March 1, 2015

It's been a couple weeks, since I have written diligently in my journal; although, I have been noting things that I have been planning to write on. Firstly I wanted to say that I am feeling well, and Jessica and I's relationship is back on track. I also wanted to follow up with a topic of my friendships in Heber City because I said that I felt friendless a while ago. Carlos is a friend that is interested in joining me at the church,  and we watched Big Hero 6 for FHE last Monday. Jessica got a job! I went to a piano recital with my grandparents last Thursday. RJ Enterprises had a Snow Day Party. Adventures with Eve is next. Aaron Hicken said that I might do actually internship stuff on Monday, which I am excited for. Track and Field are finally make good developments with a new team leader. I lastly would like to talk about some new coworkers.

     In a past journal entry, I wrote that friends in Heber were hard to come by; however, I found a good group at the Heber YSA Ward. It may have begun by joining the choir. Jeremy Jex has invited me to join his group. Rachel Saxton has been friendly. The choir is a good core group of friends. I used to be super friendly, but I feel like I can't be too friendly with everyone, since I am dating Jessica.

Jessica and I's new focus is her maturity. I love our relationship because we work so well together. I don't claim that I am good at counseling, but we counseled on what she wants to grow into to be her mature self. She said that she felt better counseling with me than her therapist. We spoke of confidence, motivation, fears, goals, and more. We make up a schedule most every day with a to-do list. Many of these tasks have a focus of her maturity goals.

     Carlos made it to church! He seems to like the fellowship. It seems that he is warmly welcomed. He was not surprised with the three hour block with the linger longer after. His perspective on religion is very liberal, which is common, but I hope that he will decide to meet with the missionaries soon. I am a little apprehensive about asking him because I asked, if he met with missionaries of a church before. He said that he doesn't like meeting with missionaries. I don't really like how missionaries are rarely seen in Utah because it seems that their presence is unknown. He didn't seem to recognize how sacred the sacrament is. His vocabulary is a little foreign to me. He called the ordinances like to sacrament a cult. We attended Fast and Testimony meeting and Sunday school, and I would give him the Bible dictionary and True to the faith books, so Carlos can understand our lingo.

     Last Monday Carlos joined me for Family Home Evening with the Heber City YSA Ward. I tried to introduce him to other people, but it seemed that he didn't understand me. He revealed that his disobedience to immigrant taxes for more than a year has piled up to be over 7000 dollars. If he could pay that, he could stay, but he had to take another option to reconcil with the government from Mexico. He has asked for loans a couple times, but I don't think that I can. I wish that I could.

     Big Hero 6 was an excellent movie, but I thought that the professor was dumb to go on a rampage of revenge after his college building was destroyed, and she lost her daughter in a stargate teleportation mishaps. His integrity was too fragile. I liked the endorsement of education and technological advances and how there are no overly powerful superhumans.

     Jessica got a job! I am so proud of her. She is starting on Tuesday. I think that it is a retail job, installing the store tenant improve details. I am excited for her of her experience because it is a better opportunity than my internship.

     I have learned very little about construction management in Delta Stone Products. The only thing that I learned is that our safety reputation is so poor that some companies deny our business; even though, we have won the bid.

     My grandparents and I went to a piano recital, which was part of a local convention, and I was hoping to enjoy it as much as I do listening to my older brother. The girl from Taiwan is named Eun Lee or something like that. When I went to China, I would here piano music played proudly on the radio, but it sounded soulless. Taiwan is under the same philosophy and government somewhat of China, so I blame that the pride of the nation limits this 21 year old girls expression. I expressed this to Thomas, my older brother, but he said that the most expressive pianist that he knows is Chinese. His name is Lang Lang. He played just like Eun Lee. They can play the song, but it is not refined. They are expressive in their face and gestures, but it is not heard in the piano. There was a question and answer session, and I wanted to ask "What piano skills are you learning currently?" or "How do you seek to inspire the audience when you play?"; however, we were at a middle school and the audience was young, and my questions would most likely go over their heads.

