True Equality

Not that I have much sway on this topic at all, but I've been asked my stance multiple times in the last few days. So this is my two cents. Please, read it all before you attack.

I'm all for Marriage Equality. I too believe that love is love and that this is a civil rights issue. Some of my favorite people and greatest friends are homosexual. I love them the same as I love the rest of my friends, am happy for their accomplishments and deeply believe in everyone's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And that is all there is to it.

Or is there more?

Who are we kidding, there is always more. I have one problem with my own line of thought. We are talking about so much more than just one issue, both in the present and in the future.

You see besides being an advocate for marriage equality, I'm also a Mormon. A proud Mormon. I love my religion and what it does for me personally. I love the feelings of peace I get when I go to church, when I visit the Temple, and fulfill my callings. I served a two year mission for my church and loved my time doing it. I am all about sharing my faith because of how much it helped me. That being said, many members of my family are not Mormon, some of my best friends are not Mormon, and I would never force my beliefs on anyone.

There is so much more at risk with this issue for individuals of faith than we are immediately looking at.

The LDS church released a Proclamation regarding the family over 10 years ago. In it, the leaders of the Church define a marriage as a union between one man and one woman. This is important for many reasons. This is coming from a church that at one time practiced polygamy, or the concurrent marriage of one man and multiple women.

My biggest personal concern is the effect this heated issue will have on my personal future rights. I am not a bigot. I am not a hate monger. But I will continue to believe that homosexuality is a sin. The same way drinking, smoking, using illegal drugs, having premarital sexual relations, taking the Lords name in vain, cursing, and any other myriad of human behavior is a sin.

And I have news for you. I'm a sinner. I have temptations like everyone else. I'm far from perfect, and I always will be.

However, if marriage equality passes and my church continues to preach that homosexuality is a sin, we will be labeled as intolerant. Our rights to freedom of speech and freedom to worship how, where and what we may will be infringed upon the same way homosexuals right to marry are currently infringed upon.

Don't believe me? Just look at our history. Then look at this study done on the effects of same sex marriage in Canada.
Same Sex Marriage -- 10 Years Later

Anyone interested in assessing the impact of same-sex marriage on public life should investigate the outcomes in three spheres: first, human rights (including impacts on freedom of speech, parental rights in public education, and the autonomy of religious institutions); second, further developments in what sorts of relationships political society will be willing to recognize as a marriage (e.g., polygamy); and third, the social practice of marriage.

Understanding that this study may be skewed in one direction or another, this still presents a great point. If/when same sex marriage passes, my ability to speak out against it will be significantly hindered. I can be prosecuted for voicing my beliefs. My church can be fined and called intolerant, bigots, hateful and any other myriad of names.

Additionally, how involved will the government become in organizational law? Will they enforce laws requiring Mormon bishops to perform homosexual civil marriages? Will they require that the temple sealing ordinance be extended to same sex marriages? Can they do that? 

In my perfect world, we would be able to be tolerant of each others tolerance. We would allow same sex marriage as well as the ability to consider it to be against the laws of God. I could go to the wedding of my homosexual friends, support their love, and be happy for them while they simultaneously respect my right to believe that acting on those desires is wrong.

But this world isn't perfect. This country isn't perfect. We have a thousand important issues that need to be addressed besides this one. We face a time of change. We have the ability to shape our future. We have the ability to work towards a better world full of understanding, hope, and Love.

A friend of mine posted the following:

"Today I have heard from people who feel so strongly for both sides of the gay marriage issue. People on both sides feel both empowered by their cause, and threatened, belittled and undervalued by their opponents. I ask everyone, no matter what your stand on the issue, to remember one thing: People are inherently good, and proponents of both sides feel they are doing the right thing. Every person has a different story and, consequently, a different understanding. No matter what you believe, speak out, and effect change! But remember that we are all just trying to get it right."

I can not state my feelings in any more eloquent a way than that.

Let us understand each other, let us love each other, and let us build a better future for ourselves and our children. We have the ability to come together in a way never before seen to find the right answers and make this country of ours a great place for all peoples once again.

