Piggyback Serenades Among Other Birthday Surprises.

Saturday I turned nineteen. And it was one of the strangest birthdays I've ever had. No, no. Reword that. It was the strangest birthday I've ever had. I... don't even know where to start. It was interesting. It was a little scary. And yet it was probably the most fun I've had in a long time. Rachelle claims that this whole experience is... not put-into-words-able. I hope to prove her wrong. And this will probably be very long, but I hope it is entertaining. Or something.

A note on Michael first. He confuses me a little. Everything he does it so weird, unconventional, and often socially unacceptable, but somehow... still cool. I have no adjectives to describe him. Rachelle agrees. Somehow all these really, really strange things he does and says are somehow endearing. Just because he is constantly hyperactively operating, I think. He has so many surprises to throw at you... and it's like... I don't know... free entertainment? He just never stops. I don't know. I've never had such difficulty writing about someone. I'll write a paragraph, look back at it, and realize, No, no. That can't be right. That makes him sound just down right creepy. But he's not creepy. And then I try and fix it and it doesn't work... Whatever. This is my best try.

Thursday night, Michael came over (surprise surprise). I was sitting in the living room, and Ingrid was in the kitchen with the door closed. Our doorbell for our kitchen entry rang. I didn't move. I didn't feel like getting up and talking to people. Ingrid apparently was feeling the same way, and didn't answer the door either. When no one opened the door, we heard an insistent knock. Another pause. Ingrid finally answered.

There is a vent in the door between our kitchen and living room, so I could hear everything that was going on. Michael asked if I was home. Ingrid told him I was in the living room, and before I knew it he was sitting on the couch with me asking about my plans for the weekend.

Hm. Weekend? I thought, and answered, "Well... I don't really have any plans. We do have cleaning checks Saturday morning."

"Well, that's not very exciting."

"I know, and I feel like I should do something exciting, since it's my birthday and --" Oops. Shouldn't have let that slip.

"It's your BIRTHDAY?" Michael's eyes suddenly had this crazy glint in them. And it was really frightening. And I began to fear for my poor birthday. I could see plans starting to formulate in his mind behind his eyes.

"Yeah," I said sheepishly. "On Saturday."

Michael continued staring at me with that crazy glint in his eye, and an almost evil grin. "RACHELLE?!?!" he suddenly yelled.

Upstairs, Rachelle heard her name and answered, "Is that Michael?"

"MAYBE!!!" he yelled playfully.

"Oh! What do you want?"

"I NEED YOU!"

And with that I was shoved upstairs and Rachelle came down to conspire against me with Michael. Well, I could kind of hear them, but no actual words, so I busied myself by cleaning my room. Maybe if I cleaned I wouldn't have to think about it. Honestly, birthdays aren't a big deal for me. I don't really expect gifts. I just like being with the people that come with the gifts. And I like surprises. Just not when I know they're coming. "NO LISTENING!" Since I wasn't even trying to eavesdrop, I didn't answer. But I didn't hear them talking anymore after that. Then, at one point, I heard them go outside to discuss my fate. I could feel the beginnings of terror looming in my insides. Just don't think about it, Jenna. Don't think. There's nothing you can do about it anymore.

I was eventually called down, and we watched videos on YouTube with my computer together. Except I noticed that there was now a word document open on that little bar at the bottom of my screen. I looked sideways at Michael and then Rachelle. I had a little glint of hope that perhaps I could see what their connivings for me were, but after another hour passed on the computer the logical side of my brain told me that it was probably a planted fake conversation. After planning a surprise like that, wouldn't you be kind of paranoid about leaving evidence? And even if you did carelessly leave your conversation on my computer, after using it for an hour, you'd probably notice that you left it open and desperately get rid of it before the recipient of said surprise saw the evidence.

At midnight, Michael left, and Rachelle went to bed. I looked at it. First line said, "How about we take her to LA?" The terror came back instantly. And then, 'mid-freak-out, the logical extremist side of my brain tickled the back of mind to get my attention again.

"They wouldn't do that," it said. "That's too expensive a birthday surprise for poor college students. Besides, they aren't stupid enough to leave that on your computer that long. They left this on purpose, to throw you off." With a little more convincing, the logical extremist portion of my brain had restored my sanity, and then I was left to wonder about my fate again.

Friday went by slowly. I cleaned for a few hours, got tired of that. Stayed up until midnight just to say that I had been conscious for the dawn of my nineteenth birthday. And then I zonked out around 1am. I woke up again around 8am, and didn't get out of bed. I just laid there, meditating or something, I guess, until my little sister called me around nine to wish me a happy birthday. She passed the phone around until I had talked to my whole family, and then I finally got up and started to super clean the kitchen. As I walked in, I blinked. Wow, Rachelle hauled some trash in here last night. Well, I cleaned and I cleaned and I cleaned. And then Rachelle came home, and then we both cleaned and we cleaned and we cleaned. Cleaning inspections started at eleven. A little past eleven, someone knocked on our door, but it wasn't an inspector or a landlord. It was Michael.

"Happy, happy birthday, Jenna dear!" he sang, Primary style.

"Hello!" I said, sponge in hand. He looked disappointedly at it.

"You still cleaning?"

"Yes."

"You're always cleaning." He came in. Looked at our kitchen. And looked a little awed. He went back to his apartment to make his cleaner. Rachelle went with him to teach him how to line the stove with aluminum foil. And then she came back.

"Jenna! They're going to check our vents!"

"WHAT? That wasn't on the list!"

"They're checking Michael's!"

Dang. Well, cleaning the vents while they were attached to the walls was a strange endeavor. So Michael came, and took the vents off the wall. The screws that were holding them in were interesting... and Michael was so excited he got to use his tools. (He's a construction management major... so he has pretty much every tool imaginable AND he knows how to use them skillfully.) Well, after we scrubbed our vents clean and replaced them, I was hungry. I fixed myself a makeshift leftover lunch with mushrooms and sausage (mmm) and then, finally, the landlady came over to check everything. I shuffled my feet in the kitchen nervously. She started by saying, "All right. I'll start by checking the part that everyone always fails."