     Early in a recent week, I was asked if I was going to the company Snow Day Party. I said that I was, but I only wanted to go if Eve and Ezra was coming with me. There was no time designated for dinner on Friday night, which confused and baffled my grandparents, but Eve and Ezra was able to come. We arrived about 6:30, and we had a good amount of time to enjoy the snow. We found a modest hill, and went down it a few times. After the kids got over it, we went to the barn before it got dark to wait for other members of the company to arrive. I found games to play like dominoes and scramble. The lights were dim. People were barely arriving at 8 o' clock.

     Aaron said that I might do actually internship stuff on Monday, which I am excited for.

Another week has passed by.  I think that I wrote this on the 22nd of March last Sunday. My internship finally gave me a position that I can learn necessary skills in on Wednesday. Jessica started working last week too. One thing that I have always wanted to do is run or bike to work, and now I get to go to work at 8. I have plenty of time to prepare in the morning. I still wake up early in the morning. I like the routine to get up before 5.

     It has nearly been a month, since I began this journal entry, and he a lot to write about. I helped John Robert Hicken, the brother of my grandpa, with his field yesterday. I have a bunch of adventures with Eve to write about. The following list has most: scrabble on the night of the Snow Day Party, a run with a friend and her, making videos, a belated Valentine, reading a book, Cooking with Eve, a rock collection, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, playing video games, and more. I have some new coworkers that I befriended because they can actually speak English. Carlos is gone. And the track and field season is coming well together. I started a new Facebook page called Latter-day Saint YSA Blogs Daily because I am testing the fruitfulness of sharing only one article a day versus one every two hours. I registered for classes a while ago. Working on the temple. Making masks with Eve and Ezra and teaching her Piano

     I think that I should begin/continue with adventures with Eve. I have been hanging out with Ezra more recently, but all he wants to do is play video games. I gave in to them the past couple weeks, but I deleted all the games. For a long time every time that I see him, he would ask me, if he could play games. Once he asked me if we can play games, and I got excited because I thought that he wanted to play with me. He wanted to watch videos on Facebook though. This paragraph seems to be about Ezra. This week, today being Saturday the 11th of April 2015, is Spring Break. Eve has gone to visit family without Ezra. It has been two days without Eve, but he has been here. My relationship with Ezra is weaker because he seems to persist in his wants more. Dividing from us when he doesn't get his way. I want to have a closer relationship with him especially as I have this last weekend before I go back to school. I question the fruitfulness on my focus. I have had personal responsibilities to take care of before I go back to school. They were begging me download the games again the day that Eve and Ezra realized that I deleted all the games. I waited until they would listen, and I said that I only have a couple weekends with them before I go; I don't want to spend them not interacting, just playing video games. We don't even talk. Eve humbled herself, and Ezra persisted in his wants as I said before. We went to make masks with paper plates as Eve and I spontaneously enjoyed each other's presence. I drew my face on a plate, and she marveled at my skill. After dinner she wanted me to draw her face, and I did. One game that she downloaded is a makeup and hair dressing in nature, and she drew her own makeup and hair on my drawing of her.

     After this circumstance, I believe that Eve was inspired by my knowledge of art, and she asked me to teach her music. She has come to like my teaching skill, and she was able to learn how to read music. I like teaching the necessary theory, so they have a complete understanding in a simple way. I thinking of teaching Ezra piano, but it will only be one time most likely, since I am leaving next Friday. I tried to teach Ezra piano yesterday, but he was distracted by the metronome. The problem was that I wanted to start new, teaching him, without the influence of the way that I taught Eve. I was looking for a clean sheet of music in the primary song book, but I couldn't find a song as simple as 'I am a Child of God'. I was able to practice personally which was nice.

     Eve left to visit family, since it is their spring break. I have many adventures to write. I will follow this list: scrabble on the night of the Snow Day Party, a run with a friend and her, making videos, a belated Valentine, reading a book, Cooking with Eve, a rock collection, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, playing video games, and more.

     The Snow Day Party of RJ Enterprises was interesting because they said that people would come to enjoy the snow and facilities of the cabin about 6 or 7; however, everyone didn't come until about 8 or 9, and my grandparents were wondering if dinner will served. They were  complained a little about having dinner so late, but they endured. During this time, we played dominoes and scrabble. The dominoes play was not actually a game in my opinion, but scrabble was interesting. The lighting was not good in the cabin, so grandma could not see the letters well. It took me a while to warm up. I believe that we played a warm up round. Eve would be impatient, and have grandma skip her turn. She was also impatient with herself and her limited vocabulary. We switched letters couple times because she couldn't find any words; however, I could. I was not exceptional, but the competition was easy.

