A lot has happened since I last posted anything.  Mainly, it's been a while because I've been busier than a soccer mom on black Friday.  My dad and I put a new engine, transmission, and front end in the DeSoto; then I graduated, took a 2 month backpacking tour through Europe, moved to Florida, and started "working" for the real Air Force.

For my ethics class here, I had to write a paper about the relationship between morality and justice.  The only guidelines were that it had to be 2-3 pages so it was a really easy paper to write.  If you're interested, here it is:

            Everybody has a slightly different idea of how morality relates to justice.  Each community defines what they consider to be moral, but the concept of justice seems less flexible.  Both justice and morality can be ways to define right and wrong, but why is justice more consistent while morality sometimes seems culture-based?  The concepts of justice and morality overlap quite a bit.  In fact, moral codes tend to include the concepts of justice, but justice does not always include morality.  The apparent solution is that morality is based on some ideology which includes the basis for justice.

            First, it seems prudent to define the concept of ethics.  For the sake of specificity, ethics will be used to address universal ideas of right and wrong.  These ideas rise from the standard human belief that it is wrong to harm other people.  A person loses their protection under this code if they break it.  Ethics does not take into account personal ideas of good and bad, only the universal goal to not harm other people.  The idea of justice is a way of enforcing ethical standards on a community as evidenced by the consistency of laws against theft and murder.  Morality then is a system of personal values addressing issues of good and bad. 

For example, murder is wrong, which makes it both unjust and unethical.  Since “wrong” is included within the concept of “bad” murder is also immoral.  On the other hand, premarital sex between consenting adults does not harm either one of them and cannot be said to be “wrong”.  Since it is not wrong, it is neither unethical nor unjust.  In terms of morality, whether premarital sex is good or bad is subjective and varies for each person.  Similarly, donating money to charity is an issue of morality only.  Whether or not one donates, they are not doing harm, so the donation is not a consideration of justice or ethics.  However, since the donation would be a “good” thing to do, it is the morally proper action.

            Now the source of overlap between morality and justice is evident: both include the concept of ethics.  Clearly if everyone lived an ethical life, societies would have no need for a justice system to enforce ethical standards.  There is however a problem with ethics, because it is too narrow.  Ethics only concerns itself with not doing harm, but is not at all concerned with doing good.  If a person was only concerned with being ethical, they would never give to charity and they would never concern themselves with the actions of others.  So if there was a society of many ethical people and one unethical person, the unethical person would go unchecked.  This is when morality becomes necessary.

            While a life may be ethical just by refusing to do harm, morality provides the motivation to prevent others from doing harm.  It is generally considered good to stop bad people from doing bad things, so morality is a necessary trait in anyone designated to enforce justice.  By taking a moral position, one realizes a responsibility to do good by preventing wrong.  Morality can only come after a solid foundation of ethics, and is incredibly necessary in an imperfect world.

            The potential pitfall of justice comes when morality and ethics are confused.  An example of this would be Nazi Germany.  Germans generally believed that it would be good for their nation to regain its economic stability.  Adolf Hitler believed a good way to accomplish this would be through the development of a genetically superior nation.  He also believed and persuaded others that a good way to accomplish this was through genocide.  Entire armies were caught up in the “good” idea of a genetically superior and financially stable nation.  They got so caught up that ethics were completely forgotten.  The Holocaust was completely unjust and unethical because it caused so much unnecessary harm, but in the minds of the Nazis it was the moral thing to do. 

Injustice occurs when people mistake morality for ethics.  They are not the same thing even though they often overlap.  Usually, a person’s concept of morality includes the universal standard for ethics.  Most people extend their concepts of morality beyond ethics to concern themselves with the ideas of helping people or following specific religious practices.  However it is necessary to remember that morality is a personal issue, ill-suited for application to a community.  If morality is broadly applied, ethics loses its influence and the society suffers injustice.  While both morality and ethics are important in a society, injustice can only be prevented when the society concerns itself more with ethics than with morality.

I'm taking a comparative religion class which requires me to visit religious services from different faith backgrounds than my own.  For my first visit, I went to a Jewish service.  For my second visit, I went to an Islamic ceremony.  I figured I'd post my experience here for all to see:

            With all the media attention focused on Islam since 2001, I started to feel like I should learn more about it.  A few months ago I finished reading the Qur’an, but I still did not understand how Islam was much different from Judaism.  Both claim the same deity and the same biblical history laid out in the Christian “Old Testament”.  The only textual basis I could find for a potential theological conflict was the prophet Muhammad claimed by Islam.  The Qur’an states that Muhammad passed on the word of God.  While Jews might disagree with the source of Muhammad’s inspiration, I could never find anything he said that would conflict with Jewish teachings.  I was left wondering why there is so much conflict between Judaism and Islam when this passage from the Qur’an even claims the Torah and the Gospel as moral guides sent down by God:

“Step by step, He has sent the Scripture down to you [Prophet] with the Truth, confirming what went before: He sent down the Torah and the Gospel earlier as a guide for people…” (Qur’an, book of “The Family of ‘Imran” verse 3)

It became my hope that I would understand the differences between Judaism and Islam more by visiting each of their services.

            The first thing I noticed when I entered the room dedicated for Islamic services was that I was asked to remove my shoes.  This was just to show respect for the sacred space of the chapel area.  Throughout the day, your shoes get dragged through the dirt and mud so removing them before you enter the chapel is a way of not defiling it.  Islam is built around a very deep respect for God.  Taking your shoes off before entering a place devoted to his worship is just one of the many ways Muslims show that respect.

            The word “Islam” literally means devotion to God.  I felt that the name accurately describes the religion.  Muslims are required by Sharia (Islamic law) to face Mecca and pray five times daily.  Sharia law also requires Muslims to attend a formal service for the noon prayer on Fridays.  By comparison, Islam seems to mandate a closer relationship with God than the other Abrahamic religions.  Before the prayer, there was a formal call to worship sung by one of the attendants.  During this call to worship everybody would stand, bow, and sit in unison while only one person sang.  Afterward, everybody knelt with their forehead on the ground for a few minutes to pray.

            I asked about some of the motions during the call to worship.  I was told it is just a way to consecrate the prayer time and open up a direct channel to God.  At one point, everybody made a waving motion behind their head.  It was explained to me that this was to represent pushing everything else out of your mind so the prayer would be completely undistracted.  The kneeling stance taken during prayer also symbolizes submission to God.

            After the prayer came a few readings from the Qur’an and a brief sermon on Sharia law vs. Muslim law.  All of the readings were in Arabic, and most were also in English.  I don’t know why the readings were in Arabic, but I assume it was because Arabic is the original language of the Qur’an.  Presumably, maintaining the use of the original language assures that congregants will always have access to the original message passed down by Muhammad.  The part I found really interesting though was the sermon.  One thing that really struck me is that it was formatted like a persuasive essay, and constructed around the thesis that Muslim law is a dilution of Sharia law. 

He argued that the guidance passed down in the Qur’an is unambiguous and clearly explains that Muslims should not do things such as drink alcohol or have extra-marital sex.   He said that Muslim law would also prohibit these things if it maintained the true spirit of Islam; however, he argued that Muslim law did not maintain the spirit of Islam and was obviously an inferior version of Sharia law.  This argument also made it clear that Islam does not distinguish between religious law and state law.

