The other night I showed some people a picture of a poster produced at BYU further explaining a nuance of The Honor Code. The Honor Code is a code of conduct, a standard, that all BYU students agree to live by before they are even accepted. What this means is that, allegedly, the individual who decides to come to the school has read, understood, and agreed with the terms of the Honor Code.

What was said, “The Honor Code takes away your agency.”

I disagree with this statement. In general, I disagree with most people when they claim that agency is taken away when you apply rules or rules of living to a life. Agency denotes that you can choose to live your life in any way you want; on the flipside, though, agency also denotes that by your choices you have to live with the consequences of your lifestyle choices.

Therefore, going to BYU requires that you agree to a code of conduct. By choosing to attend the university, you also choose to follow that code. When you choose not to, long enough, whether you realize it or not, you also choose to no longer attend BYU. At all steps, the individual has made choices that affect their life and the lives around them. The individual has not had agency removed, they have merely agreed to specific aspects of a code of conduct that they are to live by.

The poster I was showing shows a girl wearing a mini-skirt. Under the skirt are a pair of leggings or tights. According to the Honor Code (which also gives guidelines for dress and grooming) this is against what was agreed to. A mini-skirt, regardless of what is beneath it, is still a mini-skirt and is forbidden.

When Erin and I saw the poster (and I want a copy of it) we then proceeded to count the girls wearing mini-skirts and leggings/tights around campus. The number was, actually, rather disturbing.

The point in the BYU Honor Code is not whether or not we should or should not live a specific standard, but that as students we agreed to live a specific standard.

Once you have agreed to a standard you are required to live that standard. That does not take away your agency, nor does it stop you from making choices to go in a different direction. Even as a BYU student, you have a the ability to (as a girl… heck as a boy too) wear mini-skirts. As a boy, you have the ability to make the choice to grow a beard, knowing full well in advance that you a) are not allowed to have a beard; and b) you have to have a pre-existing condition and a beard card to have one, or special dispensation as a result of a play or other project happening on campus.

This extends beyond the boundaries of BYU, though. Every school in this country has an Honor Code. Whether or not the school chooses to enforce that Honor Code is not the issue. What is the issue is whether or not you choose to follow a code of conduct you agreed to before you started attending the university, college, or community college. You actually agree to the code of conduct before attending.

In some universities the code of conduct might include not drinking while on campus in the dorms. However, without going to those campuses, I know that alcohol is prevalent on the campus in direct opposition to the code of conduct. Some schools actively enforce this rule, other schools do not actively enforce the rule.

As a member of the LDS church, I have made a choice in my life to follow The Word of Widsom. This set of guidelines for healthy living have do’s and do not’s. Most people focus on the do not’s. In this case, do not’s include: alcohol, tobacco, coffee, tea, etc. These are lifestyle choices. Many members of the LDS faith believe that coffee and tea denote caffeine and go out of their way to avoid caffeine in their diets. Some of the do’s include: exercise, eating grains, meat in moderation, etc.

These are guidelines for a healthy life. The longer we live, the more science shows us the negative effects of alcohol and tobacco and other substances on our bodies. Too much caffeine can cause problems with the heart. Too much alcohol will destroy your liver. Too much tobacco will cause cancer. In essence, we can avoid lifestyle choices and the negative consequences by living a simple lifestyle guide.

However, you don’t have to live it.

That’s right, like the Honor Code at BYU, you have the option, even after agreeing to the guidelines, to live them or not. You can drink. You can smoke. You can drink coffee and tea. You can do all sorts of things that are against the guidelines that the church seems to be connected to, AND you get to live with the consequences of those choices.

One consequence is addiction.

Even then, the argument that laws or rules fly in the face of agency is a fallacy as well. You still have the ability to decide whether or not you will follow certain rules. You can walk into a store and steal if you want. You can knock down an old lady and take her purse. You can drive recklessly and kill someone. You have that choice.

However, by making those choices, you also choose to take the consequences when you are caught. The consequences include jail time. Going to jail is a result of a negative choice; but, no one is able to stop you prior to your going to jail from making the negative choices in your life. What you chose, ultimately, was going to prison.

