Reverb 10: Beautifully Different

December 8 Beautifully Different

Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different - you'll find they're what make you beautiful.

I am beautiful. I admit it. Heh.

There are a lot of things that make me different from most people. How about a list?

1. I'm freaking nuts, you guys. Most people aren't (or at least they haven't been diagnosed...), so I am different. This is usually a bad thing, but medication is magic, so it's all good (most of the time). There is some good that comes from this, though. I have to keep a close eye on my moods, and why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling. I have to work hard to make sure this illness doesn't screw with my marriage (or any number of other things in my life), so I am very careful with my words and I consider carefully what the things I say will really say to other people. I'm not perfect about this, of course; everyone loses it once in a while and I am no exception (and anyone who says he/she never loses control is LYING) (unless it's Jesus). But I think that having to think carefully about the things I say helps me be more considerate and helps me communicate more effectively.

2. I get along way better with men than women. I have a few close girlfriends, but the vast majority of my good friends over the years have been dudes. Guys just make more sense to me. They aren't catty and most of the time they say what they mean, they don't overthink things or play games, and they don't gossip as much (not all women do this, of course, it's just a generalization). This has been frustrating in the past; when I was in high school and I wasn't allowed to date until I was 16, I couldn't hang out with my friends because it would be a "date", even though I had no romantic feelings for my guy friends. Mim and I fought about this one a lot. Fun times. Also, in college, before I dated Scott, I was totally in love with my best friend, and OH BOY did that complicate things.

3. How many women do YOU know who are chemists?

4. I am apparently the only person on the planet who doesn't want babies. Ok, I suppose that's a slight exaggeration...I can think of...two other people who don't want kids, and one of them is married to me. I would be totally willing to donate my eggs to help other people have babies, but they won't take them because of #1 (I'm crazy).

5. Something different I do that lights people up...? I really like sharing what I have with other people (unless it's yarn; I'm a total Yarn Scrooge), but I don't think that's that different.

I can't think of anything else. And I don't see how these make me beautiful, but Scott and my mommy think I'm pretty so I suppose that's all that matters.

Now I'll Go Churn Some Butter...

Apparently, housewives are extinct.

An acquaintance posted this link of Facebook a little while ago. I read it, and thought it was fine and had a bit of a point, though it reeked of 19th century gender roles.

Then I read the comments.

Holy hell, people!

It took me three days to cool down enough to write this while keeping the language clean. Well, cleanish.

Gee, I'm SO SORRY I was too busy studying quantum mechanics to learn how to make a perfect souffle. Apparently I'm an awful person.

There are women who are happy to be at home, to cook and clean, and take care of children, and be there when the husband comes home with a smile and a fresh, hot supper laid out on the table. And I think that's wonderful. I think women should be able to do whatever they want to do, whether that is being at home or being out on Wall Street, trading stocks. Mim was a stay-at-home mom, and it was so wonderful to know that she was always there and would help and support us in all our endeavors. But she always wanted more. She wanted to learn. She wanted to (someday) be able to go out into the world and do something else after we kids were raised and do something she really, truly enjoyed.

I have no desire to have children of my own. I also have no desire to quit my job, stay at home, and cook. I don't particularly like cooking (but maybe when I have a nice, new, big kitchen I'll be willing to learn...) and I don't want to do all the cleaning (although I would clean more around the house if someone would remind me to, hint hint). I'm just not the domestic type. And I have thought to myself, many times, "Thank GOD I was born when I was, because I don't think I could ever be happy in a fixed gender role like things used to be!"

(And, no, I didn't just take the Lord's name in vain, because I really DO thank Him)

(So nobody get offended, ok?)

I don't consider myself a "feminist", but I'm really happy that I found a man who didn't have...ideas...about how things should be run in our home. We're partners. We share. We help each other. We pick up each other's slack. And we split the work (not quite evenly, I must admit...he's so much better at remembering chores than I am!). We both go to our jobs and earn about the same amount of money. And all of this is totally fine with both of us. We're happy.

There seem to be a lot of men (at least, all the men who left comments on this article...) that think that just because they were born with man-parts they are entitled to having a woman who will do whatever he wants her to do.

Think again, jerks.

What If...?

A few posts ago I asked what I should write about, and Scott asked:

"If you were not married how do you think your life would differ from how it is now?"

It made me start thinking about my life's path...

I'm happy where I am. Interestingly enough, though, if several years ago, like at the beginning of college, I had been able to see into the future, to see what my life is now, I don't think I would have thought it was going in the right direction, that is, the direction that would make me happiest.

My freshman year one of my chemistry professors had us all write down some goals we had for his class, the year, college, and life in general. I was only half joking when I said, "Graduate from BYU without getting married!" For those of you that aren't in the know, BYU's students tend to get married a lot more than students at other campuses. My thoughts? They really, really want to move past making out, and they're not allowed to unless they're married (not only will they get kicked out of BYU, but they'll go to hell as well). Just a theory.* Anyway, having observed nothing but bad marriages my whole life, I didn't want any part of it. Why would I want to bind myself to someone, just to have them ruin my life? And why would I want to marry someone just to make babies? I just didn't want it. So I dated, because dating's fun, and let's face it, so is making out.

I never thought I would meet someone like Scott. I never even thought someone like Scott could exist. The dating pool at BYU seemed severely limited. I found guys who were good people but had different ideas and values than I did, but nobody was ever good enough. Everyone was too...vanilla. I tried dating a lot of people, but it just didn't stick. It didn't help that guys generally don't like to date girls who are smarter than they are, so a lot of the guys who I would have liked to date weren't even remotely interested in me if they knew that I was a chemistry major.

So marriage wasn't even in my plans.

Academically, I was never quite sure where I would go. My plan was basically to get my degree, and sometime my senior year decide whether I wanted to go to grad school, medical school, or just find a job. Two things basically made this decision for me: figuring out I was bipolar and falling in love with Scott. Figuring out I was bipolar, and FINALLY understanding why I was so sick all the time, made me realize that further schooling just wasn't wise unless it were the only thing I were doing. It wouldn't have been the only thing, either, because I wanted to be with Scott, and I didn't want to half-ass my marriage. I wanted to be there 100%, and I knew that if I continued school, things would just get too busy for us to be working on our marriage constantly, like we are now. It looks like that turned out pretty well, don't you think?

So...back to the original question. If I weren't married, I probably wouldn't have met anyone that I could have married, so I would have continued school. If I had chosen grad school, I probably would have tried to stay at BYU, since I absolutely adored the chemistry department there. I loved the classes, the professors, my jobs, just everything about that building made me feel more like myself than any other place I had been before. If I had stayed there, I would have had to keep going to church to stay enrolled...I'm honestly not sure how that would have gone. For all I know I might have just decided it wasn't worth it and transferred to another university. In that case, it would probably have been a college somewhere in the midwest, since that still felt like home at the time.

If I had chosen medical school, I have absolutely no idea where I would have gone or what I would have specialized in, but I would still be there today, and so I would probably be too busy to do much of anything else.

Either way, I would still be in school.

My life is now something I never thought it would be, but let me tell you, this marriage thing is awesome.

As long as you have the right person.

Which I do.



*Just FYI, I have nothing but respect for the students at BYU who actually follow the Honor Code. I certainly didn't.