No big adventures to tell about. Thanksgiving was good, small and fun. They closed campus the Tuesday before Thanksgiving and told everyone that was heading north to leave quickly, so I left work early to make it home before the “blizzard”, it turned out it was just like every other night in Mapleton, high winds and a small dusting of snow when we woke up, nothing amazing. The drive back to school was more adventurous. This was a storm they should have warned everyone about. I made it almost half way to school when I started to see a lot of traffic, it’s kinda weird to run into traffic in the middle of nowhere, and by time I made it to beaver you couldn’t see the road or the reflectors on the side. It was crazy! The next week of school was insane, it was hard to find parking spots, the roads were covered as fast as they were cleared, and I learned that my car is an awesome snow plow. Not to mention it was the last week of classes so teachers were piling on the work. Don’t leave projects you’ve known about all semester for the last week, there is way too much to do in one week to add anything else.
My dad texted me and asked what I was doing, my reply, writing a paper on a book I never read, his response, check your e-mail. This is what I found.
Part of a talk by President Monson.
Now, that would be kind of overwhelming, except that every semester for 21 years he had given the same examination in every class of Religion 101. The examination consisted of one question. And for all those years, the question had been the same. Can you believe it? What a snap class! The question had always been: Describe the travels and teachings of the Apostle Paul.
Some young people would come to class the first day and get their name on the record. That was about it until the final examination. Then they would come, having boned up on an answer to that question.
One particular semester, three young men who had followed that practice of registering and then absenting themselves until the end of the semester sat with their pencils poised as the professor went to the chalkboard and said, “I shall place on the board the question on which your entire grade will depend.” To their great astonishment he did not write the usual question. Instead, he wrote, “Criticize the Sermon on the Mount.”
One of the three young men said, “I don’t even know what book it is in.” He closed his test book and left the room.
The second young man thought for a moment. He didn’t know anything about the Sermon on the Mount because he had prepared for a different test question. He left the room, anticipating a failing grade.
The third one of this trio stayed in the class. He wrote line after line and page after page. His friends were outside in the hallway, looking through the door window, wondering what he was writing. They knew that he had no more knowledge of the Sermon on the Mount than did they, that he had prepared for the question that was not asked. They wondered what he was writing in that test book.
He didn’t tell them until the day the papers were examined and returned. They all huddled around to see what grade he had received. He had an A on the test and therefore an A in the course. As he opened the cover of the exam book, there was the question: “Criticize the Sermon on the Mount.” And here is what this enterprising young man had written: “I will leave it to someone far more knowledgeable and experienced than I am to criticize the greatest sermon from the greatest life ever lived. As for me, I would prefer to describe the travels and teachings of the Apostle Paul.” (p.s. I got an 80 out of 100 on that paper)
One more thing about finals, just as I was sitting down to take my last final I got a text from Nedra saying they were at the children's museum having fun. I texted her back and said that it was not fair to tease me like that during finals week. She went on to tell me how they turn the stairs into a slide, super jealous! I wish I was rich so I could fly everyone to Indiana to see the Smith family and to go to the world's coolest museum.
I am very grateful that I am a part of a church that is so close knit. There is a group of people from the ward and they get together all the time and play games and they are always making sure everyone has something fun to do and knows that they are welcome. I love it! I didn’t know how much I missed them yelling and running around outside until they weren’t there. This has been an eerie two days without anyone here. Yesterday I played ultimate Frisbee with this group. We were tied and it was game point and I jumped up to knock the Frisbee away from the other team and ended up being at the bottom of a dog pile. I felt really bad for Sean, he was going to land on me but he tried to stop himself from smashing me so he put his hands down to break his fall and Brian landed full force on his arm making it collapse and they both landed on me. I was a lot better of than Sean and wasn’t really hurt at all. Next week is going to be boring without them banging on the door to get us to go play ultimate with them.
Good news my English teacher told me I was going to pass, I hope he’s right, if not he’s going to get an earful.
Today has been an awesome day! I did absolutely nothing. No papers to worry about no tests to study for, and no homework at all. I slept in until like 10, which is quite a feat for me, I usually wake up when the sun comes up. I watched a ton of TV and also managed to clean our kitchen, which was quite the disaster after finals week. And watch more TV.
Well that’s what I’ve been up to.
