Loving Me; or The Self-Aggrandizement of Nate

"Don't sit and worry what they say;
you are more than they'll ever know.
No time to be afraid."  --Natasha Watts

Over the last few years, I have been told by many sources that I am not up to standard. They said I wasn't good enough, righteous enough, rich enough, thin enough, well-written enough, experienced enough, etc ad nauseam. I heard it enough that I repeated their words to myself sometimes. Some of these sources were institutions or companies I wanted to be a part of. Some of them were pretty girls I wanted to marry. Some were family members.

In the face of this kind of feedback from people or groups who I admired, it was easy to take the Nard Dog's way out. Instead, I thought about Piglet.

For the first 17 years of my life, I thought Piglet, Winnie the Pooh's forest-dwelling friend, was a girl. When I was finally told the character is actually a boy, I had to accept it. My perception had no bearing on the reality of the situation. Similarly, all those people who told me I wasn't "enough," had no bearing on the reality of me.

Cause I'm a freakin' rockstar.

Without further ado, here's why I'm "enough":

In 4th grade, we had to team up for a month-long class competition. All my friends--and my crush--joined forces with the popular kids. I got stuck with the two dirtiest, most-unpopular kids in the grade. But I accepted the situation and determined we were going to do our best. We beat every other team, tied with the popular kids, and won a pizza party for the three of us. And my crush admitted her love for me later that year.

See what I mean? Pure rockstar.

I wrote my first poem at six years old.

I'm good with kids. I started babysitting as a teenager,but I've been an uncle since age 2. Children are so much fun to work with. I've taught youth theatre, help raise nieces and nephews, and taught elementary school. Plus, I was a kid myself, and a pretty cool one.

I played knights and castles a lot when I was a kid. At 16, I decided that I wanted to learn to swordfight for real. I looked up a national fencing champion who lived nearby, found him, and asked him to teach me.

 

  In 11th grade, my hard-nosed AP US History teacher often used the name of my God in ways that have been forbidden. I wrote her a polite note asking her to refrain from that. In return, she pulled me out of class, hauled me down to the teacher's lounge, and gave me a tongue-lashing on my disrespect and foolish ways. My mom told me I didn't have to put up with that and urged me to drop the class. I said no. I finished the class, got AP credit for college, and then submitted an essay on how American education was teaching us book-learning but not actual life lessons or morals, using this situation and teacher as an example. It won a Top 10 Award that came with a nice cash prize.

I earned my Eagle Scout Award in May of 2006 with 25 merit badges. By July, when I aged out of Scouting, I had 45.

I graduated from the LDS seminary program at 18. For those unfamiliar with that, it means that from ages 14-18, I got up at 5:00 a.m. every day and attended an hour-long religion class before my high school classes. I memorized more than 100 scriptures and graduated with 107% attendance (on vacation in other states I would attend multiple classes)

In high school, I was dating a college girl. Bam.

As a teenager, I rounded up more than 50 kids and adults and led them in an 11-month journey to create the film Pan. Along with my best friend, we shot a 30-minute modern-day re-telling of Peter Pan, a la Baz Luhrman's Romeo+Juliet.

With no budget, no script and no equipment except an old home video camera and a home-made boom my buddy designed from PVC pipe, we shot, if I do say so myself, a surprisingly well-made movie that had comedy, romance, and drama in it.


I spent three weeks on my own in a foreign country where I did not speak the language. I left with dozens of pages of interviews, facts, figures, and pictures. I then spent four months compiling those into a 1st-draft manuscript that went into a book my brother was writing.


When I was 19, I was ordained an Elder and volunteered to be a missionary for my church. I wore the black name tag and knocked on doors and invited people to learn about Jesus and live by His teachings. I taught lessons, baptized people, ran meetings, trained new missionaries, and performed service like helping people move, visiting nursing homes, and chopping wood and clearing the all-invasive blackberry brambles of northwest Oregon. I was a guest lecturer at Concordia University where my companion and I taught about LDS beliefs. I did this 15 hours a day, for no pay, for 18 months.

Twice on an airplane, I've had women give me their numbers unbidden.


I completed the Glenwood Polar Bear challenge.











After seeing That Thing You Do! as a nine-year-old, I decided to become a drummer. So I taught myself to play the drums.

 

And the bass. 

and the guitar. 