She went straight for the wall behind the oven. Felt it. And then turned back to look at me with a surprised look on her face. "But you've done an excellent job..." That's right. I spent hours on that wall alone. The grease buildup on it took forever to get off. I don't think anyone had gotten through that layer of grease and dirt and food splatter for years.

And then she continued through our kitchen and checked everything. And everything passed instantly. "Good job," she said. "This is the cleanest apartment in all of Red Brick." And I'm not going to lie, but that ushered in a bubble of pride. Cleanest in Red Brick. Finally. The landlady left, and I sighed in relief. Beat that. BEAT THAT.

Jackie usually gets asked on dates first, before the rest of us. And Rachelle tagged along once, and reported that she spread vicious gossip that I was messy and untidy and that I never cleaned. No. No, Jackie. I am convinced she doesn't know how to clean. She wimpishly wipes things. If she has to use any muscle whatsoever to get something off, she stops. And she only uses paper towels. All she does is spread germs around, not get them off or kill them. And I could go on, but I shan't. Suffice it to say that when she's grown up and married and her children get sick more often than mine due to lack of cleanth -- it won't be my fault. I've tried to teach her cleanliness and it isn't working.

I went to take a shower, and decided that since it was my birthday, I was allowed to have as long a shower as I wanted. The hot water was luxurious. I came out to hear a clamor in the kitchen, so I shut myself in my room and blow-dried my hair. Got dressed. Made myself pretty. Well, it was my birthday, after all. Who doesn't want to look nice on their birthday? But then Michael yelled up at me to come down. "JENNA! We have cake batter bowls for you to lick and presents to open!!!" Presents? Hm. Presents. I hoped that I wouldn't have anything useless. But I was excited to lick some bowls.

I came down to see Michael in an apron in my kitchen. He presented two bowls two lick. One was vanilla batter. The other was German chocolate. And he and Rachelle looked pleased. Kristen, my return-missionary neighbor (she went to Hong Kong), had also come over.

"Two cakes?"

"We marbled them. One is golden vanilla marbled with German chocolate, and the other is German chocolate marbled with golden vanilla." Hm. I had wanted a marbled cake. I hadn't told him though. I had told Rachelle.

There were two presents sitting happily on the table. One was very small, wrapped in tin foil. That was from Kristen. I opened it and found the tiniest book I'd ever seen, entitled, "The Paper Bag Princess." Now, I believe every girl should have this in their collection, and also every father's daughter. I also believe that every father should read it to his daughters as a bedtime story. It's short, and it's cute, and it's good.

Basically, a princess named Elizabeth is about to marry a prince Ronald. Except then a dragon comes, eats pretty much everyone in the whole castle, burninates her clothes, and whisks away her Ronald. Elizabeth then proceeds to look for something to wear, but finds nothing but a paper bag. She puts that on, and then decides to rescue her prince from the dragon. She finds the dragon and tricks him by taking advantage of his pride. He burns all the forests everywhere to show off until he's out of fire, and then flies around the world a couple times at supersonic speed to show off. Then the dragon passes out and Elizabeth finally gets to save Ronald... except then... we found out Ronald is a jerk. He takes a look at her, complains that she is greasy and ashy and sweaty and only wearing a paper bag, and tells her to come back later when she's dressed like a real princess. Well, Elizabeth tells him he's a bum and then leaves him there. And they didn't get married. What a happy ending, I think.

Then I opened Michael's present. It was wrapped in newspaper. I ripped that layer off. And then found it was wrapped in duct tape. Well, I got vicious, ripped that off. Another layer of duct tape? Graaawwrr!!! I ripped that off too. There was a garbage bag box, then. I opened that, found a whole bunch of newspaper in there. I ripped that out. And then, wrapped in aluminum foil and electrical tape, was a DVD shaped package. I ripped off the foil and found, wrapped in a grocery store bag... The Incredibles. Michael had gotten me a movie? He'd spent that much on me for a present? Not to mention that he had already provided the cake mixes and everything. (And also, apparently, he'd been fixing our kitchen drawers while I'd been in the shower.) But I did really, really like that movie, and thus expressed my delight.

"Let's watch it tonight," said Michael. I agreed that that was a good idea. And then he said playfully, grinning largely, "Well, we have an activity planned for you!"

"What?"

"Roadtrip! We're going to LA!"

The logical extremist in my head passed out at that point (how could I have been wrong?) and I gasped, "WHAT?"

Then Michael laughed mischievously. "No, we're just going hiking." The logical extremist in my head woke up again, checked out, and checked into a hospital.

"Oh," I said, weakly, and honestly, in relief.

He looked very pleased with himself. "Hehe, did you see that word document that we left you?"

"Yes," I said. "But I thought it was fake."

He looked disappointed. "You did?"

"Yeah... remember, you were using my computer for an hour afterwards. If you really had been absent-minded enough to leave that open, you would have seen it, and deleted it frantically. So I decided it must have been fake."

"Ohhh..." Well, Michael went to get his hiking bag, we all filled up water bottles for ourselves, and we left to go hiking in Rock Canyon. Once we were in Michael's car, he insisted on opening the whole adventure with a prayer so we didn't get killed while driving over. We got up to the trail head and started hiking. He even carried my water bottle for me so I didn't have to do that. Michael was keen to find beautiful spots and insisted that we take pictures every time we found one.

We were having really random conversation. At some point he wanted to know -- "Jenna. If you could have any superpower, what would it be?"

Well, of course I knew exactly which one. "Time manipulation," I said instantly.

"Reeaally?" He looked delighted. "I've thought about that extensively!!!"

Double take. You have? Usually when I answer that I would want time manipulation, of all things, people give me a funny look, consider it for a few seconds, comment that they've never thought of it before, and then move on to a different question.

"In fact," he said, "that's why my Gmail name is timelore." He went on to explain about games he had played when he was little about being a wizard named Timelore. I listened for a while, and then decided that even though he seems to have been thinking about it his whole life about being able to manipulate time, he hadn't thought about it as in depth as I had.