What always gets me, 100% of the time, is watching a movie where someone drags their younger sibling into a firefight and then watches as that sibling dies. They then get angry and want revenge on the person, often the protagonist of the movie, and proceed to do whatever they can to kill the protagonist and his family for taking the life of their younger sibling. As exciting and edge-of-seat-making this plot development is, the choice for the younger sibling to die existed when that individual was dragged into a firefight. Not when the protagonist of the story, in order to save a life or in some heroic fashion, pointed a gun at the person and pulled the trigger.

And yet, for some reason, we, as a society, believe that A should have no direct response on B. In the case of the example I just used, the antagonist takes no responsibility for his brothers death, instead assigning all blame on the protagonist. The antagonist’s response is revenge.

I think we, as a people, often mistake what it means to have agency. We assume that no matter what, we should always be able to choose what we want to do. We allow the noise in the world around us to convince us that our actions have no affect on the people around us and that we should be allowed to live and let live. This attitude is fallacious. It is not true. We don’t have that as an option in our lives.

When we choose to live around other people and in a civil society, we choose to follow the laws and rules that exist. Within the confines of those laws we can develop into honest, hardworking people. We can be citizens rather than anti-citizens. We can be law-abiding rather than without law.

I think people live in a fantasy world where rules and regulations get in the way of their being able to live the life they dream about. They want to be able to drink and smoke and swear and sleep around without consequence, and yet, those same consequences are what allows them to even have a conversation or thoughts about what a lawless society might be.

BYU has an Honor Code. I find it difficult to understand why adults (legal adults, not literal) come to this school and think they can flaunt the rules they agreed to in the face of other students, the faculty and staff, and the community as a whole. I also find it interesting that quite a lot of those students are going to wantonly break the rules, do what they want, and see where they can push the very guidelines they agreed to, to the breaking point.

I think either live what you agreed to, or go somewhere and give someone who wants to be at BYU a chance to be there. I think if you want to be treated as an adult, act like one. And I think too many people think that because they are able to live on their own and make choices, and because the law and world looks at them as adults, that they are actually capable of being an adult.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Cassandra West

Real Heroes Fly

I got up this morning. I didn’t want to. I felt sick. I think there is a distinct possibility that I am sick. I don’t know. The Tylenol for the body aches (of the last couple of days) didn’t do a lot, the Theraflu seemed to work a bit better. As a result, I brought one of the bottles to work with me, for when the last dose wears off.

Erin came home for lunch. That was cool. I am thinking we are falling into the work, school, life pattern where we both work, both go to school, and both miss each other until late at night or early in the morning. This pattern is not the most fun. In fact, I don’t enjoy it, at all.

However, while at home for lunch she asked a simple question, “What’s your plan for the day?”

My answer, “I don’t have a plan. I don’t plan.”

She then proceeded to point out that our first date was planned. I started to rebut with other examples and then realized I was not willing to fight that battle today and, since she’s better at some things (like arguing) than me, I should just drop the subject since I had at least one mental plan that did not include going to work.

I did hit the writing today. That was nice. I am at a point in what I am writing where I am desperate to get Alicia moved on from where I currently have her, and yet feel as though I need to slog through what I have her doing.

As a result of this, I did do some writing today.

In between episodes of writing, and installing garden lights around some of the garden space, I went for a walk down to The Riverwoods did a circuit around Borders to see if I could possibly convince myself to spend money I don’t have (I didn’t, in case anyone was curious), before walking back up to the house and doing more writing.

Around 3:30 or 4:00 p.m. I put together the garden lights, more detractors for potential lookee-loos, and then grabbed a piece of wood, a hammer, and the lights, and placed them around the house in places where people might be able to hide in shadows. Of course, one of the things I do when I get home is walk around the house and peer into the shadows, and then, you know, go downstairs, see my wife, eat something, go to bed. On Saturday we are getting a couple of motion sensor lights installed in the back that will light up if someone walks through there, again, more detractors for people that don’t need to be in places they are not wanted.

