Eat Pray Love

Has anyone else seen this trailer and just gone - yes!
D and I were at the theatre (and yes, we are in America, but yes, I am going to use the British spelling) some week long long ago
- oh wait, that was just last week.....man this week is dragging on already -
and we saw a poster for this movie. Now, I may have become too entrenched in the world of DVR (gotta have my daily Grey's Anatomy re-run fix) but I haven't seen ANY previews for this movie. Never seen it mentioned anywhere or other posters besides that one.

Why is it that uplifting, motivating, spiritually inspiring movies seem to go unmentioned?
Anyways
Julie Roberts is an amazing actress. She's classy. Smart. Versatile. gorgeous. And I pretty much love watching a movie with her in it.
So I perused the Google world today and watched the trailer. And then watched another trailer. And another.

Has anyone else had the experience where you come across a book/movie/play/whatever it may be, and totally connected....felt like it was partially telling a story from your life/past that you haven't quite unearthed yet?
That's how I feel looking at Eat Pray Love.

When she realizes that she's either been with a guy, or breaking up with a guy, as long as she can remember.
When she says, enough. Time to reconnect to me. To find me again.
When she realizes that if she doesn't do it now, she won't be able to recover all that has been broken.

Now, I'm not Julia Roberts. Or the person whose real life this is based on. So I couldn't cleanse my life and rediscover myself by going to Italy, India and Bali.

But I did have motivation.

Motivation to claim happiness instead of discouragement.
To be happy with who I really was, instead of basing happiness on someone who would only disappoint me.
To stop getting taken advantage of by a man who would never have committed.
To stop holding onto an idea. A painful idea that destroyed me.

And more importantly, motivation to find joy in the leaves changing in Autumn. Joy in the hobbies I had pushed aside. Joy in hanging out with friends that I had missed for way too long.
Joy in me.

And when I did that? After I took the time to start healing, the time to just enjoy life, and gain a firm commitment never to return to things or people who would only bring me harm...

I found it.

If Virginia is for Lovers, then July is for....

On July 4th, 1776, citizens of England decided that they were tired of taxation without representation and declared their independence. On this monumental day in world history the King of England, George III, wrote in his diary, "Nothing of importance happened today." Seventy-one years later, after deciding that they were tired of their Constitutional rights being overlooked, Brigham Young and some "Mormon" pioneers arrived in the Salt Lake Valley. On this monumental occasion, Brigham Young said, "This is the place"...to which many of the staunch Latter-Day Saints in his camp probably secretly thought, "Uh...are you sure? Could you ask God, again? I mean, I don't want to doubt you, Brother Brigham, but all I see is a barren desert, it's 110 degrees, and we have it on good authority that it snows almost everyday here in the winter. Could you ask the Big Man if we could move on just a little further to the coast?" And out of these two historic days came not one but TWO major holidays in my beloved state of Utah!

To many foreign to Utah, or those Utahns who hate anything LDS or who are just weary of the Church's predominance in the state, this might seem a little bit ridiculous. I can understand to some extent. But, who does not appreciate another day off of work or school? When I lived in D.C., I was more than happy to take a day off of work and school in observance of every Muslim/Jewish/Jehovah's Witness (they get a day off for not taking any days off)/Hindu/Buddhist/Atheist holiday (or not-holy-day in the case of Atheists). What's even better is when these holidays are on a weekend! My wife and I got the 5th off for national observance of the holiday. And the 4th of July weekend is a 24/7 festival in Provo! Then, she even got the 23rd off because the 24th was on a Saturday! What could be better? I'll tell you what could be better! Spending these days with Julie! Here are some pictures taken by my uber talented wife of what we did!

Julie and I enjoying Carrie Underwood performing and a great fireworks show at the Stadium of Fire! Well, at least she enjoyed the Carrie Underwood performance.

Us catching a Bees baseball game up in Salt Lake on the 24th! It was a lot of fun and the Bees whooped up on the Sky Sox (which is a stupid name and I disapprove of anything with the name Sox in it) 17-1. We were a little disappointed that the Bees played so well because we never got to shout "Boo Bees!" Very mature, I know.

Now, here are some wonderful pictures taken of the fireworks after the ball game by Jules! Isn't she amazing? This was done with one of the worst cameras still in use! All I can think of when I see these pictures is Ray Charles singing "America! Sweet America! My God He done shed His grace on thee!"

We're Here!

Julie and I have many friends and family members who have gotten into the blog craze as couples. We find it a fantastic way to keep up on these people without having to call them or even take the 12 seconds to text them. So, we figured that we would allow our friends and family to keep up to date with our lives without that much effort or any real contact as well! Also, Julie keeps telling me I need to get a hobby that doesn't include memorizing sports facts (by the way, I just scored in the 80th percentile on a quiz about Yankees' starting lineups since 1991). My pot-smoking writing teacher in 3rd grade told me I had talent writing so hopefully blogging will give me some way to fulfill my creativity...or just make it so I do something productive while Julie is gone. She will contribute, too, while still updating her awesome photography blog.

We have been married only a little bit over four months but have already had countless experiences--some happy, some hilarious and some heartbreaking. Through it all, I already love her more than I thought possible to love. Everyday when I see her for the first time, it still feels surreal that the most beautiful woman I have ever seen agreed to marry me (on a side note, I would like to say thank you to every idiot guy who dated her and let her slip through their fingers). On this blog, we will try to keep you updated on our growth together, our love for each other, and just other random and fun things we think and experience. Thanks for coming!