[Side story. As long as I can remember, I've had a little fiction story running in my head. My main character was Amadiora (of course she's a princess -- I made her up as a little girl), and she had a major secret. She could manipulate time. She could freeze it, like Michael fantasized doing, but I thought the far more useful thing she could do was rewind it, and relive it, while no one else realizes that this is the second or the third or the hundredth time they're doing this same thing (except for a minor case of dejavu). Useful? Yes. Of course. You could get an infinite amount of work done in a small amount of time. You'd just have to make sure you did everything that needed material evidence like written homework the last time through the timeline. And just think -- if you do something really stupid on a date? Just rewind time and your date doesn't remember. Just got stabbed and you're about to bleed to death? Erase that, and then dodge as many times as you need to until you get out of that fight unscathed. And I could go on long enough to write several whole books. No, I think I've thought about it more extensively than he has. Sorry, bud.]

We found a river. Michael helped us across after Kristen suggested he put a flat rock she found under the wobbly rock in the river to stabilize it. Then he helped each of us across, and we did a mini-photo shoot. Meditating... on the rocks in the middle of the river... etcetera. It was very adventurous.

We kept going until we found a bridge. We decided that this was the perfect picnic spot. Michael put down his pack and pulled out snacks. He had oranges and bananas, as well as some Goldfish. Kristen had some carrots and potatoes. I ate some fruit and some Goldfish. Then Kristen taught me how to properly use chopsticks, and from what angle to try and grab the food from. Then we had Goldfish races in the river. We got up and continued hiking.

Before long, we got to another bridge. This time, there was a large pipe running alongside it about a meter from the edge of the bridge. About twenty feet below it rushed the river. Long drop. With rocks at the bottom. Ow. Michael hopped up onto it, started to cross... I looked over to watch him, not quite sure it was the best idea in the world. And then he froze in fear, chickened out, and then crossed the bridge with me. I gave him a funny look, without thinking, and then he stopped walking. "Ooh, that was a glare of death. Like you basically just said, 'You pathetic wimp.' I'm sorry, Jenna, I'll cross that pipe for you on the way back."

"Oh no!" That wasn't what I had been thinking at all! "You don't have to --"

"Yes, I do... yes, I do, Jenna," he responded playfully. Dang it. He probably thinks his manhood is in danger or something. He'll lose his pride if he doesn't cross it now. We kept walking until we found a cave. Michael jumped in, declared it wasn't that interesting, and then we turned around to hike back. Michael kept making nervous comments about that pipe. And finally he said, almost michievously, "Oh, I know. You could hold my hand all the way across from the edge of the bridge."

Not quite sure what to say or do, I laughed a little. It was a long drop if he fell. And I wasn't quite sure a handhold would keep him from falling. It was a really stupid idea. Really. I wasn't at all quite sure what to think about this, so I just let myself be overwhelmed by the comicality of the situation. "And then your pride and your life would still be intact?" I laughed again.

"And my humility, since I'd have your help!"

Hm. I'm not exactly sure what's going on... "Okay, okay... whatever..." I said, mid-laugh.

Then he reached over and for a split second he put his arm around my waist. I had barely enough time to screw up my face into my "Holy crud, what are you doing and why?" face before he had already leapt back and was now regarding me with terror.

"What?" I demanded.

"You're... you're not ticklish!" He said it in an awed, horribly hushed, yet definitely playful, voice.

"No. No, I'm not."

"How can you not be ticklish?" he stammered in disbelief.

"I'm just not."

"Are you ticklish anywhere?"

... Hm. I don't think so. I thought. At one point Rachel grabbed my neck and I freaked out, so I had thought I was ticklish there. But no, alas. She tried it again later, and we discovered that I really wasn't. Sad day. "No, nowhere."

Michael looked so disappointed.

But then we got to the pipe. Michael took a deep breath, hopped onto it... and started to cross. Inch by inch. And thankfully, he never reached over for my hand, because it was a little far, and would have compromised his balance if he had. (Phew! Got out of that one!) And for once, he was absolutely silent. Inch. Inch. It seemed he was concentrating very hard. I would be too. That was a loooong drop. Inch. Inch. Finally, after about a minute, he got to the other side. And suddenly he was alive again. "Yeeaaahhhh!!! I got my manhood back! Whooo!!!" And he was giving everyone high-fives like he had just saved the world or something. I laughed a bit more, and I'm not sure why. I was amazed at his stupidness and impressed at his bravery at the same time. And confused too.

"Wow," he said. And then he looked at me. "I don't even know why I just did that."

I laughed a little. Usually when a guy does such tremendously stupid things like that...

"Oh well. I wasn't thinking about it. When you do stupid stuff, you can't think about it. You just have to do it."

And with that we walked some more. And then Michael started picking up these mongo rocks and hurling them into the river. Except he missed with one of them, and it didn't quite make it over the edge of the hill... so Michael, Kristen, Rachelle, and I start throwing rocks at that stubborn mongo rock with the sole goal of getting it over the hill into the river. We probably spent ten minutes throwing rocks... at a rock. I hit that blasted rock several times, but never with enough force to move it. And I was throwing fairly heavy rocks too. Michael finally hurled another mongo rock into it, and both mongo rocks went toppling into the river. We celebrated. Four-way high fives!

And we walked back some more... and every once in a while, I'd realize that Kristen and Rachelle were far behind us, and I was pretty much walking alone with Michael. Hm... I came to later find out that they were doing it on purpose (curses!)... because apparently, they couldn't help it. ("Let's walk slower!" Kristen would whisper to Rachelle. "Okay!" Rachelle would whisper back.) We finally got back to the paved road, and were getting closer to the car.

"All right, someone has to have a piggyback ride!" announced Michael at his most playful after a discussion about what he'd do if he were a scout camp leader. "It's tradition!" What? Piggyback ride? Tradition?

"I'll carry your pack and you can give someone a ride," Kristen told him. Don't encourage him! Ahh!

But Rachelle. Dearest dearest Rachelle. "Michael! I'll give you a piggyback ride!"

This was obviously not what Michael had in mind when he said someone had to have a piggyback ride. At all. But Rachelle insisted. And insisted. And finally...

Michael hopped on, unsure of what he was doing. "Waaah!" chortled Rachelle. Michael's eyes were open kind of wide, and he was laughing his distinctive and outrageous laugh. And Rachelle was trying so hard to carry him. Some of the people behind us started to laugh and take pictures of the two of them, because it WAS a ridiculous sight.