     The food was finally prepared, and it was good. One dish was interesting. It was green onions cooked in butter or oil. I enjoy one serving, but the second didn't feel good. There some barbecued meat, which was amazing, chips and tortillas. I was eating with Eve, Ezra, and my grandparents as usual, Robert Hicken, the CEO of RJ Enterprises, joined us. I always encourage Eve to be friendly, and, Robert's daughter, Camille came up to her, asking to be her friend. Eve was a little leery, but she went with my prompting, saying that Camille is her cousin. They went out to play in the snow, and it was fun. Camille and her exchanged phone numbers, so they could hang out again. John Robert Hicken is Robert Hicken's father, and John Robert has a lot of granddaughters Eve's age. I wish that they could meet and hang out. I met them at a work day a couple weekends ago that I will write about.

     One Saturday, I was planning to go on a run just as Eve and Ezra arrived for the afternoon. Eve said that she wanted to go with me on her bicycle. When we were about to leave, Eve's friend Danica was riding her bike passed the house with her family, and she joined us. Danica has a cool little sister, but she is a little too young to go out with us. We almost ran all the way to the end of Red Ledges. Danica was exhausted quickly, ending up walking before we reached the turn back point. Eve acted as though she was faster than me, but I just wanted to keep Danica in my sight between Danica and Eve. We decided to turn back at the top of a hill to enjoy the ride down, and Danica was satisfied with the decision, enjoying the ride down. Eve was dressed as a pirate for an odd reason. I think that it was a costume for a school performance. On her first ride down the hill, her bandana fell off her head, and it got stuck in the chain. After we got it out, she wanted to go down again, so Danica had to wait a little as we were figuring out how to get the bandana out of the bicycle chain and her second ride down. We made it home save. My first time visiting my grandparents. I lacked skills to take care of the children when I went out with them, but things went much smoothly this past winter with them.

     This journal entry is a little choppy because I have not been able to finish an entry. It has been more than two months. Today is May third. Grandma knows that Eve and Ezra love me, so she hoped that they would visit before I left the week before I left. On the last weekend that I had with them, Eve visited her relatives, since it was Spring break. My relationship with Ezra is kind of weak. I felt bad because I came down from see how everyone is doing, and grandpa and Ezra was watching television. Ezra asked "What I have been up to?" I didn't even answer. I don't like television because it distracted me from that moment. Jessica and I agreed to not have television. For the last week in Heber, Eve and Ezra were able to visit me before I left Friday morning. On Tuesday grandma and grandpa took me to see the Provo City Center temple, and we went to the outback, since Doug Nielson gave them a gift card. We went to visit Doug, the brother of my grandma. He wanted to show us pictures that he had taken on a trip to Patagonia. It is not the first time that I visited his house to learn of his travels. I was surprised on the Tuesday that Robert John Hicken wanted me to work for him for the remaining time that I had there, which was only a couple days. He wanted to take me out on some job sites, but we did not have time too. I bought a bread maker machine because Jessica and I decided that purchasing groceries is more affordable than eating out most meals. This has been working out. Eve and I made the first loaf that I had the machine together. Grandpa had a bread making machine, so we got everyone involved. Even Carl my uncle stopped to enjoy a slice, when he picked up Eve and Ezra. Jessica and I have been growing closer together, since we have united. The first two weeks of school have been incredible. We are enjoying our social dancing class. Track and Field Tryouts started last Monday, and we currently have 90 athletes. On the tryout days, we asked the people signing up on imLeagues to come back to give their contact information to make things more simple for us to retain their activity. Only 55 came back to give their information. We are planning to do an All Comers Invitational, and I think that we can double check their information there.

     It took us way too long to contact our athletes to see who was in the program. I wanted them to contact the list of people for a long time, but they did not understand me. We finally contacted them last minute. It turned out that we barely have 40 athletes. I asked Brother Stutz, if my stats were average, and he said yes. I have innovated idea, but the implementation always failed. It has been almost disappointing. I am optomistic and flexible.