Outside of all that, the door is still hung, it still works, it still locks, and I think Erin is still willing to sit at home, alone, with all of the doors shut, bolted, flip-locked, etc. until I get home.

Walking down to Borders was an interesting walk. Not necessarily long, just a walk because I am feeling pudgy, and probably looking a bit pudgy. What is interesting about it is, in part, the car parked in a field that is covered and, truth told, I don’t see a reason for it to be there. What was interesting was see where grass was sprayed (as opposed to sod laid down) and how often the person doing the spraying missed his mark and hit everything but dirt. What was interesting was the number of grey hairs driving down the road and hitting the rumble strips making their cars sound like they were falling apart (and one time, it sounded like the engine had a serious problem) before I realized that the individuals were just really bad drivers.

When I got back home, I locked myself in the house.

I don’t always lock myself in the house. It was nice to be able to do that.

I guess, the other interesting thing, for me, about the day was putting together the solar garden lights. I don’t know why I would’ve cared (or not) but they all had rechargeable AA batteries. I thought that was very cool; though, at the same time, I am not (at all) sure how they turn on and off. Maybe (this is me postulating here people) they don’t turn off and a good, sunny, day runs both the battery AND the light (small LED job) while the lights hang out in the garden.

Erin recently (today) told me she wasn’t feeling well and then started an online chant about how she couldn’t be sick. Which was interesting in the sense that had she been right there I doubt she would’ve gone through the chant in my presence. I, however, would’ve done the chant in her presence. On the flipside, she can growl at me, but I am not allowed to growl at her since (apparently) my growling is scary. She told me (on the someday scale) that we would probably have daughters that were like her and that when I made faces (like she does) it will probably scare her.

The future… (no, no one we know (intimately) is pregnant) prospects of parenthood are so wonderful to think about.

Anyway, that’s about it for the day.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Cassandra West

Real Heroes Fly

Well, another day, and Erin and I slept in. I slept in because my body hurt… bad. I don’t know what I did yesterday… well, I know exactly what I did last yesterday and that consisted of deconstructing and reconstructing the main entrance to our place. What I hoped would take me a couple of hours finally wound down sometime around 8 p.m. I started working on the door around 1 p.m.

By the time I was done, I was tired, I was hungry, I was sore, I was dirty, and I was cold. Good thing I didn’t really expect to spend a lot of time writing yesterday as the most I did was the blog entry… and that was a struggle.

I woke up this morning feeling like I’d been beaten with a bat. I have to admit, the soreness I experienced this morning is the kind of soreness you want to have, but, at the same time, it is also the kind of soreness that frustrates the living tar out of me. Especially since I couldn’t move, Erin got out of bed, did her thing, and eventually offered to let me continue lie there rather than shower, dress, yadda, and go to class.

Apparently, she tried to get me to play back and I slept hard.

When we did get up, I stumbled into the show and just let the hot water cascade over my sore body. Not really sure what I did to cause the soreness, or the extreme soreness as I am not a lazy person, I just know that it was an interesting experience to go through. My body still hurts, I probably should’ve brought, to work, with some Tylenol, but I will suffer through the aches and take some before bed tonight. Hopefully by tomorrow, I will be ready to tackle things… like writing.

Anyway, after getting out bed I realized something important. I didn’t read, nor prepare, for the dreaded science class today. Nope, not even slightly. We were meant to go home and research evidence that refutes Global Warming. I was the only one who disagreed with global warming, when asked, and then maintained my stance as he delved deeper into what he meant by global warming. Is it man made? Do we need to change our actions/attitudes toward the environment?

This is the deal with AlGore’s Global Warming, the earth warms up and then cools off, it is a cycle thing. No matter what we do, the earth is going to get hotter, and then, very quickly, it is going to get a lot colder. I understood that in advance of the questions being asked. I do not believe that the chlorofluorocarbons from aerosol cans are a significant cause of the alleged warming in the air, nor do I think that AlGore, who has not changed, in 17 years, his argument, is the right person to champion an extremist point of view. And yet, with G.W. showing that he really is an idiot, and AlGore trying hard not to run for President (he would win in a landslide this election), we have him championing the environment.