As the name suggests, Islam is intensive on devotion and submission to God.  It is most important to follow the laws laid out by God through Muhammad.  Understanding the law is important, but even if you don’t understand, it is vital to follow the law.  Like many other religions, the importance of tradition is emphasized over its meaning.  The meaning of the traditions and laws offered to me when I asked was generally something to the effect of “because God said so.” 

I find it surprising that Judaism and Islam can claim the same God and even many of the same books, but still evolve as such diverse methods of practice.  Both religions orient themselves around devotion and obedience to God.  Both religions even contain strict dietary restrictions and mandate circumcision without a clear explanation for why God mandates it.  Islam seems to be more focused on prayer while Judaism is heavily focused on reciting biblical readings.  Based solely on observing the practices of Muslims as compared to Jews, conflict would seem reasonable because the ways they devote themselves to God look very different.  After visiting a service from each tradition though, I feel like understanding the persistent Islam-Judaism conflict is farther out of my reach.  It seems to me that the real conflict might lie in the obvious cultural differences instead of the theological ones.

Two days ago, I had to write a persuasive speech for my English 411 class.  It took me a while to think of a topic I cared enough about to try to convince people to agree with me on.  Eventually I picked skepticism.  I thought about going off on creation science (which is not science), but thought I should warm up with a lighter topic like astrology.  My plan was to ease into creation science from astrology through psychics (I don't buy it).  Eventually I realized that I was already going to be pushing the 8 minute upper limit, and religion might be too touchy a topic anyway, so I just argued about skepticism in general.  Here it is.

            I’d like to speak to you about the importance of skepticism.  I believe that people are often all too comfortable with their gullibility.  Often we get lazy and allow ourselves to believe what is comfortable instead of what is reasonable.  The problem with this is that we don’t get to choose what is true.  Assuming our goal is to understand the world as it truly is, our level of comfort with an idea is entirely irrelevant.  The important thing is the evidence, so I encourage you to keep a question ready for any astounding claim you hear: “Is there a more rational explanation?”

            The first example I’d like to touch on is astrology.  As a group of well educated college students, I hope I won’t be offending any of you when I say that astrology is entirely fraudulent.  I will even go so far as to say that if you believe astrology has any use beyond cheap entertainment, you are a foolish person.  There is no scientific evidence to suggest that a person’s astrological sign is related to their personality traits, luck, or fate.

            A person’s astrological sign is determined by the zodiac constellation oriented behind the rising sun on their birthday.  I was born on March 3^rd which many of you can probably identify as the sign Pisces.  The modern convention is that the Pisces sign applies to anyone born between February 20^th, and March 20^th, but here’s the kicker.  On my birthday, the sun doesn’t rise in front of the Pisces constellation.  In the 2000 years since astrology was “developed” the Earth’s orientation in inertial space has wobbled so that all of the astrological signs have shifted by about a month, so my “true” sign would be Aquarious.

            One might argue astrology is valid because it is consistent with real life, and I agree that it is consistent.  Take me for example.  You’ve all had almost an entire semester to get an impression of me.  Tell me if this astrological description of me sounds accurate:

The Pisces person is compassionate, empathetic, imaginative, sensitive, mystical, spiritual, dreamy, passive, easy-going, idealistic, visionary, inspirational, accepting, undiscriminating, charitable, believes in soul growth, self-sacrificing and artistic. They can also sometimes be distracted, detached, illusory, impractical, gullible, neglectful, escapist and lazy.

I personally don’t see myself as visionary, much less charitable, self-sacrificing, artistic, detached, impractical, gullible, or escapist; and I’m sure that the adjective “sensitive” isn’t the first one that pops into your mind to describe me.  There were a lot of adjectives in there that could apply to me, but it’s easy to find some accurate descriptions in such a long stream of adjectives.  The real question to ask here is how many of you felt like this described you a bit? 

            This is a “cold read” which means it’s vague enough that everything in it seems to apply to the reader.  James Randi once performed an experiment where he handed out professionally developed personal horoscopes to a classroom of students based on their birth information.  The students all rated their horoscopes 4/5 or 5/5 for accuracy.  Then James Randi allowed the students to trade, showing them that all of the horoscopes were identical.

            Now I’ll admit that this experiment didn’t prove all horoscopes false, but it does answer that question I posed to you earlier: “Is there a more rational explanation?”  So I ask you which is more rational.  Option 1: Someone can tell you about your fate, personality, and luck based solely on the month you were born.  Or option 2: Someone other than James Randi figured out how to write a cold read.  James Randi has a standing offer of $1 million to anyone who can prove paranormal abilities under laboratory conditions.  His offer has been standing since 1964 with no winners.

            Hopefully, debunking astrology is old news to all of you so I’d like to move on to a closely related field: psychics.  If you listen to a psychic, or pull up some videos on YouTube, you’ll notice that their responses are always vague enough to answer the question with little chance of being wrong.  If you’re asking for a name, they might give you a letter, but it won’t be any old letter.  It will probably be E, R, S, or T because these are the most commonly used letters in English.  If you’re asking for a location, they’re inclined to respond with something vague like “there’s something tall nearby” or a description like hot or cold.  Can any of you think of a place you go to normally that doesn’t have something tall nearby?

            Now I’d like to ask a new question specifically tailored to psychics.  Why don’t they gamble?  If they can read minds, they can win at poker.  If they can guess numbers, they can win at roulette.  If they can see the future, they can win the lottery.  As always, it’s important to ask “Is there a more rational explanation?”  Do psychics possess these amazing abilities, but avoid casinos because they would rather charge people in need of their help?  Or is it more reasonable to think these so-called psychics have learned how profitable vagueness can be?

            In fact, when psychics are forced to be specific, they show zero ability.  When psychic Sylvia Brown was asked to make predictions for the year 2007 on television, she was exactly incorrect.  She said George Bush would pull out of Iraq, major drug busts would be made on both the East and West coast, terrorists would be caught smuggling bombs into the U.S., and the housing market was the safest investment.  As soon as we check for objective outside verification, the fabrications fall apart.

            Keep searching for outside verification when you hear a claim, but search honestly.  It’s easy to find support when you start from a conclusion, so we must approach investigation scientifically.  I wrote an entire research essay in High School claiming that Attention Deficit Disorder was due to candy, and that medication couldn’t treat it.  That was the idea I had in my head before I started writing, and I found the support for it.  I had to rely on outdated studies and unscientific sources, but with a lot of effort I backed up my conclusion.  Had I started with the topic and done research before making my conclusion, I would have finished earlier.  I wouldn’t have had to spend so much time ignoring reputable studies.  I wouldn’t have had to dig through blogs to find personal anecdotes by unqualified citizens arguing unsupported opinions.  Only when we question our beliefs can we truly learn.

            I know it’s uncomfortable to question the things you believe.  It might lead you down a path you don’t like.  It might shatter your world view, or redefine what’s important to you; but I assure you, the truth is worth it.  I stand before you both as a victim of skepticism, and someone who has been saved by it.  When critical thinking started disassembling the beliefs I held so dear, I was terrified.  I didn’t know what to do if the things I had sworn were important weren’t.  I felt lost, scared, alone, and unimportant.  If you develop the habit of skepticism, you might go through some of the same crises. 