In 2011, I taught acting classes and directed plays at the SCERA theatre, directed Narnia: The Musical at another theatre, worked as a copywriter for an SEO company, worked as a writer and editor at my university's newspaper, worked at a Provo restaurant, was performing with my band, participated in church, helped my friends start a theatre, and carried on a relationship. I was also taking a full load of college credits. All at the same time.

I spent two weeks on my own in a foreign country where I did not speak the language or know anyone, in the middle of a massive government protest. When someone tried to blow up the resistance leader, I told all the guards I was a reporter, snuck under the cordon, shot photos and interview people, and reported the story to Western media before any of the major new sources.

I was courted by a lot of colleges, but I only had eyes for one. I was accepted to BYU (Provo) not once but TWICE, four years apart.

I watched Work and the Glory III with Gordon B. Hinckley and some popcorn.

I was a member of the best group of roommates who ever existed.

I dance like no one's watching, but everybody does.

My curly hair is unbeatable.

I didn't read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows until 2009. The real feat here is not letting anyone spoil it for me for two years. 

That first poem I wrote, at age six? It went like this:

Oh as the stars fade,

oh as the stars fade

It makes me feel like I am prized.

And, as you know, I am prized.

21 years later, that's still true. Others can say I'm not "enough" of one thing or another. But I'm so much of me.

My name is Nate.

And I'm an awesome guy.

Debts & Wages: Part I

There are a lot of articles being posted online about how the class of 2014 is "The Most Indebted Class Ever" and it's only going to get worse. The argument people make really boils down to two things:

1. Getting a higher education is expensive.

2. The jobs available with the higher education don't pay enough to get you out of debt. 

I'll be the first to decry the ridiculous tuition costs most universities charge, but let's examine that first argument. To preface my argument, we need to remember something:

Harvard University, a name that is almost synonymous with higher education in the United States, declares that it is "devoted to excellence in teaching, learning, and research, and to developing leaders in many disciplines who make a difference globally." Let's dissect that statement. "Excellence" is defined as "a talent or quality which is unusually good and so surpasses ordinary standards." The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) for teaching are as follows:

The last word is communities. Their site layout is wonky.

So, now that we know what the standards are, we have a better idea of what "excellence" Harvard is talking about. As long as Harvard is exceeding, can anyone gripe that they are not fulfilling their end of the bargain? They said they would deliver X product for Y tuition. I don't think anyone can argue that Harvard is not turning out "leaders in many disciplines who make a difference globally" when they boast these people as graduates.  

In exchange, Harvard charges about $46,000 per semester.

At this time, I invite you to go re-read The Joker's advice. 

Getting a Harvard education is expensive. No one's arguing that point. What people seem to be unhappy about is that, armed with a diploma, the jobs available make it impossible to live at the graduate's desired level of comfort and pay off their loans. 

There are a couple of a elements to the equation then. 

1. Desired lifestyle
2. Amount of debt. 
3. Amount of income 

From where I stand, it then makes sense to take your tuition dollars to a university that gives you a good ratio of the three. If that's Harvard, kudos to you. If it's University of Phoenix, that's fine too. I've known Ivy League grads and community college kids, and they were all in pretty good places in their career. One of my mentors when I was a teen graduated from a small community college out west and, after working for a three-letter government agency now holds an important position in a globally-recognized energy company. Not bad for less than $30,000 in tuition. 

I'm frustrated because I see lots of people complaining that education is costly and jobs don't pay much. I think we need to remember that education does not always equal high income. Archeologists are very educated people but get paid pennies. We're all familiar with teachers who are incredibly smart and good at what they do and get paid poorly. 

The issue is, no college has ever promised "Earn our degree to make $150,000/year!" They just say that they'll teach you enough about biology or chemistry or political science to bestow a bachelor's degree on you. If a business requires you have that degree in order to be hired, that's not really a concern to the college. They're in the business of bestowing degrees. Businesses are in the business of hiring employees with skills or knowledge to earn the company money. You are in the business of knowing enough to do a job worth X dollars a year. You get to fill in the X. 

If you think you're paying too much in tuition, then go somewhere that's more in your budget. That's a no-brainer. If you think your degree will not land you the income you want, then you should learn a skill or earn a degree that will. 

