Musings on Mormonville

For the first time in my (rather pathetic and short) career as a blogger, I have a legitimate excuse for not blogging recently. 

I am in college. 

You have no idea how long I've waited to say (or type) that sentence. 

Although honestly, it still hasn't hit me. The classes aren't really hard. At all. In fact, I'm typing this during my Introduction to Film lab, as we Twitter-stalk our TA to find out when his birthday is (it happens to be today—Happy Birthday, Joshua!). I still eat at a cafeteria; the only difference is now I eat there for almost EVERY MEAL. (Yes, I'm already sick of it). For all intents and purposes, I feel sort of like I'm on an extended vacation with midterms and lectures. 

Of course, this is no way lessens my excitement. 

So, at this point you should be wondering: why isn't this kid blogging more? He has all sorts of exciting stories to share. And it's true, I do. So I am going to make a conscientious (if not successful) effort to share these exciting stories via this significantly under-read blog.

That's right. Be excited. 

Today, however, I'm going to let you down. I have no story to share today, because today I have done three things: go to my Book of Mormon class, take a 2.2 hour nap, and eat lunch. (I guess blogging during my film lab counts as a thing, but three things sounds better than four. Get over it.)

So I have no story. No writing sample. Nothing really of interest to share with any of you. Essentially, this blog post serves just to distract me from watching all the important parts of Super 8 to learn about linear narratives. You might as well just stop reading now. But I'm gonna keep typing. 

I'm gonna be straight with you, and all of my Mormon followers/readers are not going to understand this at all. I was not thrilled to be coming to BYU. Don't get me wrong, I've been excited about college since the fourth grade. But BYU seemed...weird. In my (highly irrational) mind, BYU seemed like a college full of self-righteous Mormon kids with the same views and the same ideas, gathered together to take Mormon classes from Mormon professors and watch devotionals every Tuesday and all campaign for Mitt Romney. 

But that's not what BYU is at all. 

Sure, we're all Mormon. Sure, I haven't heard a swear word since Mid-August. But that doesn't lessen the ideological diversity that exists here. There's a club campaigning for Barack Obama. We watched a documentary about Satanic coal-miners in film. There's a Gay Pride flag in the windows of a couple dorm rooms on campus. And while each of these things has individually infuriated a large portion of people on campus, I love them. It shows me that I can be simultaneously in a community that shares my standards and not sacrifice individuality. 

So keep that in mind. Just because a (HUGE) group of people share one core trait doesn't mean they're all the same, or even compatible with each other. Every person is a bundle of insanely complicated feelings, thoughts, and perception. Even Mormons can hang Gay Pride flags in their dorm rooms. 

And that is why I love college.