     Today is now the last day of May. I think that I should just summarize what has happened and finish this entry. The track program is preparing for its second official meet this week. I am trying to adapt, implementing the things that will make it successful. It is interesting because after the first meet I was inspired to have another all comers invitational type meet for June 12th; then, the top athlete that are not in the official program will be invited to the championship meet. Brother Stutz seemed to think that it is a good idea, and the word got around in the activities office. They invited me to a meeting to discuss the benefit of my idea. I could not attend the meeting because I had a class at that time. When I was in the office, I asked around about the meeting. They said that it was cancelled. Upon further inquiry it turns out that Track and Field will most likely not be a competitive sport next year, and they will make all comer invitations be the focus of the sport.

     My opinion on being Track and Field coordinator is that I need to focus on my academic learning of Design and Construction Management. The skills learned in sports is good, but I am not giving enough time to my classes. I don't plan to be a leader in the things that I do not need to pursue. I always talk about this to my friends. I was planning to pursue being a director, but the effort is a distraction from my real life's pursuit in innovating design and construction management. My academic grades are suffering because the effort to make Track and Field productive.

     Yesterday my team and my FHE sister's team ran the temple to temple relay. This relay had a special family feel to it because Irvin Silva asked to join the team. I may have let the environment be family oriented because I asked him, if his wife wants to accompany us. I suggested this because we have plenty of space in the cars. Irvin's sister in law join the team, and when we were looking for a second car. Irvin's mother in law wanted to drive. Our welcoming group embraced her love of photography, and the relay is well photographed. I feel that the first few legs of the relay ran better than it was expected, and the last few were hard of the participants. The last few days before the relay I coached Jessica, and she applied the running skills. On Thursday, Jessica ran the distance of her leg, but she just did not want to give into the desire to walk. That was my expectation for her, but I want her to be a runner. She ran a slow jog, and I invited her run faster during the last mile to feel how fast that she can run, since she was just running the minimum speed, which will not give her the desire to walk. This is what we did before, and it made her feel accomplished. She talks sometimes as if her perspective will not change, but I see that her performance should grow exponentially by the change of experience. Her not walking is not an accomplishment for this relay because she already knows that she can jog slowly and not walk. There is a running effort, which can increase the efficiency of her speed, just by changing her perspective, and I am proud to say that she did it. Jessica enjoyed the competition.

     Editing this entry, I see that I want to write about my contribution to the construction of the Provo City Center Temple and my work day with John Robert.

     My contribution to the Provo City Center Temple is very small, but a small contribution is big in my life. When I was working in the office of Delta Stone Products, I was given the job to estimate and design the stone for the stairs up to an entrance to the temple, but it turned out that the blue prints were not accurate to the dimensions and the size of the stairs. I told my leaders that the dimensions didn’t work, and the management had to consult the church on redesigning the stairs. The stairs is not a completely different, but the lengths of the stone had to be reconsidered. I was also able to sand a beehive that is also part of the hardscape of the temple. I learned that landscape and hardscape is similar. Landscape has to do with plants mostly, but hardscape is the stone work of a building. It took me like 12 hours straight of sanding by hand to complete one.

     John Robert Hicken is a person that has the biggest testimony of work that I have ever seen. A story was told that rumors say that the Hicken family work for fun. John Robert asked me about what I do with my spare time, when I was growing up. I grew up in a condominium complex, and I never had to clean my own yard. Work seemed to be all he knows. He said that he would work 3 job his entire career, working life insurance before he worked in school as a teacher, waking up at like 4 or 5 in the morning; then, he worked in the farm after until 7. My main job was the clean out manure from the irrigation system. John cleaned it effortlessly, and that puzzled him, since he is probably older than 80 and I struggled with it. He worked on the farm since he was a child. The clean irrigation system let the pasture have double or triple the amount of water than without the day or maintenance and work. Most of John Robert’s family came to work, and it was nice to meet them. At this time I was able to meet the cousins that were about Eve’s age.

     Another thing that I should write is that Jessica and I had to quit Track and Field and our Dance Class, so we can focus more on our academic achievement. I am doing well in my accounting class currently, but my statics class requires more study time.