Teeny little Rachelle. Tall Michael. Teeny little Rachelle carrying tall Michael = hilarious. But Rachelle couldn't carry him very far, and Michael got off quickly. Then he dashed in front of me and announced mischievously, "Your turn!"

Oh. Hm. "Come on, get on!" he insisted, in his happiest voice.

Gaah! I thought. I'm terrified of heights. I'm even more terrified of falling. And I'm not sure I trust this Michael not to drop me. Well, I guess if Rachelle gave him a piggyback ride -- whatever. Whatever. I hopped on. And instantly regretted it. You know those moments when you're filled with terror for no good reason? Where you feel your stomach migrating to your toes and your brains falling into where your stomach used to be? Yeah. I like having my two feet on the ground. A lot. And whatever made me think a piggyback ride was going to help me conquer my fear of heights was definitely wrong.

"Ah!" I said. That exclamation was followed by another and another and another, each more terrified than the last, and my eyes were shut tight.

Michael exclaimed happily, "You're lighter than my pack!" And lifted me higher up until I was almost at his shoulders. "Ah!" I responded.

He kept walking. And then... he started singing. "Good morning beautiful..." Tenor. First tenor. "How was your niiiight..." Fine, thank you. ... And, hold the phone, are you honest-to-goodness singing to me? "Mine was wonderful, with you holding me tiiiight..."

And then I realized just how tightly I was holding on. Not just tight. Really tight. Really, really, really tight. Well, I was terrified. I wonder if that was a good enough excuse? Whatever. Whatever. I just need to survive until he puts me down. Which for me meant holding on as tightly as I could. Survive. I will survive.

Well, I wasn't yelping "Ah!" anymore because I was busy listening to him sing. I curiously opened my eyes to look over at Kristen and Rachelle. They were talking to each other, and kept glancing over at Michael and me and then grinning. I shut my eyes again. Nope, not singing to them. And he sings to himself a lot, but I don't think "Good Morning Beautiful" is the sort of song he would sing to himself, especially with a girl on his back. Okay, so perhaps a piggyback serenade is unconventional. And although he wasn't particularly good, and he was a tenor instead of a bass, and was flat the whole time, he was confident enough to keep the tune and still enjoy it. So... I mentally crossed off "Be serenaded" off my list of things to do before I died.

(Booyah, Rachel. Booyah. I win. Except he wasn't a bass. Still have "Be serenaded by a bass or baritone" to cross off... We'll save that one for random pizza delivery guys, or dashing men who are tall, dark, and ominous. Yes. That's right. Who got serenaded first? Me! Okay. I'm done.) I had just kind of been hoping that I would be in a situation where I could concentrate on enjoying the serenade when it happened instead of irrationally fearing for my life.

I was silent until he stopped singing. He then asked if I wanted down. "Yes," I answered weakly. He put me down. I wobbled a little, and then started walking again on my own. Yikes. Glad to be down. And then we walked back to the car, and went back home.

Then it was decided that we needed to frost the two marble cakes. I decided that I wanted chocolate buttercream frosting. Mmm. I started making it, and got to use my happy little alien mixer that my daddy sent me for my birthday. Then my phone rang. But it wasn't the usual ring -- it was the ring that meant I had voicemail. Whhaaaat? That shouldn't happen unless someone called me first!

So I popped out my phone and looked at the missed alerts. Two missed calls! And a voicemail. The voicemail and one of the missed calls was Kathwren. The other was Ryan. The message basically said, "It's your birthday and you're not answering your phone. How rude." So I called her first.

Kathwren and everyone else in the Burchfield's van sang me a ginormous happy birthday. I laughed. It was amazing. Sister Burchfield was probably driving, but I got to talk to her, kind of. I could barely hear her. Don't worry, Sister Burchfield. I'll be home soon. June 20th. It's a Friday. I should be home home by evening time. After I talked to everyone or nearly everyone in the van, the call ended.

Then I returned my other missed call from Ryan. And he got to be the lucky one, because I was still talking to him when Michael, Kristen, and Rachelle were done frosting the cake, so he got live birthday celebration commentary. For lack of candles, Michael had arranged a bunch of matches in a "19" design on the cake. We had to carry the cake outside to light the matches because we weren't allowed to burn anything inside the apartment. And when the first match lit...

Zschoom, zschoom, zschoom! The flames ran across the numbers quickly, and the flame licked up into the air about three inches. My goodness. I'm supposed to blow that out? Yikes! I blew. It took some windpower to get it out, but that's okay. It had been a spectacle. We ate cake, while people socialized in the kitchen.

When I hung up, Kristen wanted to know who I was talking to. "Oh, Ryan. Good friend from my last ward."

Michael heard and blinked. "It wasn't your family? Oh. And you talked to him for that long? Woooow..." Hm. Poor guy seemed a little concerned, like he perceived a threat... haha. Although the thought made me stifle a laugh, I ignored it and enjoyed cake, cake, and more cake.

Then Michael left temporarily to do some economics homework, and Rachelle and I went to the store to buy a bit of food. We came back, tidied up a little, and then Michael came back over to watch the Incredibles.

We watched it, and Michael ate scads of popcorn and Rachelle and I ate scads of the flavored Tootsie Rolls. In the middle of the movie, my phone rang. Someone loves me!

I answered. Patrice! Well, Patrice and Jackie Bodily (not my roommate Jackie) were going to come visit me. Yay! I was really excited. Patrice hugs are the best. You can't have a birthday without a Patrice hug. When she showed up...

Patrice and Jackie sang Happy Birthday, and presented me with another cake. This would be my third cake. But it looked good -- chocolate cake with chocolate frosting with "Happy Birthday" written in caramel glaze. I was delighted. We talked for a bit. After they left, Michael mourned that he made a very bad first impression and that they thought he was a major weirdo. Haha. Probably.

When the movie was over, we were happy people... it really is such a good movie. And then suddenly, Michael went for the tickle again.

And again, not immediately recognizing his advances at tickle-attempts, I just gave him my weirded out "What the heck?" look. "Oh... I forgot you're not ticklish." Yes. Not ticklish. "Nowhere?" I shook my head.

And then he got down... and pulled off my sneakers with another mischievous look. "What... are... you... doing...?" I wanted to say, but it didn't actually come out.