While they may be scary, they’re incredibly liberating experiences.  When you finally realize that you don’t have to contrive reality, you can spend time on the things you learn are actually important.  The bottom line is that you can’t change reality just by wanting it to be one way or the other.

            We face fabrications that can give us false hope, but we tell ourselves that false hope is still hope.  Why do people suffer from consistent gullibility?  It’s because we’re afraid.  We’re afraid that we can’t know what will happen next.  We’re afraid that there’s no structure and reassuring plan for our lives.  We’re afraid that we’re small and insignificant.  We’re afraid that our existence is a meaningless series of random events.  What if all it’s true?  What if tomorrow is a surprise?  What if our chances really are random?  What if you’re really just one of 6 billion people living on just one of billions of planets in one of too many galaxies to count?

            Like it or not, your existence is cosmically insignificant, but that’s not really a problem.  To me, we’re important.  I hope you think we’re important to.  So, lacking a strict definition of important who’s to say we’re wrong.  Why do we need to succumb to our gullibility?  Things are the way they are, and maybe there’s not a problem with that. Documentation:
I got the pisces info from wikipedia.org
I learned that the signs are shifting from Bill Nye (youtube clip), and double checked with another site, but I forget it's address.
I got the James Randi challenge info from his website randi.org
I got the info on Sylvia Brown from a video clip of her on youtube.com

Finally, the much anticipated tale of bodily harm.

The Thumb:
So there I was, standing in the hallway.  I was hanging out with a girl named Storm from my squad.  I had only really gotten to know her a few days earlier, but we were getting along really well.  Lo and behold, she found out that I was ticklish and that it's really funny to watch me squirm when you poke me in the ribs.  She proceeded to do so, and an onslaught of tickling commenced.  At one point, she jabbed me with her left hand and I jammed her forefinger.  At another point, I smacked away her hand before it made contact forcefully enough to leave a bruise.  I want to make it clear that I'm not normally so abusive.  It's just that my sister always used to tickle me and still does.  You could say that over the years, I've been conditioned to react a bit forcefully at the threat of involuntary laughter. 

The most significant thrust of the evening was next.  She successfully penetrated my defenses and poked me in the ribs.  The squirm that followed was a fast one.  I twisted back and accidentally caught her thumb between my elbow and hip bone.  I heard a loud popping noise which I thought was just her knuckle popping.  She said it really hurt and I thought I had jammed another finger.  At this point we agreed that the tickling should stop.  But apparently Storm is a slow learner because she started up a few minutes later.  With much restraint, I managed to overcome years of conditioning and calm the degree of my reflexes.  She kept complaining about how bad her thumb hurt all evening.

The next morning, it still hurt pretty bad and her roommate talked her into going to the hospital to have it checked out.  She got X-rays and hilarity ensued.  The doctor came back and told her two things.  First: that her thumb was broken.  Second: that she should "milk it for all it's worth."  When she learned this, she told me, and she told her mother.  Now to illustrate my gift for impeccable timing, it's important to explain that she learned her thumb was broken on the Friday of parents' weekend.

Within a few hours, I had the privilege of meeting Storm's mom and little sister.  It's without a doubt, the most interesting way I've ever introduced myself.  "Hello, my name is Casey.  I'm really sorry I broke your daughter's thumb."  Her mom forgave me, but her little sister didn't.  All day I had a cute little 9-year old shaking her fist at me and telling me "You better stay away from my sister!"

It's probably the strangest way I've ever started off a friendship, but it's working pretty well so far.  Storm's mom loves me because I've been spending every waking moment nursing her daughter back to health.  Soon I'll post photographic evidence of my selfless commitment to her recovery.

A few days ago my English 411 professor gave us an assignment to write some sort of ceremonial speech.  The only things I could think of that would be interesting were either a eulogy or a graduation speech.  Since I'm not one for downers, I picked the grad speech.  I'm also a very relaxed and irreverent kind of person.  When you add in the fact that I'm never actually going to give this speech, I decided not to edit my speech to make it more politically correct.  I said what came naturally, and I tried to personalize it to the graduating class.  In hindsight, the humor came across as a little more negative than I intended it to be.  Without further ado, I give you my hypothetical 3-6 minute graduation speech.

Graduation Speech

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Hubert Zemke class: congratulations.  Many people like to be inspirational in their graduation speeches, but I’m not one for that Hallmark stuff.  The only thing I know to say is that our hard work has paid off.  Unfortunately for all of you, I’ve got another five minutes to fill so I had to think of something.

We’ve all heard the quote that USAFA is the last place you’d ever want to be, but the first place you’d ever want to be from.  I guess that means that our lives just got a lot better.  But for those of you that know me, you probably know that I like to be just a bit of an odd ball.  So on this day when all of you are excited to finally get out of here, I’d like to reflect on a few things that are truly great about the academy.

The first great thing is how the academy teaches you leadership.  I know that right now some of you are rolling your eyes, but I believe that the academy is truly amazing at showing you what not to do.  Without naming specific people, I’m sure we have all seen examples of toxic leadership.  What makes the academy great is the prevalence of these types of leaders.  As cadets, we learn leadership through examples, as well as trial and error.  We are given the chance to screw up horribly before the consequences are too serious, and we do it among people who are likely to forgive us.  People say the academy is broken because cadets are so cynical and hard to control.  I say that this is exactly how we know the academy is working.

The day that cadets are on time to everything and happy about it, is the day that someone is in charge who knows what they’re doing.  When that person is in charge nobody is learning leadership, because the only way to learn is through trial and error… mainly error.  If nothing else, we have seen four years of how not to do things.  We’ve had a chance to get that error out of the way so hopefully we’ll stop screwing up before those ROTC and OTS guys.

The second thing I love, is that now we get to start out stories with: “Back when it was hard…”  When we showed up, the class of 2006 was excited to finally give someone a four degree year like they had.  Since 07 and 08 had missed out on the fun, we got triple.  Our class witnessed the return of recognition, and I believe that we were the only freshman class that really got to “feel the fire.”    Once during my freshman year I found myself talking to some students at Colorado College.  They asked what an average day was like, and when I explained they looked on in amazement like I was superhuman.

Another amazing thing about USAFA is that by comparison, our next assignment is going to be amazing.  It’s pretty hard to get people looking forward to 12 hour work days, but the Air Force has found a way.  Unfortunately for cadets the way is to cram people into tight living quarters and drop a 16 hour workday on them.  Oh by the way, half of your weekends will be scheduled for you too.  The requirements of your job will change every week, and you office will be your home.  You’ll have six instructors, an AOC, and a cadet chain of command.  Every single one of them will think they’re the only important thing in your life.  You can still get grounded, you can still get time-out, and you’ll live in a zoo where six hours of sleep is an optimistic goal.

To move on to a more serious note, I also love that I’ve gotten to spend four years with some of the highest caliber people in America.  While civilian college students were experimenting with drugs and alcohol, we have been experimenting with baja racers, satellites, ground-breaking lasers, and the occasional balsa wood.  Many of us have already been involved in multi-million dollar research programs, and at one point we have all directly trusted our lives to another cadet.  In BCT our classmates swung us out over the edge of the Tiltin’ Hilton multiple stories above the ground.  During soaring, we trust our cadet IP to save our butts if we enter a flat spin or a turning stall.  During jump, we trust a cadet to teach us the procedures that will save our lives if something goes wrong with our parachute, and later we trust that cadet to hold onto us as we hang out the side of a plane going over 100 miles per hour.