I truly hope everyone who reads this understands where I'm coming from. I do believe in marriage equality. I do believe in gay rights. I want my homosexual brothers and sisters to be able to find happiness and tolerance in this world. But I also want to retain my rights and I'm deeply concerned about where these roads will lead. I wish it wasn't a "your rights or mine" type of issue, but until we can come together in love and understanding, it always will be.

I am not conservative. I am not liberal. I am an American. I am human. Like every single one of you. I pray we can come together and find the right solution that will benefit all. Like my friend said, '...we are all just trying to get it right.'

Who am I?

Indeed, this is a question I am forced to ask myself on an annual basis.

I am an Arizonian through and through. I love getting out of doors and living life.

I enjoy time traveling, or at least I will at some point in the future. Once, after defeating Jude Law (a notorious underground cage fighter, a fact hidden from the public for obvious reasons,) in glorious battle, Chuck Norris invited us both to his secret under-the-sea coffee shop where we proceeded to sing songs from the 70's band, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. We play poker every third Tuesday with the winnings going to charity. I taught Donald Trump how to scuba dive and helped lower his golf handicap in a matter of minutes. I originally created the chemical properties for true Chicken Noodle Soup for the Soul, but Jack Canfield beat me to the rights to use the name. My soup is now used to fuel jet engines for the Armed Forces. I inspired the international hit Looking for Freedom by David Hasselhoff. I have a third nipple.

Years ago, I climbed to the top of Mount Fuji in search of a fortune cookie with the meaning of life written inside. Upon reaching the summit, I gave the cookie to a small, starving orphan child who devoured the cookie whole. I know the way to San Jose. I enjoy opening and reading mail. I can juggle 27 pens and a chainsaw while doing the gallon challenge. I have been called a Saint, a Sinner, and a Patriot all in the same long winded sentence. I am prisoner 24601.

The only child of two loving parents, I had a happy childhood. Despite popular belief, I am not spoiled, with the exception being in the area of attention and love. When I reached the age of 12 my Father decided it was time for me to become a man and began to employ me in hard physical labor. I worked as a Brick Carrier/Layer for a summer, I've worked in a metal shop, and in a warehouse dealing in surplus goods. I ran concessions at Hale Center Theatre in Gilbert, Arizona and thoroughly enjoy the arts. I am sure I've done much more, but am bored with the lack of variety in my working past.

I am accustomed to working, and tend to enjoy it when it is engaging. I like to work to learn, money is just a side note, a positive externality if you will. That being said, I want to be rich, or at least wealthy enough to support my family. My family is defined as my parents and their siblings and the children thereof. Of course, my own wife and children will hold precedence to all others.

Now my task is to find and convince someone to marry me, preferably of the female persuasion. I want a mid-size to large family. Being the only child, I feel a need to give my parents many grandchildren so the attention and love may be shifted to the youngens. The poor suckers won't even know what hit them.

In my professional life I will be abnormally successful. I want to be seen as a force for good and help create jobs for others in a company I own or in which I am a partner. I want to help others succeed, and make both parties money while doing it. I love to create and build, and hope to employ these desires in my future occupation.

I desire to want for nothing. I desire for my family to want for nothing (unless of course it is a healthy want, the kind that teaches my children how to work and save for a desired object). I will spend much time with my family engaging in our hobbies and interests as often as occasion permits.

I love extreme sports involving boards, with the exception being water-boarding. Many people confuse torture and extreme sporting regularly. I practically grew up as a fish and love the lake, the river, and the ocean. I played baseball, football, and volleyball in my adolescence and enjoy watching and playing anything that appears on SportsCenter.

Religion plays a very important and rather large role in my life. I have been raised believing in a loving God who sent His Son to this world in order for mankind to be saved. I dedicated two years of my so far short life teaching the peoples of Germany the things I hold to be true. I returned home in June of 2009 and miss my time abroad dearly. The memories made and adventures had flood my consciousness on a daily basis. I miss it more than words can express.