He touched the bottom of my foot. I glared. "You're not even ticklish on your feet!" he said. "And I thought I was being so clever, too..."

Oh, is that what you were doing. He looked very disappointed. And a little lost.

Then we would talk some more, and then randomly he'd jab me in the side, hoping that I was ticklish there. All right, I had enough of just sitting here being jabbed. My hand shot out at his core for a vicious tickle. Let's teach him a lesson...

Except that wasn't the best place to try and jab. It was like jabbing rock... I remembered him commenting about his eight pack earlier during the hike... I had assumed he had been joking. Apparently I was wrong. So I jabbed his sides, tickling with mother-like efficiency (no one tickles quite like your mother, it's true).

He squealed. I wondered if this hadn't been his goal the whole time... to get me to tickle him back, but I jabbed in the sides until he finally pulled his arms tight to his sides so I couldn't tickle him anymore. So I stopped. No use in trying to tickle a rock. And instead we tickled Rachelle. But when we did that, it seemed like she was dying. So we air tickled her, and she still almost died. So we stopped that.

But then Michael had an idea. He grabbed my orange fleece blanket that I had made at girls' camp a few years ago... and bolted. I gasped and my eyes widened. Oh, no you don't. My blanket! It is in peril!

Michael had run out the door. Rachelle and I bolted after him into the grass volleyball court, and gave chase. No! My blanket, my blanket! And then little Miss Logic (nearly recovered from her stay at the hospital earlier that day) who lives in the back of my head, said, "You know, this is only a ploy, perhaps a subconscious one, to get a couple of girls to chase after him." I thought back, "Yeah. Yeah. Probably..." and then I thought. "Crud. I can't believe I gave into that."

But then I heard the blood-curdling scream of my poor blanket, "Jenna! Save me! A strange man has me! Save meeeeee!!!" And after a plea like that, you kind of have to go save your damsel, I mean blanket, in distress. At one point I nearly body-slammed him... but then he saw my proximity and threw the blanket over the net... dashing underneath to catch it...

And he missed. The blanket hit the ground. He yelled in horror and frustration as angel Rachelle immediately grabbed it and dashed for home. She ran as fast as she could with her injured knee... but Michael gave pursuit and was gaining on her. "Rachelle! Get the blanket in one of our bedrooms! If goes in there, he'll spontaneously combust!" (It's true. The BYU Honor Code forbids him to enter our bedrooms.)

But Michael was so close! I rammed him.

He was thrown off track for a few seconds, but it would have to be enough. Rachelle dashed into our apartment, Michael on her tail, and I on his. She ran up the stairs, but only one at a time... Michael ran up the stairs after her. Three at a time. And Rachelle was nearly up top, when he tackled her. She screamed shrilly enough to stop anyone's heart as she fell, tossing my blanket into her room in one last desperate attempt to save it.

"Noooo!!!" yelled Michael.

Blanket was safe. Past the doorway at least. I leapt over the tangled mess that was Michael and Rachelle trying to stand up without hurting themselves and pushed the blanket deeper into the room so that he couldn't reach it from the doorway. And then it was victory for the girls. Success. (Although I'm sure it was the chase Michael wanted more than the blanket itself, so I guess, in a way, he also won...) Michael, Rachelle, blanket, and I all panted for our breath. Blanket wheezed a few thank you's and we went back downstairs.

We sat back down on the couch to regain our breath, I with a cup of water in hand. Then Michael asked, "You know how I crack eggs?"

No. "On the knee. Like this." He took his hand, hovering it over my knee. "And then you crack it!" He hit my knee. "And then you just let it ooze..." And he let his fingers spread out from the center of my knee like they were oozing.

Confused, I just furrowed my eyebrows, gave him a weird look, and said, "You crack eggs on your knee?"

He blinked at me, again looking disappointed. "You're not even ticklish on your knee!"

I shook my head. I can't even tell when he's trying to tickle me, dang it.

He paused. "Are you sure that when they put titanium rods in your back they didn't damage your tickle nerve?"

I shook my head, but didn't say anything. I remember being ticklish when I was little. But after not, not so much.

I then decided to check my email for any birthday wishes. But no one had sent me anything. In fact, the last email I got was Ryan's little commentary that the pizza delivery expert, Nathan, was spineless. Michael noticed this.

"Ryan again? Gee, he's popular or something..." said Michael playfully.

"Hm, yes. He's pretty much my favorite person ever," I answered. And with that, Michael's face fell, and for a split instant, he appeared to be heartbroken. But then a split second later, he had hidden that and his face was a calm blank. (Rachelle can testify this is true. His visible pain was, sadly, very entertaining, though.) Perceiving a threat, he had to know more. "Is he from Arizona?" "No... California." "How old is he?" I laughed and explained he was only my age and thus was going on his mission to Australia soon. And suddenly Michael was happy again. I stifled another laugh. Haha. Michael had seriously thought I'd been taken or something. I decided not to clarify any further. Let Michael fear.

We watched a few videos on YouTube for the rest of the night, and then he left.

Rachelle had gone to bed a little earlier before Michael left, and I really didn't feel like climbing up into a bunk, so I turned off the light and curled up on the couch. Then Rachelle came down again.

She sat on the smaller couch, and said, "Jenna. I want thoughts on Michael."

"You mean my thoughts?"

"Yes."

Hm. In other words, she wanted to know if I liked him, but wasn't actually going to ask. "Michael is interesting," I replied. "And kind of scary. And really weird..." And really playful. And really surprising.

We sat in the dark, talking to each other. It wasn't like most girl talks I'd ever had. We'd spend a minute talking. Then it would drop off into confused, thoughtful silence the next. Both of us agreed that it was probably the most exciting day of either of our lives. It also worried me. I was confused about a lot of things, as was Rachelle.

Rachelle lamented, "I'm jealous. I want a boy..."

I laughed quietly. "You can have Michael!"

She laughed too, also quietly. "No, but he's taken now." (... No, he's not.) She shook her head a little. "Jenna, you're gong to have to give me lessons on picking up guys!"

"I'm not doing it on purpose!" I countered. Which would make lessons hard, would it not? I'm not at all trying to get guys. In fact, I'm nearly, but not quite, on the verge of avoiding such attention. But alas, I've been noticed and there's nothing I can do about it.