Distinguished visitors: I apologize for not introducing you each by name; but with all due respect, this is not your time.  This is our time.  Today is all about the class of 2009.  After four years, I think we’ve earned it.  Ladies and gentlemen of the class of 2009, you rock.  I am proud to have known you and I am proud to graduate with you. 

**Broken thumbs and drug barons still to come

What is your life for you right now?  A seemingly simple question, yet a complex one.  It's direct and if answered honestly, the answer is often scary.  It seems that so much of our time, we take comfort in the idea that life will be better tomorrow; that this trial is making us a better person; that God has a plan.  Is comfort really what you need though?  I've stopped sharing my troubles and concerns with most people because too often the answer is something to the effect of "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade."  I don't know if this works for other people, but it generally seems to cheapen the present moment to me.  Life is made up of a collection of instants.  If I refuse to accept this instant for what it is, I feel like I'm refusing to accept my life.

Today ends parents' weekend for about 4500 cadets at USAFA.  For most people, I think it was a refreshing and encouraging few days.  For me, not so much.  This past week, I've felt exhausted, sick, and a bit depressed.  People who know me probably understand that for me this is anything but normal.  When the weekend came, I found no refuge, no rest, no inspiration, just more of the same.  At times I've thought that it's just too much for me to take, but what options do I have?  The answer is that I don't have any options that will make me feel much better about where I am right now.

All the inspirational crap that people will tell you to try to help you through times like this seems like a way to fight with what life is giving you.  I think some people find it helpful because knowing that this will help you grow as a person is like Judo.  Lemons may seem discouraging, but they allow you to make lemonade, which is nice to think about.  Life has come to punch you in the stomach and you feel like you've just caught life by the arm and thrown it to the mat.  Have you really, or do you just tell yourself this so you can pretend that you've won?

Try this on for size: "Life has given you lemons, now you have lemons."  or "Life just kicked you in the mouth.  It hurts and you're bleeding."  I'm still sick.  I still have more work to do than I feel like I will be able to manage.  For a long time now, I've felt like I was in control.  I was generally happy with how everything was going in my life.  I felt nearly super-human because I was handling things and staying positive while comforting people around me as they felt overwhelmed.  Now, the only thing that feels consistent is the fact that I'm still breathing.

So I found myself feeling stripped of everything that brought me comfort, so what did I do?  I let it overtake me.  Imagine you're skydiving and your parachute opens in a tangled mess.  You cut away and your reserve flies loose as it deploys.  Where's that lemonade now?  There's only one thing you can do: you can keep falling at the ground.  You're not going to win this one.  Supposedly the last phase of dealing with loss is acceptance.  Today, I decided to start there.  I opened up to how helpless I felt against what was facing me.  I just took some time to really be with the fact that I feel really crappy right now.  Everything that sucks seemed to be pounding on my front door.  How do you stop the knocking?

I opened the door, and welcomed all of this stuff that I didn't want because whether you want it or not, it's there.  Did I feel better? No.  As all of this stuff came in, it felt horrible.  I wanted to shove it all out and close the door again, but that didn't work before.  I stayed with that, just accepting that it felt horrible for a long time.  You know what happened?  It lost its power.  I opened the door, and now life couldn't keep knocking.  The only thing I had with me was the consistency of my breath, so I surrendered that as well.  I gave my breath over to everything that was causing me so much discomfort.  I stopped pretending that I could defend myself, and eventually life stopped attacking.

Now here I am.  These problems still need to be solved.  Everything may still be going to hell, but I feel strangely relieved.

I wrote this mainly for myself.  I don't know why but I felt the need to put this all into words.  But I also wrote it for everyone else.  Like the rest of this silly little blog, it serves first as a journal to myself.  Maybe I'll come back through one day and read all my old entries.  I can look back on how my mentality has changed over the years and feel embarrassed at how self absorbed and angsty I've been at times.  Or maybe I'll never read any of these again; they'll just serve their purpose at that moment and be gone.

But I also post these on a public forum where anyone else can read and critique as they see fit.  I think that on some level I hope that they will help a little bit.  Maybe you'll see what has helped me and it can help you too.  Maybe you'll just think it's silly and feel a little more confident about how you handle things.  I know one or two people who are going through something similar, if nothing else maybe they'll just see that they aren't alone.

            The other day, I decided to go to a Jewish service.  I did this partly because I’m in a comparative religion class which requires its students to visit services of faiths they’re not familiar with.  I also did this partly because I’m just curious.  A lot of the Jewish people I’ve met seem really friendly, and I’ve always gotten the impression that Judaism was a very devoted religion.  I guess it may have helped that I knew the Rabbi fairly well, and he seems like a really nice person.

            I had always thought that I knew what Judaism was all about.  I was raised Catholic and we dealt with the Old Testament every service.  I always just figured that Catholicism grew as an offshoot of Judaism so they should be pretty similar.  I expected that the Jewish service would be pretty similar to a Catholic mass, except for the readings from the New Testament and communion.  I was in for quite a surprise.

            As I walked up to the synagogue, a couple greeted me with “Shabbat Shalom.”  I was caught a bit off guard because I’m not used to hearing Hebrew.  After I told them that it was my first time attending a Jewish service, they explained that Shabbat Shalom simply means “Peaceful Sabbath” and that it’s a traditional Jewish greeting.  While we were talking, I took the opportunity to ask the couple if there was anything special I needed to know so I wouldn’t offend anybody.  They told me that I should put on a yamaka, but that I didn’t really need to know anything else.

            I was surprised that the Rabbi didn’t seem to perform a very active role in the service.  He mainly handled introductions and told people what was coming next.  Most of the readings were led by ordinary people who regularly attended the service.  I was also surprised to see that all of the readings were in Hebrew.  Since I don’t know any Hebrew, I followed along using the English translation in the prayer book.

            I noticed that all of the prayers seemed to have a very calm tone.  Rather than asking God for what you want, the theology seemed to focus on praising God and trusting him to take care of you.  The difference is a subtle one, but sets a hugely different attitude.  The impression that I got of the Jewish mindset is one of selflessness.  The Christian prayers that I’ve said and heard over the years have usually focused on asking God for support, while the Jewish prayers that I saw that night focused on complete devotion to God and gratitude for his work.

            Another thing that I noticed was the strong sense of community.  When the Rabbi spoke to the congregation, he emphasized the unity amongst all Jews.  After the service, we all shared dinner and I took the opportunity to listen to what a few of the congregants had to say about their practice:

            “There’s an important difference between Christian families and Jewish families.  In a Christian family, when the kids hit 18, their mother says ‘I think it’s time for you to get your own place.’  In a Jewish family, when the kids are 25 they say ‘I think it’s time I for me to get my own place.’ and their mother asks why her house isn’t good enough anymore.”  That was probably the most memorable thing that I heard all night.  While the Jewish woman who said it was joking, it still emphasized the unity and sense of community that I noticed.  I think the purpose of holding the service in Hebrew was partly to express their ties to the other Jewish communities all over the world.