I enjoy being with people. I enjoy watching people. I enjoy talking to people. I enjoy listening to people. I enjoy being in front of people. I enjoy helping people. I enjoy people. This is possibly my most dominating and helpful trait. I am a people person. I find it easy to converse with people; I can be anyone's best friend for an hour or two. I like to think that I understand people, I like to find out what it is that makes them tick, who they are at the core, what their fears and great aspirations are, what and who they love, the reasons they do what they do day in and day out.

I am a hopeless romantic (although the concept of love eludes me at the moment) and try to be an advocate for hope. People can change, and there are seeds of good in everyone. I want to help as many as I can in the time allotted me here on this temporal sphere.

As stated before, I enjoy building and creating things. I like to be organized, although at times I find chaos to be the best filing cabinet. I love to have a good time and consistently mix business with pleasure. I find that personal productivity goes up when I have fun doing what I do.

This is who I am. It would be folly to think that a few words could adequately describe the essence of my being, mostly because I'm still trying to figure out who or what it is that I am. I am just a confused kid who is trying to make a name for himself. A name had for good among many.

 I love my family, I love my friends, I love my dog, I love my life, and, most importantly, I love my God. This may not be the typical descriptive essay, but I am not typical. I am Me, a unique composition of strengths and weaknesses. A complex cornucopia of thoughts and feelings making up the core of my being.

Who am I?

I am Chad Jeffrey Arnett.

Welcome to my universe.

BYU Library

So I'm sitting in the library with my buddy Chad Tanner discussing life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness when he says to me, "Man, I feel like its so hard to find a girl to date. If I could find a girl that is pretty, has a good personality, and is reliable I'd marry her on the spot."

And thus I created this graphic of the realities of dating.

Cracks in the Foundation

A long, long time ago I worked construction. If you could call what I did work. But I learned a few things from my stint as a mason. One, that it sucks. Two, that its interesting. And three, I was no where near as strong as I thought I was. Also, becoming severely dehydrated and passing out 8 stories up on scaffolding is not the most productive idea, nor is it conducive to ones health.

What does that have to do with what I'm trying to write about? Absolutely nothing. It just seemed like a good beginning, especially with a title like the one I've come up with.

I don't know how else to transition into what I want to say, because its not something that I can compose in a whirl of my semi-creative mind.

Occasionally in life, the system lets you down. You learn a truth that shatters your view of the world around you. Hope seems to vanish.

You've fallen through the cracks.

It's a sobering thing to realize that you don't matter. That you are small and unimportant to the world you live in. It's not a pleasant place to be. For every step forward you take, you slip two or three back. The moment you start to see the light and claw yourself out of the void, you get sucked back down.

But even after the hottest fire is extinguished, the coals still hold warmth. And if you fan those hard enough a flame erupts again. Hope is the same way. All we need is a spark. A chance to fan the flame. Even at our worst, when it seems everything has been extinguished the most important thing we can do is remember the heat once felt. The winds of opposition will serve to stir the ashes and allow oxygen to again reach the faint ember.

Hope is all we have once we've fallen into the void. Even if you don't feel like you have any, it burns on in the deepest parts of our souls.

It just needs a little fanning. You can't kill hope.

4:44 in Phoenix

I find myself eternally conflicted. I live in a colorful world, filled with different and decadent shades of grey -- interpretive off-shoots of the traditional black and white.

Unfortunately, I'm color blind in my left eye.

It sees the back room deals made in the darkest alleys cutting through the deepest recesses of our minds. It sees the criminally insane in all of us. The perpetual struggle of a line drawn in the sand that humanity named morality. It is the judge and the jury. Black is black and white is white. Hope is dead. Loyalty is relative. Digression is retrogression, and both are fatal to the potential progression possessed by us in those choice moments where we are at our best. If we trip or stumble, then we lose the right to run. If you are not perfect, you deserve nothing. You get nothing. You failed.

But my right eye. It sees brilliance all around. It writes a myriad of love songs and beholds the benevolence of getting lost in a strange town. It longs to find the melody in a kiss. Taste a lifetime in the first touch of destined lovers. It understands the value of courage and truth, and wishes to stare down mortality until it bends. Because we are just mortals, and we are perfect in our imperfection. Hope is an ideal, and one worth dying for. Loyalties are valued above all else and make a man who he is to become.