For the past week I've been trying to convince myself Michael doesn't like me, but now I don't think I honestly can pull such a major self-convincing denial job off. It is probably (most probably) true. Which means I will probably worry about it for ages. I honestly don't like being liked that much. It scares me and I don't like the unnatural level of attention. Whatever. Whatever! I shan't think about it.

We sat in silence for a while, and then Rachelle went upstairs to bed. I laid on the couch in darkness. And I stared at the ceiling for a few hours until I finally fell asleep.

The End. (How was that, Rachelle? Satisfactory?)

A New Place For Adventure, Perchance?

I moved into Monticello, my new residence for spring term! I will also be coming back to the same place for fall/winter next year. So far I have three roommates.

The one with whom I am sharing a room is Jackie -- dearest Jackie Corbitt! Except I have a minor fear that one of us might kill the other. Jackie and I are very similar. Except for a few things which often results in sparks flying. Dear Jackie is very... how shall I say... empirical? Well, of course. She's a physics major, and incredibly smart. She has a very linear mind -- very rational. Thus, she has systems.

I've got systems! But... hey, our systems happen to not coincide. And both of us are very resistant to changing these time-tested systems.

For example, take the instance of the peanut butter knife.

Jackie sure does love her peanut butter. She eats it... and almost nothing else. She'll take her knife, get a huge hunk of the stuff, and then she'll put it on a cracker and leave it. But Jackie has this irrational discomfort of eating in front of people. She doesn't do it. She binges in secret. Not really binging, though. She snacks and nibbles... grazes! She'll eat a bite or two. Leave. Come back two minutes, later, and do it again. By the time a few hours have passed, she'll have eaten tons, but none of it will be good for her.

I don't have a particularly huge beef with this. What I do have a beef with is the knife. It'll be covered in peanut butter. And she'll leave it. On my counter. Eew! And she gets upset if we clean it up, because in her mind, it only makes sense to leave it, because inevitably she'll come back and use it again. And thus cleaning it is a futile act, a waste of energy. What she doesn't see is the obvious mess, the blemish on my kitchen. It is quite frankly impossible to keep a kitchen clean when you live with Jackie. I've decided I can handle that, as long as I think of it in similitude of the impossibility of keeping a kitchen clean with children. (Except I do hope my children learn to keep tidy by the time they move out...)

Unfortunately, Jackie doesn't trust my judgment in the slightest, either. She won't listen to me or any advice I may give her. For instance... there is this one guy, Neil, whom I severely dislike and distrust. I tell Jackie exactly what I think about him. But... she keeps going on dates and doing things with him. What she says is that I don't understand, because he's a different person when he's only around her, and when there's a group of people around. I'm not saying I don't believe her. But... I don't. I don't. Jackie doesn't understand people. Well, at one point she told me that she keeps feeling that she needs to stop hanging out with him. I emphatically agree. And then she'll decide, once and for all... no more Neil.

But then! Neil will text, or call, or show up at our door... "Hey Jackie, let's go do something!" And Jackie responds with an enthusiastic, "Yes!" And off she goes. And then she'll disappear for hours and hours, and no one will know where she is. And then she'll come back late at night. Finally, Jackie told Neil she wouldn't date him any more. At all. Maybe Neil is really a good guy, but from what I can tell, he's pulling her strings... "Oh, Jackie, we don't have to date... I respect you... but in the time I've known you, I've become such a better person, and I really just like spending time with you..." etc. I really have no right to have decided this guy is not a good person. I really don't. There is no such empirical evidence to say such a thing. So... Jackie doesn't trust me. Maybe she shouldn't. Maybe I'm just a nutcase.

Maybe I am a nutcase. Last night, Jackie went away around 9 and then didn't come until after 2am... I kept wondering where she was... and finally, Rachelle said, "Oh. Jackie told me not to tell you, but she's with Neil." My heart dropped all the way down to my feet. Now he knows where we live again. And now...

I think the whole point of saying all that was to establish... that now Jackie and I have a big wall between us. I don't confide anything in Jackie. Every time I do, she gives me... a rather condescending look. A sweet, I-care-about-you look, but condescending nonetheless. And what frustrates me is that I'll say something, and she'll completely misinterpret it, and get extremely insulted. And she won't tell me. And so, I can tell she's offended, but she won't tell me what's wrong. Gaah. And she won't confide in me.

This is not a rant about Jackie. I love her dearly. If I wanted to rant, this would be pages and pages and pages long. But I feel I need to establish what the relationship between us is. All I'm saying is that there's a very tall wall between us, that we dance around and pretend is not there. But it is.

That is one roommate. Dearest Jackie Corbitt.

My other roommate, Rachelle Jackson, was in my ward for the last two semesters. She lived in 128, which I believe should have been collectively translated or something. I'm sure the only reason they're all still on Earth is so that the rest of us mere mortals can learn from their examples.

Rachelle and I get along much easier. We are both a tad OCD about cleanth. We are both competent cooks, and we almost immediately discovered that we functioned together nicely while cooking. We like to flip through cookbooks and theorize about cooking some of the goodness we see therein. And we could and would have if we had the ingredients. And when we are cooking together... it is like well-oiled machinery. Immediately when we get to a part in the cooking where only one of us can do the job, one of us unhesitatingly moves to put away used ingredients and clean up messes and dishes we've left behind. And the whole time we'll be talking and talking and talking. I do believe I am quite comfortable with her.

I know Rachelle, but nearly well enough, because I haven't lived with her that long. But... I do believe that I could confide in her. As long as I don't mind the information spreading to a few other people. Which I think is okay with things that I want to tell to everyone, but am comfortable in doing so. Things that I actually need as secrets that no one else will hear though... I still don't know who I'll confide in then. I suppose I could call or email Hillary. But if the situation got bad enough I couldn't ever tell something important over the phone or through an email. Gaah. Oh well. But I can tell Rachelle things, I think. And she tells me things.

I haven't lived with her long enough to be able to give you paragraphs and paragraphs about her. Just that I like her and that she will make the next two months a lot easier for me.

The last roommate I know about is Ingrid. I have had about five minutes interaction with her. But... this is what I know.