            While I don’t think one can really understand a religion without practicing it for a while, I feel like I understand Judaism a lot better than I did before.  I no longer think of it as a truncated version of Christianity, and I think I’ve begun to understand the very giving attitude that I notice from Jewish people I know.  I’m very glad that I attended this service, and in a way I feel closer to everyone else who was at the service that evening.

***Coming Soon:  Broken thumbs and drug barons.

I don't expect to die any time soon, but I figure that a lot of people who die don't really see it coming.  I figure that whenever I kick the bucket, I might as well have a note of my intentions left behind for whoever has to wrap up whatever loose ends I leave behind.  There's really no particular reason that I decided to write this tonight, it's just a thought that has occurred to me a number of times and this time I decided to follow through with it.  I don't really feel like going to a lawyer and drafting up anything official, so I imagine that if I die before doing so my next of kin will have to figure things out.  So I guess this is a guide for them and sticking it on the internet might make it a little easier to find.

My body:  If I end up a vegetable in a hospital bed with little chance of recovery, pull the plug within a month.  If I haven't made a recovery by then, I probably won't at all.  There's no point in postponing the inevitable in that situation, and my body could be useful for other purposes.  I'm an organ donor for a reason.  I don't expect that I'll have much use for a body once it's dead, so if any part of my body can be used to help anybody out to any degree, they can have it.  If there's anything left and it can be of any value for scientific research, that'd be great.  If there's no scientific application, I guess you might as well burn whatever is left and toss it in the garden.  To me, the body has no value once the spirit has left it.  I mentioned cremation because I think it's the cheapest way to get rid of a person's remains.  If it's cheaper to bury me, do it.

I don't want any more money than is necessary wasted on my death.  I don't think I have life insurance right now because I don't have any dependents.  You can sell my stuff and use the proceeds with whatever savings I have to cover funeral expenses.  If there isn't enough money, do a cheaper funeral.  I don't just say this because I'm habitually frugal, but because I see too many ways that the money could be better spent.  Which brings me to the next topic.

My assets:  Obviously I won't need my stuff once I'm dead.  If I'm married and/or have any dependents when I pass, they can take their pick of all my stuff and keep what they want.  Then my parents and sister.  Sell the rest and give my wife/dependents the money.  If I die single, my parents/sister can take their pick of my stuff and sell the rest.  Use some of the money to cover all my (hopefully small) funeral expenses and tie up any financial loose ends I leave behind.  Whatever is left, I'd like to give half to the USAFA Buddhist Sangha for use at their discretion.  How the funds are used should be decided by a vote between the group's leader and anybody who's been attending services for 6 months or more.  I'd like the other half to go to kiva.org because they're the most awesome charitable organization I know of.

Friends and Family:  If anybody feels like sending flowers, don't.  Instead, make a contribution to some organization you believe in.  Do it in my name if it makes you feel better, but don't waste it on aesthetic crap when it could be used to help people.  I hope everyone I care about knows how I feel about them.  Chances are good that if I've met you, I love you and care about you.  If I've wronged you in any way, I'm sorry.

Sendoff:  I think I've already made it clear that I want a cheap funeral.  If I was there to plan it, I'd put my ashes in a coffee can and have the service in someone's garage.  If you care about me, you won't need something fancy to say goodbye.  If you don't care about me, you probably shouldn't be at my funeral.  Anybody there who feels like saying anything should be allowed to do so, even if they want to say how much of a bastard I was.  The only thing I ask is that whoever speaks is respectful to the other people there, and don't put words in my mouth.  I'd like the service to be either a Buddhist or Unitarian Universalist one.  Since I don't really consider myself a theistic person, I don't think it would be fitting to have a theistic funeral.

Sorry if that all seems a bit morbid.  I'm happy with the way my life is going so far and don't want to die anytime soon; however, I'm also at peace with the way things are and the eventuality of death.  I only write all of this because I would hate for my death to cause unnecessary suffering by forcing people to guess at what I would have wanted.  What I want is to let my death help as many people as possible.  I don't want emotions or religion to stand in the way of helping even one person no matter how minimally.  We're all going to die, I figure that death might as well serve a constructive purpose.

I've been thinking about the whole religion thing a lot lately.  Right now I consider myself a Buddhist.  I've been practicing Buddhism for a little over a year now and it feels right for me.  When I first stumbled on it, I realized that it was just a religion that matched up with what I already believed.  I've maintained a curiosity about religion for quite some time now and I've learned quite a bit in my research.  I've gotten into quite a few religious debates and I've gotten to the point where I don't really enjoy them anymore.  I think I've heard the major points on each side of the argument and people tend not to listen when you're disagreeing with them on the foundation of their life and belief system.  I still enjoy religious discussions, where both parties are just legitimately interested in the other person's viewpoint and neither is trying to convert or "save" the other.  That's not what I want to write about right now though.  I'd like to talk about my slow digression from Christianity.

I was raised Catholic.  I did the whole first communion, first confession thing.  When I was really young I loved the faith and was about as devout as it gets.  At the time I thought it was perfectly amazing and I was really happy with it.  I also had a basic idea that everything was interconnected and we were all part of some greater whole than the sum of its individual parts.  I was confused that other people didn't seem to agree with my unity idea because it seemed like such common sense to me.  Nobody had ever taught me that, I just knew it was true for as long as I could remember.  This kind of idea caused me to start asking questions.

I stuck with the devout Catholicism thing up through early high school (~14 years) and eventually I started to feel dissatisfied.  I had so many questions and nobody could give me answers that I thought made sense.  I started with the basic questions about how to understand the Bible, because it didn't make much sense if you took it literally.  Earth, made in 6 days?  What about dinosaurs?  I'm pretty sure that's where it started, then the more complex ideas of whether it's ever moral to break the commandments.  During this time in my life, I would get into religious debates and adamantly defend the belief in God and the other teachings of Christianity.  When I encountered people who were atheists, I thought they were ignorant and obviously just didn't have the same knowledge that I did.  So to answer my questions and learn better how to convert others, I started reading the Bible.  I started with one of those little ones that people hand out by high schools, so that meant starting with the gospels.  A little way into the gospels, I felt like I needed more background to fully understand so I decided to get a full-blown Bible and start reading the old testament first.

As I started with reading the Bible cover-to-cover, I got involved with the New-Life type of evangelical Christianity.  Catholicism didn't have the burning passion that I wanted from my faith, but I found that passion and devotion with the YoungLife program and the local evangelical church.  I got involved with an evangelizing program, reaching out to local middle schoolers.  After a year or so of that though, I realized that I had no right to push my religion on others.  By this time, I had realized that there was no scientific proof for my beliefs and as such, I didn't feel right pushing others to accept it.  I still though it was fine to gently persuade people when they came to me with questions, but evangelizing didn't seem moral to me.  Around the same time I began to realize that there are good atheists.  That's right, these godless heathens could be upstanding, moral, ethical, valuable members of society.