But the real point that we seem to be missing is that universities exist to teach people how to think. It wasn't until about 900 years ago that universities starting teaching skills that related to jobs (and that's only because guilds and corporations were sponsoring the university to do so) 

I can really only speak on my personal experience. I went to two universities, one private, one public. They cost roughly the same; about $2,300 per semester. While I did take out a student loan, the majority of my tuition was paid by my parents (~$9,000) and Federal Pell Grants (~$15,000). 

At this point, you might cry foul at my position in this post. Sure, it's easy for me to tell people not to complain; my education was paid for. I'm very grateful that my parents spent money on me that they earned for themselves. We can get into a discussion of parental responsibilities and love, but the fact is, they shelled out a lot of cash to get me an education. After I graduated, I helped a few others with their college expenses and plan to continue to do so. As far as Pell Grants go, I'm not special. Lots of people can get those, and it makes financial sense for the government to offer those. In the job I work (which I could only get with a college degree) I will have repaid my Pell Grants in the form of income tax with the first year or two of post-grad employment. And then I will continue to pay those taxes for the next 40 years. My college degree was one of the best investments Uncle Sam ever made. 

At the end of the day, we live in a capitalistic nation. Schools get to charge whatever they want. If they charge too much, students stop going there and the school either closes or lowers its tuition. Adam Smith's unseen hand guides American education just as much as it does the marketplace. 

Holding Hands to Konstantine

"I just lip-raped your roommate."

That is not what you want to hear the girl of your dreams tell you on a hot July night.

It was freshman year of college and I was on top of the world. Two months out of high school and I was in Provo, Utah, surrounded by more beautiful women than my phone contact list could hold. But one stood out: Anna Hawkins. I met her standing in line at Brigham Young University's Cannon Center Sunday afternoon and she blew me away. Her dyed pixie hair bespoke her rejection of cultural norms and the fact that she played bass in a band called Origami Freeway just made her cooler. She was not your average Mormon girl.  Plus, she loved Something Corporate, one of my favorite bands. I was pretty sure I knew how everything was going to play out. We become fast friends, I'd serve a mission and she'd write me faithfully, and afterwards, we'd go to the temple and be sealed as husband and wife for ever, roll credits.

                          

In chucks, there is love. 

As the youngest of my parents' nine kids--all of whom went to BYU as well--I'd read the script enough to know how these things worked. After all, each of my siblings had gone off to the Y and fallen in love with wonderful people who were now their respective spouses.

The only problem was that while Anna was the first girl to catch my eye, the first guy to catch her eye was my roommate. And she was as hopelessly in love with him as I was twitterpaited for her. And the thing that drove me nuts was he had zero interest in her. It was just like that time when the kid who didn't like pizza won the pizza party in 4th grade. What a waste.

So we all chased each other. I'd call her to do something and she'd say "Sure thing, invite your roommate!" Balls. And we'd all hang out and I'd try to build a relationship with her and she kept pairing off with my roommate. We were all good friends and even had a band--or the idea of one--for a little while. They were both my best friends. I felt like Ron Weasley in Book IV.

One night, I got a call from Anna. Her and my roomie had been off on their own. I answered and was immediately greeted with "I just lip-raped your roommate." There must have been a burning orphanage nearby, because I found myself getting uncomfortable and hot and angry. With a few more details, I pieced together that she had gone to drop him off and finally moved in and kissed him. And without reacting in any way, he had turned and gone inside.

She was hurt, she was rejected. She needed a friendly shoulder, so she turned to friend-zoned Nate. In hindsight, I'm flattered. In the moment, I was anguished. That was supposed to be my kiss! I think I kept my replies somewhere between pissy and consolatory.

Life went on. Me and my roommate went on missions. Anna traveled the world making costumes for BYU's Young Ambassadors. Although I was thoroughly friend-zoned, she kept her promise to me and wrote me a couple of letters soaked in perfume to show my companion I had game. We kept the friendship going. She even admitted she really had feelings for me once after I got home...only to explain a few days later "I think I just really missed you. But, friends?"  

A few years down the road, we both wound up back in Provo and it so happened, Something Corporate was playing in Salt Lake City. Their last show in Utah of their last tour. Ever. We HAD to go. Besides, girl+boy+going to an event. It was, like, a date. We spent the day on the roof of the library and visiting an LGBT thrift shop, where we tried on butch vests and leather pants.    