She's absolutely gorgeous, like an angel. She has perfect poise, perfect hair, perfect face, perfect style. And her eyes are beautiful. I remember eyes about people... they can tell you a lot about people. You can look in someone's eyes and see how they're feeling. And sometimes, if you're really lucky, you can see what they're thinking. Ingrid was a little aloof and distanced when I met her, but I think she was just a little nervous because she didn't know any of us. Mostly though, she's confident in herself and she has a very friendly demeanor. She kind of glows with happiness and peace, and I get the impression that she has a deep testimony, so I think that maybe she has the potential to become a confidant of mine. I also think that as long as she has her personal space she'll be able to keep her happy, sweet demeanor for the most part. She also has a wonderful laugh.

She's from Park City, so she just drops by about once a day with stuff, and then goes back home. Some time today she'll drop by... permanently.

We may have one more roomie, but we may not. It may just be the four of us.

I've decided that I really like my apartment.

When we moved in at first, my initial project was to set the kitchen in order... of course. I couldn't have any one organizing my domain. The kitchen is Jenna's territory. And oh. I am so pleased with the cupboard space. Cupboards. Everywhere. Which definitely makes it easier to have designated places for things. So Rissa (Rachelle's sister) and I set off to put things away. Except I found nasty surprises in nearly every cupboard. The last tenants obviously didn't know how to clean or organize, or throw away trash. I found cupboard after cupboard full of crud and grime and things that obviously should have made it to the trash. I found a plethora of gross, grimy dishes that I didn't even want to touch. It was even more disgusting than any disgusting pile of dishes I had ever found in 116's excuse of a kitchen. I threw most of them away, only keeping the ones I found left in the dishwasher, which appeared sanitary for the most part. I didn't trust my cleaning skills enough to clean that crud off of the rest of those things. There was the most disgusting dish rack I had ever encountered. There was a pool of stagnant water in the bottom of it, which smelled horrid and seemed to have turned pale yellow with months of bacterial growth or something.

Well, to say the least... I was rather upset. I had no outlet to vent my frustration except to clean and organize, which I was doing frantically. At some point in this process... the doorbell rang. ("We have a doorbell? No way!") I eventually found the landlord outside my kitchen door. He greeted me, explained who he was, and then explained what he was here for. "My wife said that the last tenant left this place filthy. So... if you like we can hire someone to come clean it up for you." Nuh-uh. This is Jenna's kitchen now.

"No. I'll clean it. I've already started anyway."

The landlord looked pensive. Then, "Well, just keep track of how much time you spend cleaning it, so that we can pay you for cleaning it up." With that, he left. And miraculously, my mood changed from just-barely-bridled anger to contentment. I didn't at all mind the idea of being paid to clean up someone else's filthy mess. So I went back to cleaning my kitchen happily. I got all our dishes put away into our cupboards... we now have a medicine cabinet above the oven, and a cookbook and recipe cabinet next to that. We have a spice cupboard, a plate cupboard. A cup cupboard. A bowl cupboard. A shelf devoted to Pyrex items. A shelf devoted to tupperware. A shelf just for mixing bowls. A shelf for Tupperware. A shelf for flower vases (we're girls... we get flowers... the flowers die, and we are left with an assortment of flower vases... I definitely the next guy to bring one of us flowers should forgo the vase and just bring us flowers...). A drawer for utensils and cutlery. A drawer for serving spoons. A drawer for all other utensils. A drawer for rags. A drawer for hot pads and oven mitts. A drawer for rolls of kitcheny things like Saran wrap, aluminum foil, and wax paper. And four humongous cupboards that could be turned into a pantry fit for a queen.

Oh, I could have danced right then. And I did. Only to look down and notice the horrid state my new kitchen floor was in. So... after I swept, I found the oldest mop I'd ever seen and set off to clean that. And then I discovered that my kitchen sink had one of those hose things that you can pull out and spray water anywhere with. I was rather pleased. ("Ooh! I can even rinse off behind the tap when I clean the sink now!") I used that to fill one of our trash cans and I used that as a mop bucket. I mopped happily. Then I cleared the table, cleaned it. Then I scrubbed the counters, since I didn't have any faith that they were actually clean. I scrubbed the happy little windowsill.

And then I looked around at my kitchen. It... was homey now. It was welcoming. It was old-style too. In fact, I might have been glowing right then. My new kitchen definitely had a touch of, "Ooh, look a bunch of girls live here!" That, of course, was okay, since we are all girls. It would even have been all right if it was a manly sort of place. It's okay for a girl to live somewhere that seems masculine. However, it is not okay for a guy to live somewhere girly. Oh, it is good to be a girl.Well, after that I moved on to my new living room. I... have not had a living room for a while. It made me happy. Well, the furniture was all in disarray. And there were boxes and boxes and boxes of Jackie's, Rachelle's, and my stuff all over the place. I sighed. And got to work. I got the feeling that my kitchen-OCD-ness will carry on into the living room.

Then I called Hillary and wished her happy birthday and such. I was quite proud of myself to working up the courage to call someone besides my family. Initiating phone conversations scares me like none other. I know, an irrational fear. But it's so much harder to tell what the other person is saying, and it's even harder to tell what is going on in their heads.

Then our doorbell rang again. Jackie and I answered it to find two men out there. They kind of looked at each other nervously, then proceeded to introduce themselves and ask if we wanted to go see a movie with their big group of people. I considered... I told them I might. Jackie went with them. I... didn't. I don't know what it is about having my home all in disarray, but my self-confidence goes down and my comfort level plummets. I couldn't leave. My house was dirty. And Jenna doesn't do well in big groups of people anyway. Rachelle also left some time later, but with a big group of her high school friends, since one of them was about to leave on his mission.

Now I was alone with the mess. I rolled up my sleeves and got to work. At some point, Ryan called me and I talked to him for a while, finding things I could do to clean with one hand. (I suck at holding a phone with my shoulder and neck. I suspect such cursed inflexibility was a result of that blasted surgery. Gaah.) After he hung up, perhaps to call Hillary and wish her happy birthday, I continued my more efficient two-handed cleaning. Then, I went and stood where I could see the whole room. It was a mess, but I needed to know where things were going to end up.