About the same time I fell away from the evangelist lifestyle, I began questioning other things.  There were some teachings in the Bible that just didn't make sense and seemed flat out wrong.  Of course if I just understood a little better, everything would fall into place and I would feel better right...  So I prayed more and more.  Every night, without exception, I would read from the Bible and pray.  Most of the time I prayed to God to help me understand, answer my questions, and eventually, I prayed that he would help me regain my lost faith.  I was terrified, because as I lost my faith, I knew I was more and more likely to go to Hell and burn for eternity.  I think this is one reason, I was so hesitant to leave the Christian faith.  I was literally terrified of going to Hell.

Over the years this praying for understanding and help in maintaining my faith, it still faded.  The teachings of the Bible as the word of God made less and less sense, my belief that the head honcho existed faded, in short the Bible killed my faith.  I eventually realized that the Bible only made sense if it was interpreted as something written by and for mankind.  About this time, I left for college. 

This was actually a great thing for my religious strength.  Since I came to the Air Force Academy, I started off with basic training.  For those who have been through basic training, you know that it can be a rough time.  Many people have their faith strengthened during this time because it can be very helpful to turn to a god for emotional and spiritual support.  I’d like to clarify here: nobody at the academy pushed religion on me.  Basic training was just a rough time and I felt personally like I needed God’s help.  Unfortunately, that effect began fading even before the end of basic training.

During my freshmen year, I continued to struggle to keep my faith.  I kept praying for better understanding, stronger faith, and all that jazz.  I don’t think I gave up on God until some time around the end of my freshman year.  It was terrifying for me to take that giant leap from faith, but I basically figured that there was one of three possibilities.  The first possibility was that God didn’t exist.  I felt that the evidence leaned this way.  The second possibility was that God did exist and being the benevolent, omniscient, omnipotent being that he was, he would understand not believing in him considering the evidence.  The last possibility was that God would not forgive a lack of faith.  If this was the case, that meant that God would condemn many people who I thought were “good” people.  If God was so egocentric that he would damn people just for not having blind faith, he didn’t seem like someone I’d want to spend eternity with.  So now I was left with three possible explanations of God, none of which inclined me to believe in him.

So around the beginning of my sophomore year, I felt essentially atheistic or agnostic.  Releasing my futile clinging to a dead faith, I actually felt a lot better.  It was incredibly freeing to let go of this.  Now despite having lost my religion, I kept reading the Bible because I still wanted to finish it.  I finished it right around the end of my sophomore year.  Since this shift, my belief in God has not changed.  I don’t deny other people’s right to believe in something that I’ve fallen away from.  However, if they try to convert me after I’ve asked them to stop, I’m going to get pissed.

There are still some funny things though.  Even though I don’t believe there would be any “sin” associated with “taking God’s name in vain” or colloquially, “dropping the GD” I don’t feel comfortable saying it.  In my life, I have never said it…ever.  It seems strange to me that as an atheist/agnostic I don’t say GD while some of my very devout Christian friends aren’t bothered by its use enough to stop themselves.  I’m not trying to say that I’m a better person, but it’s interesting to point out.

I just posted some info at desoto.org about woodgraining so I figured I'd post a picture of the final product here.

http://desoto.org/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=2363&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15

for the discussion on woodgraining

I'll start with the important stuff.  My car handled a highway trip just fine.  Last Sunday, I decided to drive my car up to school from Pueblo.  I think my parents and I were all pretty nervous because my car had never endured highway speeds for longer than 5 minutes before.  One thing that I did before the trip, was change the oil.  I'm really glad that I did.  I wasn't too concerned about it because the guy who I bought it from said that he changed the oil when he got it.  I didn't think that he had driven it very much so I didn't expect it to need an oil change, but I figured that I didn't know exactly how much he had driven it, so I'd err on the side of caution.

When I yoinked the plug on the crankcase, the oil that came out was black as night, but that wasn't much of a surprise.  I also thought that I saw a few flecks of metal or something in it.  Bad signs, but not surprises.  The surprise came when I went to change the oil filter.  It's a different style of filter than most modern cars have now; it's a cartridge that sits inside a permanent metal can.  Well, the metal can was stuck shut because it had been left closed for far too long.  And the filter cartridge was a rusted chunk of crap.  Yeah, that's right, rusted.  Iron doesn't rust when it's sitting in oil, so obviously this filter had been in there from the time when this car was sitting in someone's barn or field with the oil slowly leaking out of it for years on end.  This filter was probably older than me.  That was disappointing because the guy I bought the car from seemed to know better than to change the oil and leave the old filter.

After removing the filter I found years and years worth of engine sludge and metal shavings inside the canister.  Again, a bad sign but not a surprise.  I did some extensive cleanup work and tracked down a new oil filter (I love NAPA), then filled the green machine with fresh oil.  When I started her up, she seemed to run a little smoother, a little quieter, and produce a bit more power.  I even gained about 20 psi of oil pressure.  It just goes to show that a little maintenance will pay off big time.

The car held its own pretty darn well on the drive up here, even though it was working against a big time altitude change and a pretty constant 75 mph it did a great job.  I'm proud of my car.  At first I stopped every ten minutes or so to do a quick walk-around and make sure that nothing was blatantly wrong.  But after doing that 3 times without finding anything, I decided to plug along and did just fine for the next 50 miles or so.  Thank you car.

Now on the issue of spirituality.  I've had a few people mention to me lately that they believe Buddhists are pacifists, and that there seems to be a conflict between that and a military life.  I can't claim to speak for anybody except myself, but this issue has come up quite a bit during our discussions at services.  Now while I'm sure there are some Buddhists who undertake a pacifist lifestyle, that's not generally a necessity for Buddhism as I understand it.  I don't think there are many people who would argue that you don't have a right to defend yourself and others.

Nonetheless, one of the grave precepts of Buddhism (similar to the commandments) is the vow of not killing.  Obviously, a military profession is not the most effective way to prevent yourself from killing others.  But as a Buddhist, you take responsibility for the well-being of every sentient being.  So if I allow somebody to be killed, I still hold myself responsible for that death.  Now is the rough part.  By taking responsibility for that death, I take away any chance I have of making "the right" decision in that situation.  If I have the choice of killing one person, or letting him kill other people, I will be a killer no matter what I do.  My choices are to do a wrong thing by letting him kill, or do a wrong thing by killing him.  I'm left to choose the lesser of two evils, or the best mistake.

If I sit back and absolve yourself of guilt by not taking action, I am being selfish. I am removing my guilt by shirking responsibility just so I can feel better about myself.  How can I justify killing as a Buddhist?  I can't.  Like it or not, ethics are complex.  To believe that there will always be a clear right and wrong is naive.  Sometimes, people will just have to bite the bullet and make the best of a bad situation.

I just got back from Christmas break and I had a great time let me tell ya.  I had three weeks off for winter leave.  I spent most of those tinkering with my car and laying around the house.  The car is working well and my dad tinkered with it a bit so now all four gears work.  The only remaining problem is that there's no kickdown control for the transmission.  This is just a throttle-activated switch that will drop the transmission down in gear if you push the gas in while you're in a high gear.  As is, my car is driveable and I can take it on the road just fine, but that kickdown switch will allow me to accelerate a lot quicker while I'm merging and stuff like that.  My dad also built an adapter plate to let me mount a CD player in the dash using the space where the old AM radio's speaker went.  Since we changed over the whole electrical system (6 volt positive ground to 12 volt negative ground) I can't think of any way to hook up the old AM radio/speaker anyway.