Such is the duality of my mind. It will be your most lenient critic and your greatest advocate. It will love you fiercely and stand by your side as long as you haven't scarred it.
If you have, it will be your greatest critic and your harshest antagonist.
That's the truth.

Does it make me a terrible person? I don't know. I do know it gives me a headache. And it makes me feel horrible.

It has convinced me, however, that those who don't live in the past have a short memory span. And those that do have long term memory loss.

The past is beautiful if you forget the bad. But it is devastating if you can't remember the good.

This life is a delicate balance of past, present and future. You cannot live in only one. You cannot see solely in black and white or in technicolor. You cannot be loyal to a false hope and call it progress.

We are the products of a gold star education. A generation raised by the internet. We are impulsive because we were taught that it was okay by the dotcom's of the 90's. And now, the sins of the fathers are being visited upon the children. Seth and Cain must suffer for Adams transgression.

We are inherently indecisive and irrevocably impotent.

We hide behind the mask of political correctness.


And we deserve every hit this life is going to give us.

Parental Units

"Why are you so whiny on your blog?"

One of the many comments Unk (aka my Father) decided to throw my way regarding the most recent post.

For anyone else who thinks that Unk was right, that's not at all the way I meant it. The little rant at the end of the monologue on up and down relationships was just my way of showing what I was/am excited for in a future relationship and a way of pulling out the best lessons learned with my previous girlfriends. If it was seen as anything more, my apologies. It was not intended as such.

But this brings up an interesting point. My relationship with my father.

A few of my friends are lucky enough to see our relationship. They think our candidness is awesome, and they can't help but laugh when they hear us talk to each other or interact. And I think that that showmanship is actually a huge part of who we are.

But here's a little fact that I don't always think is abundantly clear.

I respect the hell out of my old man.

I've been living more or less at home for the last 6-8 months. And I'll be honest. It's kinda hard. But its been quite a bit of fun as well. Most of all, its been enlightening. I've gotten to see my parents as I've never seen them before. You see, I moved out 6 years ago. Since that time I spent maybe a total of 4 or 5 months at home. This isn't unusual for college students.

When I moved out, I immediately grew closer with my parents. My mom learned to text and it has been the biggest blessing to our relationship. Except for when she forgets her phone. So every other day. And Unk refuses to learn how to text. So he usually calls me a couple times a day. Which I've come to realize I really enjoy.

Though I'm working on being my own man, I hope to be able to carry on the Arnett honor that my dad exemplifies. He took the torch from my grandfather, Howard Marshall, and continued running. If I turn out to live and love and influence half as well as those two men, I will have a happy and fulfilled life. Of that I have no doubt.

So, even if some of the things they do and say get on my nerves/annoy me, the fact of the matter is they love me and I love them. I know they always have my back, and I have theirs.

So this ones for you parental units. I love ya. Sorry for raising as much hell as I can and shortening your lives.

Why I'm excited to be in love.

Ya, that's right. I'm excited to find someone to love. I'm a young 20-something male (last time I checked) and I think I have a serious problem. Every once in a while I get on chick blogs. You know the kind. They talk about arts and crafts and marriage. In fact, sometimes I find myself stalking the young and in love blogs. Or the funny, young and dating blogs. Or the previously divorced and in love blogs. (One of my secret favorites. These two are pretty incredible.) The ones that actual married couples write about being married. Which is so un-manly in its entirety. But I do it. Because I love love. I do.

However, I have a problem with the whole process. And a few of my own ideas of why so many of these little relationships are doomed to failure before they start. It's because of codependency. What is codependency you ask?

Well look at Romeo and Juliet.

Its the perfect example. Two people who place so much importance on being together that it takes precedence over their own well being. That is entirely unhealthy. Also, those kids were like 14 and 17. In my not so humble opinion, those two were addicted to the drama of their relationship. "Star-crossed lovers"? Bull. They were two rebellious kids trying to find a way to lash out. But that's just me.