The outcome to that is we believe, as a people (or children, teenagers, new college students, and the insanely gullible believe) that we are screwing up the earth and making it inhospitable.

AlGore, by the way, invented the internet back in the 1960’s… oh wait, in the 90’s… sorry, I keep forgetting how old he is and when the internet was actually invented and by whom and for what.

Global Warming is a natural phenomenon.

Think about this: In the 1980’s we discovered a hole in the ozone layer above Antarctica. That hole, according to scientists, was (most likely) caused by our constant and persistent use of aerosol sprays. The outcome, we were sending chemicals in the air that was destroying our atmosphere and, as a result, destroying the protective atmospheric layer ultimately causing more instances of cancers caused by exposure to sunlight. We were, literally, dooming coming generations as a result of our stupidity.

In the 1990’s, scientists, upon further looking and researching and Antarctic polar cap drilling, discovered that the hole in the ozone layer had always existed and, over time, grew and shrank. In the 2000’s, scientists track the size of the hole which can, in some years, cover large parts of South America, but, in other years, gets relatively small.

By this time, according the scientists in the 80’s, we should be suffering from specific sun related cancer issues. However, outside of improvements to SPF and sunblock, the changes in the quality of sunlight and the likelihood of you getting melanoma are relatively minimal. Though, spending a ton of time in the sun is a bad thing… but that was true before the 80’s.

What this doesn’t explain, though, is how we get knee-jerk reactions from bad science. Get an extremist scientist yelling their gobbledygook at people and the outcome is, quite literally, people freaking out. They get worried, Hollywood jumps on the bandwagon, and the outcome is about the equivalent of Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 911. You sure have a lot of people’s opinions about a bad president, but little of it rotates in the realm of fact and Moore, admittedly, spent a lot of time trying to get soundbites that were negative rather than searching for a convenient truth.

Incidentally, AlGore’s latest attempt to incide people, titled: An Inconvenient Truth.

What we know is that the earth both warms, drastically, and cools drastically. The Army War College ran a scenario where they tested this hypothesis and then published it. The outcome, in Hollywood, the movie, The Day After Tomorrow, where massive storms turned into another ice age.

Guess what happens after you get extreme warming? Oh, wait! Let me guess…. Is the answer, rapid extreme cooling?

I win.

Here’s the kicker, as long as any form of beast has lived on the earth, they have produced greenhouse gasses. Methane is a greenhouse gas. Methane is produced by carbon based life forms. Cows and people are carbon based life forms.

I don’t doubt that the earth is warming up. I don’t doubt that crazy weather is a part of the warming trends. I don’t doubt that this isn’t scare. And I don’t doubt that we shouldn’t pay attention to it and do what we can.

I do doubt that science, today, has enough data or experience or heads out of bottoms to make the educated decisions or suggestions that will make sense in the long run. Rather, I think that AlGore and much of the vocal scientists don’t know the first thing of what they are talking about. They are creating knee-jerk theories that are not supportable. And they choose to spout those theories in any way that will give them money and support by the public-at-large. Scare enough people and you get what you want. Isn’t that what G.W. has effectively done since 9-11-01?

My last thought: Gasoline was a byproduct of the distillation process for kerosene. Back in the day, before people knew what it was good for, they dumped gas in a pit and lit a match. Big fire. The outcome, a lot of years of destruction for a waste product (in copper mining gold and silver are byproducts)… and then someone found a use and lots of people have become millionaires, billionaires, and whole dynasties exist as a result.

CO2 is a byproduct of fuel consumption. We will find a use for it, sooner or later. Our money, our time, and our discussion is better spent on finding a use for a waste product than it is in finding a way to eliminate something that isn’t even the dominate reason for global warming, and doesn’t equate to a large enough portion of what is in the air to substantiate the argument.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Cassandra West

Real Heroes Fly

Normally, today would have consisted of my doing everything and anything I could think of around the house to avoid actually writing and then, toward 2 or 3 in the afternoon, I would’ve started writing and felt good about it, before closing the documents down and heading to work. Today, none of that happened.