                

That night, deep in The Depot in downtown SLC, we sweated and screamed along with Andrew MacMahon and his boys. It was everything a concert was supposed to be. New friends, our favorite band, loud music, and a beautiful girl next to me, a girl who I'd been building up feelings for for five years.    

And then, they played Konstantine. Anna's favorite song. Heck, this was SoCo's song. The one the die-hard fans used to distinguish themselves from the fans who became fans after the band was big.



And she grabbed my hand and held it.

Fingers entwined and everything. We stood in sweaty awe of Andrew playing his piano and blissed out, and I took in the lights, the sounds, and the feel of her fingers in mine.

When the concert ended, we ran down the street, ecstatic in post-rock glory. And we screamed in overload. And we sang out songs for Salt Lake. And we bought a gallon of water and took turns chugging it on the way to my car.

And you know what? It was enough. Years of wanting to hold her, kiss her, share life and a last name, and after all that angsty college love, holding hands to Konstantine was enough.

It's been four years since the concert. I stood in line and cheered when Anna and her awesome husband made their honeymoon getaway. I went to their homewarming party and stood around awkwardly. And it was fine.

       

                                                                 That's me with the arm. 

 Eight years after I met this cute punk-rock girl from Reno, we're still friends. We went on Space Mountain together last week, and shared a Monte Cristo sandwich and complained about calories. And we were happy. Not every relationship has to be a romance.

I come from a culture of true love and romantic happily-ever-afters. The stories of how my grandfather romanced my grandmother, how my dad wooed my mom, and how my bevy of brothers and sisters ended up with their mates would make even the hardest heart soften and swoon. I had been taught to head West and find The One. With all that, I thought I needed a soulmate. And I'm sure she's out there somewhere. But along the way, I made fast friends with a girl who's exactly what I need: a buddy.

In Anna, I found a true friend.

                           
And that is wonderful.

Carwash Worries

whumpwhumpwhumpwhumpWHUMPWHUMP

The yellow, wet carwash Muppet-things were beating the tar out of the side mirrors I'd been looking at since I was 16. When they finally took a break to regroup, I could hear a solitary drip-drip-drip from inside my passenger's door.

Water dripping down inside the door would fry the window's gear, putting another of my windows out of commission. If the Muppets made another pass, I'd probably lose a mirror. That would be super pricey to replace. Would it be worth it? What if the water spraying the undercarriage caused something to give up? or blow up? With 165,000 miles under her twice-replaced belt, my green Honda Civic, Eirey, may be approaching the tollbooth that leads to the great highway in the sky. If she died, I'd have to buy a new car. That'd be expensive. My job didn't play me enough to be laying down cash for a new car and making payments. In fact, I could lose my job and then I'd have to move in with Mom and Dad and I'd never be a real man.

I'd be that guy who's in his mid-thirties, telling you about his big plan that clearly would launch him into successful, independent adulthood, while you send that eye-signal to your spouse that says "I know, it's a shame, but we can't help him. Meet you at the car."

As I sat there in a Wisconsin carwash, listening to my door going drip-drip and wondering how I'd get to Mom and Dad's without a car, it clicked.

Worry is the opposite of Faith. Worry is the realization that relying on my own strength will not solve life's dripping doors. Faith is the belief that God has better solutions than me and will provide them as--and when--needed.

If my door broke, He can provide a way for me to fix it. If I need a car, He can arrange for a Dodge Ram to get stuck in the bush. Or Something. I don't know. He does. That's why I need to stop worrying about how my solutions don't measure up--because God's solutions to my problems far surpass anything I can come up with.

Prior to the carwash, I'd spent a week focusing on having faith in the face of what seem unpleasant difficulties. As a Kansas-sized fan blew the water droplets off Eirey's hood, I realized that worry and faith can't coexist in me. If I'm chewing the former, I'm not trusting the latter.

Addendum:
As I wrote this, I realized that I'm a grander-scheme-of-things Eirey. Getting the mud Muppet-whipped off you can be scary and doesn't feel good. But if you let all that Midwestern winter salt corrode your soul, you'll face a serious breakdown at some point. It's better to go through the carwash and have faith that God will get you through, rather than fret over your own bumbling attempts not doing the trick.



Let faith wash worry off you, and get back on the road.