Here I used my imagination. I painted a picture in my mind of the finished room. Hm. The long couch can stay where it is. But I will not have the television on the coffee table. Ooh, there's a desk over there. I shall leave the desk there. And and I'll put the television there. That would be better. And then I can put a printer next to it. Oh, but then you wouldn't be able to see the television from the little couch. Never mind. The little couch looks better where the coffee table currently is. And the little side table will go between the long and little couches, so that it forms a V. Then I can put the keyboard where the little couch is now.

Then I noticed where the electrical outlets were and distressed a little about that... but in the end, I decided my initial plan was better. I moved and moved things until it resembled a real living room. At this point, I was quite exhausted. I should have gone to bed right then. But I didn't. Bad idea. I started thinking about the people I missed. That got the tears going. And then I started thinking about my family, and I lost it. I was up for a few hours after that. I didn't do anything productive. I just thought and thought and thought viciously. It wasn't a good thing to be doing though, because the more I thought, the sadder I got. I finally slept around 2am.

Sunday came, and I woke up to see a beautiful view. I had commandeered the top bunk. And there was a window up there. I had left the blinds open, so I could see everything that was going on as I fell asleep. I like watching people as they go about their lives and they think no one is there to watch them. And so I just laid awake for awhile watching people walk by. I pulled my computer out from under my pillow and turned it on, as I do every morning when I wake up. I didn't have a desk, so I had made my top bunk the place for it. When I'm not sleeping it'll be my desk. When I am, the computer goes under the pillow, and I sleep.

I got up and got ready for church. I didn't feel like prettying myself up. But I did anyway with the encouragement of my roommates, who patiently reminded me that this is the first time the guys in the ward would ever see me. I didn't tell them, but I thought that maybe that meant it was a better idea not to dress up. I have a hard time when guys only talk to you because you're cute.

We marched up to church... which was in the testing center. It was rather bizarre having sacrament meetings in those cursed desks where so many people's lives and grades had been decided.

I met lots of people in a short amount of time. But a few stood out and stayed with the three of us... his name was Michael Smith. RM, like all the other guys in our ward... he'd been back from Albania for six months. He is also kinda good looking... I remember his eyes were blue and friendly and happy, but just a little uncomfortable. Well, this is my impression of Michael. He is rather eager to make friends. I think he can't stand not having anybody. And so now his life is in limbo. So he smiles an awful lot, and throws compliments out like pretzels, hoping lots of people will like him and thus become his friend. He speaks rather loudly too. But... I think he could be a good friend. He'll ask questions, but not because it's the polite thing to do. He seems genuinely interested, and he listens. And he talks fluently and easily, so it is easy to carry a conversation with him, because he'll throw out good questions that you can give real answers to. My guess is that he'll either make lots of friends quickly, or people will think he's obnoxious. I haven't figured out which case it'll be though. But that is my first impression.

Another RM, Kristen, has been back for a month. She went to China. She's quite friendly, and she also, like so many of the people I've met, sort of glows with happiness and peace. She is also quite confident in life and herself. She'll remember your name if you spell it... at least that's my guess since she always asks how you spell your name before she'll remember it. And then, as far as I've been able to tell, once someone has spelled out their name to her, she doesn't forget. I'm Jenna, J-E-N-N-A. Jenna. She knows my name. And Rachelle's, R-A-chelle. And Jackie, with an I-E. I think I could get closer to her if I wanted to. She lives right next door.

After church we all napped like crazy.

Ward prayer was at 9pm in the parking garage underneath one of the neighboring apartment complexes, the Granary. We went down there and I sang alto with Kristen, which earned another compliment from Michael... "Oh, go alto!" And then we went around and introduced ourselves. Then we sang another hymn, with one guy conducting it with his opened pocketknife. Michael says, "Oh man, you're soooo good!" I haven't quite figured out how to respond to Michael's abundance of compliments yet. So I just smiled. They went through announcements. Then we sang happy birthday to someone named Clay. Kristen and I harmonized exactly the same way. We looked at each other and smiled... but Michael didn't seem to notice that Kristen had been harmonizing too, but enthusiastically complimented my harmonizing skills. I smiled again, not sure what to make of the concentrations of compliments on me...

After ward prayer, everyone collectively went to one of the guys' houses. It was an actual house. Big. Nice. And importantly, clean. Rachelle and I found a corner and stayed there, not quite sure what we were doing here. We were going to leave... but then we were noticed. Nearly every guy came and introduced himself to us, and talked to us for about five minutes each. Not a single female soul came and talked to us. Suspicious.

One thing I absolutely hated though, was that when they would find out that Rachelle and I were both pre-med and that I was a neuroscience major... somehow we weren't human girls anymore. Superhuman or something. But not real people. It was worse when one conversation turned into how Jason hated math. And when they found out I loved math... I was even less human. Gah.

I appreciated that Michael still thought that Rachelle and I were still human beings. He even invited us to go watch a movie with him at his place, but then Rachelle doesn't watch anything except for church movies on Sunday, so we declined. Michael was sad, but we said that we wouldn't mind watch the Testaments or something churchy with him next Sunday. He liked that, and then Rachelle and I went home.

We were going to make rolls, but then Rachelle remembered that she had promised Ryan to call him today. She did that. I wandered around aimlessly as she did that, waiting to make rolls. When she was done, we set to making them and talking and talking and talking. We stayed up till about 2am doing such. We also attempted to decide which pie we'd make in May. But they all looked so good. I wanted to make the key lime pie in May and then the chocolate creme pie in June, but Rachelle begged that we do the chocolate first. So that's what we'll do. The grasshopper pie looked tempting too... But we decided on chocolate creme and that's that. Thursday is May, so we have until then to decide.

Well, sorry, that was long, but after all, I am in a new environment. There is so much to describe.

Much love and pancakes,
Jenna!

P.S.
Oh, what joy! I got the B- I was hoping for in physics! Yay! You don't even know how HAPPY I am about that. It was the hardest class BYU has to offer. Most often failed. And... I didn't fail. I got a B-. Yay! And the best thing, I think my poor ego is still all right. I've decided that I don't really need beautiful GPA... it's about learning and not the grades. I learned a lot. And that's all that matters. Okay okay. I'm still mourning the drop in my GPA. And ego is quite bruised. But no tears. I'm okay. I promise. Haha.