Endings and Beginnings.

In eight days, my brother will be home from his mission. While driving yesterday and blasting a really bad playlist which alternated between Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift's RED album, I made a list of endings and beginnings:

Endings

-End of Brian being away for two years(side note: my lovely cousin Joe got home today and I get to see him after school :D)
-End of the lovely phase of "General Education" and finally getting into my major
-End of the awkward transition from high school to adult life
-End of some friendships
-End of some lives
-End of saying goodbye

Beginnings

- A complete new phase of life that I have no knowledge of
-Being an adult 
-New friends
-Letters to new folk
- Becoming a better person
-A Spring semester with little required reading so I can read more
-New library card


The future is bright :) oh I figured it  out and I'll graduate when I am 24 tentatively speaking. 

"You'd make a great sister missionary"

So my dear prophet President Monson lowered the mission age so men can go at 18 and women at 19. What does this have to do with me? I feel like everyone keeps saying to me since conference "Grace, you'd be a great sister missionary." 

I do not want to go on a mission now or at 21.

I said it. 

I'm going to use "I feel" message now. 

I feel like the Utah Mormon culture is confused with women my age. Because I don't have a steady boyfriend and I'm not engaged, I must be just the perfect type of girl to go on a mission. 

Regardless:

- that I'm in the middle of beginning my major

-I-LOVE my job

-I'm trudging down to path to self-discovery

-Building a solid foundation of emotional stability after two years of Hell

-I hate living with other girls

-Moving on to a new chapter of my life

-Getting ready for Brian to be home!!

If women want to go, I think that is wonderful. I know countless sister missionaries who love it. 

But, it's not for me. So please stop pressuring me to go. I want to teach art and be at the U and find a Jurassic Park loving husband when I graduate. 

And if someday I want to serve, I will. I'm a lot of things but when I want to do something I do it. No matter the consequences. I also I want to say I know Jesus Christ is my Savior. I love Him and he has been by my side these last two years while my dear brother serve the Lord. He knows my heart and he's so merciful when I mess up. I also know that my best way of being a "sister missionary" right now is by being the best I can be. I don't want to go and Jesus won't make me. I recently told Brian my feelings of being pressured into all of this and how I had no desire to go and I didn't know what that means he in sweet Brian terms said,

"It means you have a vagina and it's not your job."

He comes home in 20 days in case you're wondering :)