It all, actually, started last Friday. If you’ve been reading you will know that I chased someone off of the property. Yesterday Erin and I went and spoke to the police about who our neighbors think it is. And finally, today, I went to Home Depot and purchased a new door slab to hang in the place of the screen door we already had there.

Last night, after work, I met Erin and her brother at the Utah Valley Regional Medical Center, in the Emergency Room. Erin‘s brother has had this cough for about four weeks and it has only gotten worse. According to a sign on the wall in the examination room we all hung out in, the average time it takes to get through an ER visit is 2.5 hours. Erin and her brother were there for about 5, I was there for 4 and a half with them. The outcome, one crazy doctor who got on every computer we could see in a matter of minutes, raced into the room, raced out of the room, and then disappeared sending in another doctor who, I am not even sure, is out of medical school let alone in his residency, let alone really knowledgeable enough to be practicing medicine, let alone anything else.

The outcome, a pronouncement of some bacterial infection that caused Erin to ask if something else might be the problem and a couple of different trips to get x-rays because her brother has had a history of collapsed lungs, and like a newly married woman going to see the doctor and him checking for pregnancy, they have to rule out the possibility of another collapsed lung.

I don’t know what I expected this morning. Erin slept longer than she’d originally intended and then got up and went to work. Our landlord called her to let her know they were looking to see if they had a door we could install. Erin called me to let me know the landlord might be coming by, and then to tell me she was coming home for a bit from work to check on her brother and run interference between me and the landlord. I am not, really, anti-social, I just prefer to be left alone.

My idea of a great landlord is one I, pretty much always, never have to see, speak to, interact with, etc. In this instance, I am glad to associate with people at church and socially when it is necessary; however, on a day-to-day basis, I would prefer to just do my own thing.

Since we didn’t get into bed until 3 a.m., thereabouts, I don’t know when I expected to wake up today… I did wake up around 11 a.m. when Erin texted me and then called me.

I got up. Climbed around the various storage sheds that the landlords have looking for a compatible door. Checked the locks that we were brought. And then, after all that, went and purchased a door. When I got home, I thought we could just mount the door on the inside, but realized, when I went to physically stick in place, that a door on the inside wasn’t practical. In my way of thinking, this was a bust of an idea. I called Erin, she told me her vision of the door (the one I should be pursuing) was that it was literally on the outside. That meant, along with everything else, that I had to take the screen door and jamb off as well as extra bits and pieces of woods someone had tacked up there.

I think it took me about an hour to get everything out of the way before I could begin putting the new door on. Because I needed to balance the door, I grabbed some of the pieces of wood and then began to hang hinges. It was a process and since the weather has turned cold, I got to work in the cold.

This reminds me, Superman’s fortress of Solitude is in the Arctic, the cold, and as a result, I think, given the title, that Erin‘s Fortress of Solitude is fitting since the door (steel by the way) was built in the cold.

Anyway, my day was turned over to installing a new door. Installing new catch plates on the old doors, installing a new flip lock on the bedroom door (required a bit more effort than one might expect) and then taking Erin back to the store so we could be strips of wood that I could cut and then nail into place. Basically, when I took out the screen door, there was nothing to stop the new door from swinging too far in. This required that I build a stop on the inside, three strips of wood cut to fit, and then glued and nailed into place.

Once we got back from the store I measured and cut the strips before gluing and nailing them into place. This was a trickier that I thought it would be. Start at the top, establish a distance, and maintain it as you tack the strip into place, then check to make sure the door opens and closes and locks properly as we made our way down the strip to the bottom. Finally, do the same thing on the hinge side of the door.