Now I've got a CD player with four speakers which will be very nice.  I didn't go with anything too fancy because it's such an old car that it would probably be easy to break into.  It also didn't seem right to put a monster system in such a classy old car.  I'm sure you can visualize a 1952 DeSoto cruising along with throbbing subwoofers shaking the car apart.  Yeah, it just isn't right. 

My neighbor also came by and installed the headliner.  Or tried to.  It turns out that the headliner he made is a bit too big.  One section specifically seems to be the culprit.  I'm thinking that he'll just have to trim a few inches out of that one section, re-sew it, and it'll fit like a glove.  So I'm frustrated that the upholstery still isn't done.  Originally he told me that it should take about 5 or 6 weeks.  He's been working on it now for over four months.  I think that he's frustrated that he's not done too.  Alas, it shouldn't be a surprise really because he's a beginner to interior work and he's doing the work for less than I would pay a regular upholstery shop.  I guess those shops take a long time too so looking at the big picture I think I'm coming out pretty even.  I was going to drive my car back from break but he told me that if I leave my car there, he can finish it this week.  I would really love to go back home this weekend and find my car totally upholstered, with seats, carpet, headliner and all.  On the upside, I put in the doorpanels that he made for me and they look really good.  The tan color of the cloth works really well with the brown and woodgrain color of the dash and trim pieces.

I've also been working on repairing my steering wheel.  It's a metal core that was originally covered with a sort of plastic resin.  Well over 56 years, a lot of the plastic broke off and what's left is cracked and brittle.  I was going to try covering it with polymer clay, which I think would look really neat.  Sadly, when I tested some of the steering wheel resin, I found out that I can't bake it, so the clay option is out.  What I'm trying now is some body filler.  Traditionally it's used to help smooth out small dings and scratches in the body of a car.  I figured it might work pretty well for building a steering wheel so I've applied a few coats and sanded and shaped it until it's got the shape I think I want for the spokes.  Then I'm going to try to use some rubber hose to get the right thickness for the wheel part.  Next, I'm either going to use fiberglass to cover the rubber hose and paint it, or just get a steering wheel cover.  I'll have to think on that for a while  I guess.

Over break my parents also decided to send my sister and I to Cancun for a few days.  They said that it's getting hard to shop for us so they decided to get us a trip.  We didn't actually stay in Cancun, we stayed on Isla Mujeres which is a little island off the coast of Cancun.  It was a nice opportunity to lounge around on some beaches.  There's not a whole lot to do there, which is fine by me because I'm more of a beach bum anyway.  When I did travel through the island's city area, it was like a small tropical version of Pueblo.  I had a good time, but if I was going to do it again, I wouldn't bother checking out any of the island's attractions, I'd just hang out on the beach a lot.

So there's an update for those of you that I haven't talked to lately.  Here are a few pictures of my car's progress.  Hopefully, I'll be able to post some final pictures within a week.

Thought you might like to know that I have gotten my car running and driving.  In fact, I spent most of yesterday afternoon driving it around town.  Between fiddling with the clutch, choke, brake, gas, steering wheel, and shifter all at once it stalled on me a few times and it's going to need some work.  I felt kinda like I was learning to drive stick all over again, but this time was a lot harder.  Imagine learning to drive stick, but you have to double clutch when you shift.  Now imagine that along with the fact that reverse, 1st, and 2nd are all in the same place.  Yeah, you have to shift out of first, then back into the same place for second.  Throw in some uncooperative blinkers and an engine that doesn't want to idle at the right speed and you've got a recipe for fun.

It'll need some work before I can drive up to springs and keep it at school.  For example, it will be nice if we can get it to shift into fourth gear so I can go over 50 mph.  It's nice though to be at a point where I can actually drive my project.  I love the way it looks even though I still have a few pieces of chrome to put on and all of the upholstery left to install.  We'll see how it goes.  Here are a few pictures for you.

I'm totally psyched (pardon the 90's throwback) because I finally have the grille mounted on my car.  And in the case of a 1952 DeSoto, the grille is the defining trait of the car.  A lot of Mercury guys like to buy DeSoto grilles to mount on their "leadsleds" because it's just that awesome of a grille.  It has all of it's shiny teeth that just look amazing and if you can't tell I'm really excited to finally see it on my car after being replated.  Bit by bit, the car seems to be coming together and I'm pumped to finally drive it.

Now to completely break up any sort of continuity I figured I'd go on about something that's been on my mind a bit lately.  Since I've been at this school, I've literally trusted people with my life quite a few times.  These people were other cadets.  During basic training, one of the obstacles on one of the courses we did was called the "Tiltin Hilton" and it can be rather spooky if you're afraid of heights.  Beyond being spooky, it can also be very dangerous if you do it wrong.  The obstacle is basically a bunch of platforms stacked on top of each other.  You have to get to the top by throwing your team mates up to the next level, then they throw you and so on.  If someone does it wrong, you could end up plummeting a few stories to either death or significant injury.  It's strange to think that I did this with a bunch of people that I had only known for about a month.  I was responsible for their lives as they were for mine.  It's even crazier when you think that the whole thing was organized, briefed, and monitored by other cadets.  I still haven't heard of anyone ever getting hurt on that obstacle.

Another time that comes to mind is when I did the parachuting program after my freshman year.  I met a few other people in my class and we were all taught by a cadet how to jump out of planes and live.  If that junior on the parachuting team didn't know her stuff down pat, I could easily have ended up getting tangled in my parachute's lines and falling a few thousand feet to become a pancake.  But she knew her stuff, and she knew how to teach it.  She taught us how to stay stable in the air so that our parachute would deploy properly to save our lives.  Because she taught us so well, I wasn't even nervous my first time up.  I had complete confidence in the capabilities of the USAFA parachuting team.  I trusted them with my life and it rocked.

The final example that's fresh in my mind is the glider program here.  You hop into a tiny little glider with no parachute and a tow plane takes you up a few thousand feet in the air and lets you go.  There are plenty of things that can go wrong, rope breaks, stalls, glider malfunctions, and if your instructor doesn't know how to handle those issues you can both die.  Add to that the fact that the student doesn't know what they're doing at first and that means that the instructor has to know exactly what you're likely to screw up.  Not only do they have to know what's going wrong and how to fix it, they have to know which approach to take depending on altitude and the plane's orientation.

It's kinda like doing trust falls, except that instead of a half dozen people ready to catch you, there's one.  And instead of falling a few feet over some grass, you jump out of a building over a spike pit.  Trusting my life to my peers is almost commonplace to me now.  I don't expect that most people around here think about that very much, but having that kind of trust in the people around you and their abilities really says something about this school.  It's one of those subtle, yet significant things that makes me love it here.

I know this might seem kinda random but last Saturday, I had quite an amazing experience.  I got to ride Elanore's grand-daughter.  That's not as dirty as it sounds though.  By Elanore, I mean the Shelby GT 500 from Gone in 60 Seconds and her grand-daughter is a brand new 2008 Shelby GT 500 with 500 horses under the hood.  Believe it or not, a friend of mine recently got one and I got to tag along with him while he took it out for a spin.  He didn't do anything too crazy because he had just gotten it and the roads were wet.  If I had that car, I'd definitely get myself into trouble, so I guess it's a good thing that it's his car instead.  I'll just have to bum rides off of him a lot so I can spend some quality time with his car.

