Sometimes you feel like a nut...

Sorry, this blog will not be about Almond Joys or Mounds candy bars. It's about Slurpees.

I had two Slurpees last week. It had been a long time since I'd partaken of one, probably at least one year if not longer than that. Slurpees and I have had an interesting relationship that culminated my freshman year of college with a near-death experience. I will definitely blog about that experience later.

I want to talk about the most recent Slurpee I had, a mixture of wild cherry and banana flavors, admittedly not the greatest combination of flavors. I spent my Sunday evening watching Rad, a so-terrible-it's-great 1986 film about a BMX racing teen, and playing games with a group of friends. Around 11 p.m. someone mentioned something about 7-11 and making a Slurpee run once the clock reached 12 and Sunday became Monday. I thought that was an awesome idea, and at midnight, five of us piled into a car and made the journey to 7-11.

We got our Slurpees and left 7-11. Our driver, Elyse, asked if any of us minded going for a drive to Springville to drop off her friend Rachael. We were all in high spirits and on the verge of Slurpee-induced sugar highs so we, of course, went along for the ride. When we got to Springville, we decided to continue on our spontaneous road-trip and headed towards Hobble Creek Canyon. All the while we were listening to music and enjoying ourselves immensely. As we continued up the right fork of Hobble Creek Canyon, we eventually decided to stop the car and have an impromptu dance party on the side of the road.

We found a spot to park the car, rolled down the windows, jumped out, and started the impromptu dance party. The bulk of the dancing (i.e. flailing around wildly and trying not to look terribly white) was done by myself, my former roommate Joel, and Elyse's friend Rachael. The pictures I've included, taken by Joel, show us doing the move of the night, something we saw in the movie Rad. We probably looked really stupid, but we had a lot of fun.

Look at us go!

After dancing spastically for more than half an hour, we got back in the car and returned to civilized life. It was such a random, spontaneous celebration of life. It left me happy and exhilarated. I hadn't done anything quite like that for some time, and to be completely honest, I missed all the similarly random and stupid things I did when I was a more carefree and spontaneous teenager. I used to always do weird things like this in high school. Maybe it was because I lived in a small town like Vernal, Utah and had to create fun wherever and however I could. Maybe I've lost something or at least been ignoring a part of who I really am while going through the motions of being a mature and responsible adult preparing for the rest of my life.

Thinking about this incident has helped me remember how adamantly I, as a teenager, refused to believe that I would ever let myself become a boring adult afraid to have fun and not care what anyone else thinks. I am not saying that I have become that boring adult, but I have definitely been underusing the spontaneous and random side of my personality. Of course, it helps to associate with people who can bring out that side of one's personality. Too much of my life these last few years has been spent in solitude. I haven't done enough to keep my spastic and spontaneous self alive and well. That's a part of who I am that I don't ever want to lose, and the Hobble Creek Canyon impromptu dance party helped me realize that.