The final step, make sure that Erin is happy with the outcome. She seemed to be. She was impressed with the fact that I could hang a door. I guess, you know, whether you realize it or not, the outcome to being raised by the man I was raised by qualifies me to be able to hang a door like this. I am just glad it didn’t require me to have to install the jamb, since I am not sure I want to level it. Well, I would’ve. I am just glad I didn’t have to.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Cassandra West | Clockwork Princess

Real Heroes Fly

I realize I don’t often write on the weekends. That is intentional and had things not changed over the past twenty-four hours, I doubt that I would be posting anything. I certainly missed my writing goal for the week, though I won’t determine by how much until Monday sometime. I think I may be close to half the goal, which means I get to work this next week to catch up and to complete some assignments that are in need of completion between now and then.

However, the object of this post is what changed in Erin and my life last night.

I work weeknights until 11 p.m. During that time I am in pretty constant contact with Erin and we discuss what is going on, revel in things going well at work, and she commiserates with me when things are less than stellar.

At a little after 11 p.m. I got in my car and drove home. I live about five or ten minutes from work, so I get home relatively quickly. Except, when I got home last night and walked down the driveway to our entrance, I paused at the door leading down to our apartment and heard something large, someone large, making noise on the other side of the alcove to our door. There is a large pine tree and I refuse to scare or back down, which meant that the more the noise existed, and the louder it became, the more I am likely to hold my ground.

I said, “Who’s there? Show yourself.”

The noise got louder.

I said, “I am not joking. If you don’t show yourself, I will be back with a gun.”

Still more noise.

I walked down the stairs and proceeded to get my gun and a flashlight and immediately walked back out of the house with both, in hand, as I made a circuit around the house and yard, checking bushes for any sign of what (who) was out there. I didn’t see anyone. The next step was to call the police and let them know there was some suspicious activity around the house. Followed by sitting wit Erin as, at this point, we both needed a little time to calm down after I raced out of the house with a gun.

After all of that, late at night, Erin started chatting with the kids upstairs and found out that they’ve actually noticed this as a problem, with the girl upstairs having called her father-in-law (also the owner of the house) to come and walk around the house. Her husband (son of the owner) ran off someone who was lurking outside of the house. The person ran off across the street and into the field.

We believe that whoever it is lives around here, is aware that the house is occupied by newlywed couple’s, who also have their husbands working in the evenings. We believe that it is probably someone who knows the house, the neighborhood, and the house as well as who is living here.

However, once all was said and done, and we waited to see if the police officer that was sent to patrol the neighborhood was going to stop in and speak to Erin and me. He shined a light around the house, hopefully drove around the neighborhood to be seen, and then reported that nothing was the matter. The key, here, was that a record of events is being recorded.

We also informed the kids upstairs that, in the future, they should make a call to report suspicious activity.

My next step, after all of that, was to look up the sexual offenders that were in the area and made sure Erin saw them. Saw their faces. Then I had to go through the process of showing her how to operate a gun, with the intent, after months of promising, that we would go out and have her get used to shooting the thing.

Today, we followed the preplanned activity of Erin getting her hair cut. I wrote some, not enough, and then stopped to chat with Kelly, a friend from the play I was in two summers ago, and then Erin and I came home where I went to help James and then Erin and I went to look at more solid doors, window coverings, etc. (to include purchasing pepper spray) so that she is a bit more secure as she walks to and from the car. We then came home and hung things.

One of the side-effects of visiting James was that he gave me a Louisville Slugger baseball bat that I wanted to acquire so that we had something we could use that didn’t include slug, gunpowder, firing cap, or Erin and her brother reciting, “I’d pop a cap in his ***.”

The point, I think, in all of this is that we’ve felt that our privacy has been invaded and yes, this is not a house burning down or something completely drastic, but, you know, I own a gun more because it reminds me of a past that I did like (well, parts of it), and because I cannot fathom someone else having it and potentially using it. Last night was an interesting wake-up call for me. It was a call to realize that I am husband to wife, that I have a personal obligation to make sure that my wife is safe and taken care of, and, ultimately, we often don’t know what will happen when we come home late at night or in a semi-rural neighborhood.

Needful to say, last night was a rude wake-up call. I don’t like feeling unsafe and I don’t like conversations about gun safety or what would happen if I was to walk around the house with gun in hand and see someone.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Cassandra West | Clockwork Princess

Real Heroes Fly