I guess that pretty much sums it up.  It's starting to look like I'll have it done around Thanksgiving break.

Last weekend, I finally got some paint on my car.  My dad and I painted the roof and it came out awesomely.  I got a really light creamy green color for the top and I'm going with a medium tone of green for the bottom.  I painted the base coat, or the color on the top.  Then my dad put the clear coat on top of that to make it really nice and shiny.  There are a few spots in the paint where a spec of dust or a gnat landed in it, but we didn't have many.  My dad says that whenever you paint a car, you always get a few specs in the finish and this paintjob doesn't have very many.  Also on the up side, neither of us put any runs in it.  When I painted the inside, there are a few spots where I put the paint on too thick and got some drizzles, but most of the paint on the inside will be covered up anyway so it's no biggie.

Hopefully next weekend I can finish up some sanding and finally spray the rest of the car with the final color!  Maybe, I can even start hooking up the new wiring and re-assembling the rest of the car.  After that I'll just get it upholstered and slap some tires on it, then drive the beauty around.  I'm even starting to think about dropping a V-8 in it next summer but I guess we'll see how that goes.

School's also been going pretty well.  Pretty busy, but pretty well nonetheless.  I'm an element leader which means that I'm responsible for keeping track of 8 other people.  So far it doesn't seem too bad, but I've got to make sure that  my freshmen stay up to speed on their military knowledge.  Depending on what other stuff we're doing, I'm sometimes responsible for organizing exercises and making sure that everyone completes whatever training they need to do.  I also signed up to work a program called reconditioning or Recondo for short.  I basically keep track of people on athletic probation and run them through workouts to help them get in better shape.  It's a pretty time consuming job because we meet three times a week for about 2 hours each day.  I like it though because it's got a very tangible purpose and outcome.  My third job is standardization/evaluation NCO, which means I'm partly responsible for grading knowledge tests and inspecting rooms.  I didn't expect that job to be much of a time commitment but last night it surprised me with a couple hours of grading.

I think I'm going to drop stan/eval because 3 jobs on top of being a physics major is taking a lot of time.  This is the first significant chunk of free time that I've had during the week since the semester started.  I guess it's my fault anyway because I also go to two religious groups each week.  I go to the Buddhist group because I've noticed that it helps me calm down, and approach situations more appropriately.  It also helps me understand myself and others better.  New this year, I've been going to a Neo-Pagan meeting each week too.  They had a stand set up at a barbecue a few weeks ago and I checked it out because it was the only religion I didn't know anything about.  I don't particularly subscribe to any of it, but it's very interesting to learn about unfamiliar religions.  I'm not sure how long I'll keep going, maybe until they've told me everything they've got to say or maybe it'll just stick like the Buddhist group did.  Right now I'm the only cadet who shows up so I get one-on-one edification which is nice, but I almost feel like I'm wasting their time.  I guess they want to run the group and having one person show up each time justifies running the group long enough for other folks to come. 

It's funny after being raised in a church that taught the trinity as the only way to salvation, to learn that most other religions are pretty much the same.  For the most part, they all seem to have pretty much the same ideas about morality.  They all just have different stories and ideas for where morality originated from.  The Bible paints non-Jews and non-Christians as a bunch of murderous evil-doers.  Now I'm learning that they really aren't that bad, and in most cases are more tolerant of different people, lifestyles, cultures, and belief systems.  It's really funny to find out how common virgin birth stories, flood stories, and creation stories are between the different religions.  It's really too bad that my psychology of religion class got canceled this semester.

Until next time: Peace, love, respect, and whatever gets you there.

Well I finished up my third summer here at the grand ol' Air Force Academy.  In the last few days of Ops AF, I managed to tag along on a tanker mission to Hawaii.  We started with a straight shot from New Jersey to Oahu island Hawaii.  The flight was ten hours long and I am pretty sure that I slept for at least nine of them.  We spent just over a day in Hawaii which gave me a chance to see the USS Arizona memorial at Pearl Harbor, spend a few hours on the beach, and drive along the coast with a couple other cadets.  Early the next morning I helped load a few tons of cargo onto our jet until we were just 4,000 lbs short of max takeoff weight (max is 590,000 lbs).  When that was done we flew six hours to Luke AFB in Arizona acting as a mobile gas station for 6 F-16's (fighter jets).  It was pretty cool to watch them fly so close to us while our plane extended a boom (it's a big pole that connects to the receiver to pass gas) right into a receiver on their plane.  We stayed about three days in Arizona because of a minor electrical problem then went back to New Jersey.  Two nights later I was back at the academy again.  I still don't think my body knows which timezone it's in.

Last night, there was a big dinner for every junior at the Air Force Academy to celebrate a special occasion.  For me that occasion will occur in one hour.  The first class I go to today will kick off my junior academic year.  By going to that class, I will be legally agreeing with the Air Force that I will spend two more years at the academy, graduate, and serve at least five years as an officer afterward.  I expected to be a bit nervous about the fact that I am making such a hefty commitment, but that has not been the case.  Instead I feel a calm sort of happy confidence that I made the right choice.

Coming in, I wasn't sure that I would mesh with the military lifestyle and the fact that one day I might be personally responsible for killing somebody, or many sombodies for that matter.  In the past few years, I've been trying to figure out where I stand spiritually and religiously and part of that was wondering whether I could agree with killing somebody who --just like me-- will believe that they are doing the right thing.  I've thought about it long and hard and I know it won't be easy if/when I'm ever in that situation.  I know it sounds too simple, but in the words of General T. Michael Moseley (Chief of Staff USAF) "Some folks just need killin'."

I'm excited about the next two years I have here at the academy, and I'm looking forward to working in "the real Air Force" after that.  I think I've figured out the morality of killing, for myself anyway.  I figure that it's most important to have a damn good reason for killing.  Killing should never be the goal, but only the means.  I also believe that you shouldn't kill for anything that you wouldn't be willing to die for.  So if you look at Iraq right now, we're killing a few people because it will keep thousands others safe.  Hopefully, it will also allow those people to live freely.  You might believe that the war in Iraq is just for oil.  You might believe that it's a conspiracy since they never found WMD's.  You might believe that it's a total waste of money, and more importantly, lives.  But the fact is that most Iraqis are damn happy that we're there.  We are doing great things for entire nations.  To do those things it is necessary to kill bad guys, but I believe that if we do it right, we can help it become a more peaceful area.

People at the academy give me a hard time for wearing a bracelet with a peace sign on it.  They call me a hippie because I tell them that I love everybody.  And that's fine.  I think it's important to remember why we're killing people.  We shouldn't want to kill, but we should accept that sometimes it is a necessary step.  We don't help the good guys to kill the bad ones.  It's the other way around.  I came to the academy because freedom is the most important thing to me.  It's so important to me that I'm willing to give mine up to make sure that other people can keep theirs.  I salute the flag so others can burn it.  I guess I'll wrap it up with a quote because whatever you say, someone else has usually said it better.

"I do not agree with what you have to say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
-Voltaire