's a different story), I was more than happy just to be making any friends.  I guess I could be content with that.

Last Topic: School - Upper Division Classes!

Freshman year might be a bit early to start enrolling in upper division classes..  but I felt like the past two "quarters" (the UC system's name for trimesters) as well as my senior year of high school lacked any significant challenge.  The result: senioritis and a severe lack of practical time management skills.  I'm very worried that I don't belong in this class yet.  The content is straightforward, but elaborating on it, providing my own input, is a tremendous task.  My textbook shipped late, and so I'm three weeks behind on reading, and I'm not even sure what the TA expects from me with regard to the weekly assignment (of which I missed 2).  It's way past deadline to drop the course, so I guess that as long as I put forth and honest effort, I won't feel too terrible if it's the first class I ever pull the big "F" on..  (I'll still feel pretty bad though.)

In Conclusion

A lot of things I post on this blog are pretty personal, but the reason I like to keep this sort of personal diary on a public forum is because it makes me feel vulnerable, and when I'm vulnerable is when I see  myself in the most critical light which hopefully helps to improve myself as a person in the long run.  The fact that anyone, especially people that I know, can read this forces me to put 1000x more thought into what I have to say, and just that helps me to think through my troubles 1000x deeper.  This has turned into a really long post (about two and a half pages single spaced), but I appreciate everyone who has taken the time to read it, and I really really don't know how many people actually read this (the 1004 total pageviews have to have come from somewhere, right?), but I really appreciate all of you that do.  So whether you're just one person who has feverishly read my posts 1004 times, or 1004 people who accidentally clicked on that strange link with Chinese words on it: 感謝!

[三十九] 平等

So the news is really lighting up this week about the supreme court hearing out the gay marriage cases, and I'm pretty happy to see the majority of my own friends supporting it.  The others?  Well, they are still my friends.  No one is flawless right?  hehe  And it's important to respect beliefs, which even they do.

I don't remember if I've actually written about this issue before, but I'm going to highlight it again here.  First off, sexuality is not a choice.  Pretty basic.  Second, I don't feel that actively protesting people to change their beliefs is very helpful.  Attitudes are very impressionable, but often only when you are young, making attitudes toward homosexuality pretty generational.  For example, Bob Jones University had a ban on interracial dating based on religious claims (sounds pretty archaic right?).  This ban was in effect until as recently as the year freaking 2000, when it was finally lifted by the university president.  If you didn't guess, Bob Jones III was a healthy 70 years old at the time of the lifting.  One more example: the most common argument against gay marriage I see and hear from my Mormon friends is this little gem:

That article was published back in 1995.  However, as more members of the church come to realize homosexuality as natural, the likeliness of the new church leaders sharing this view increases.  Many people like to present these kind of documents to justify their belief, but if we look further back in time we can also find things like the 1843 and 1886 Revelations published by the church claiming God's support for plural marriage.  If we look at the LDS church today, you will notice a significant lack of plural marriages.  If a document like that can be invalidated, so can The Family.

In the harshest terms, people who still oppose gay marriage, like modern racists, are a dying breed.  As long as we actively participate in getting the right laws passed and continue to teach the younger generations the correct way, everything will shift to the way they should be.

[三十八] 失敗

I'm nearing the end of my second quarter (UCI has a weird trimester system, but we call them quarters) of college, and grades this second quarter are kind of bleh.  I put almost all of my effort into the environment class and writing this quarter.  As a result, psych and math kind of suffered.  I think I let them fall into this mindset that they are "freshman throwaway classes."  Psych 9 is literally the same class as AP Psych, and Math2A is the same as AP Calc.  Now I need to work my ass off to get a decent grade on the final.  Needless to say, next quarter this will not happen..  For now though, the goal is to keep my gpa above a 2.5 so I can still submit my study abroad application.  heh  That's all I can really say for now I guess..