But here's a bigger problem. I see people my age (ca. 24) doing the exact same thing. Being crazy. Not to be confused with crazy in love. Just straight up crazy. I have several friends (that's right, not just one) who are in completely unstable relationships. When they fight it literally sounds like World War 3. And when their done, the room looks like it was nuked. Love should not be a terrorist.

Look at the little graphic I made. Too many relationships I see are like this. I know that relationships are a roller coaster. I get that. Its not always going to be daises, long walks on the beach and listening to the latest musings of gossip girl. But a relationship should not be that up and down.

I had a buddy who said, "Yeah, we fight a bit. Okay a lot. And yeah, they can be pretty bad. But the good times are really good."

I get that. I've been there, to be honest. But its about minimizing the roller coaster. Find a happy medium and stay there. There will be hiccups, I'm not ignorant of that. But look... if its always up and down, something is not right. It really doesn't matter how bad you want it to work. Its not healthy.

I had another dear friend who related her story to me. She said that her road to marriage seemed like it was one fight after the other. The engagement was the worst. It seemed as if they were fighting about everything. When I asked her why she stuck with it and stayed on the path to marriage she said she prayed about it and felt that her answer was yes. She just knew they were meant to be married.

She's now divorced.

(This girl is drop dead gorgeous, extremely intelligent, and a spiritual powerhouse so I won't attack her judgement call on this one. However, I think that this general issue must be addressed at some point. I believe that far too often individuals get the Spirit mixed with their own personal feelings of love and often mix the signals. Just because you want it to work out and have prayed about it DOES NOT mean that your work is done. Your continued warm feelings towards that individual does not constitute Gods answer to your prayers. But that's another post for another day my friends.)

The solution to this whole thing is what I call intradependency. Not to be confused with interdependency. In my mind, the term 'intra' refers to a much more intimate relationship. And I don't mean sexual. The best relationships I've seen are when two people know who they are and what they want out of life and meld the two together. Their lives are then the beautiful ugly sweater of hopes and dreams that they knit themselves.

That's what I want. And its why I'm excited to be in love.

I can't wait to come home from my day and get to share it with the girl I love. I can't wait to hear about her day. I can't wait to develop a genuine interest in whatever it is that her life revolves around. I can't wait to be forced (let's be honest, I probably won't be forced) to watch chick shows. I can't wait to randomly show up to her place of employment with her favorite variation of a Cafe Rio salad. I can't wait to wake up to her kiss. I can't wait to plan vacations with her and our friends. I can't wait to have random adventures with her. I can't wait to hear her real laugh, not just the one she gives everyone else. I can't wait to look in her eyes and be able to see that she loves me. I can't wait for that rush of heat when I think of her. I can't wait to have conversations late into the night about why cheer-leading is or isn't a sport. I can't wait to give random gestures of romantic grandeur. I can't wait to tell her she doesn't look fat in those jeans. I can't wait to have a consistent date to plays and musicals. I can't wait to get overly excited about my non-profit and entrepreneurial business ventures and have someone that I can talk to about it. I can't wait to have a personal cheer section at my sporting events. I can't wait to hate her new haircut or color but say it looks great. I can't wait to feel her hand slide into mine when we're walking at the mall. I can't wait to photo bomb every cute picture she tries to take of us. I can't wait to be forced to try hot yoga. That's a lie. I can't wait to take her sailing and show her my hobbies. I can't wait to support her little blog about us. I can't wait to have my expectations blown out of the water when I meet her. I can't wait to buy her things. I can't wait to be her shoulder to cry on. I can't wait to be the one she turns to when she's scared or insecure. I can't wait to tease her. I can't wait to see her determination to finish something she's started. I can't wait to remember her favorite color and ice cream. I can't wait to know her favorite books and movies. I can't wait to send her off with her girlfriends and wait to hear about the reasons why she's glad she's not single when she gets back. I can't wait to feel the jealousy and simultaneous approval of all my friends when they see how good we are together. I can't wait for a reason outside of myself to be motivated. I can't wait to tell people how we met. I can't wait for her and my mom to become best friends. I can't wait to be surprised by learning something new after I think I know everything about her. I can't wait to live to see her smile. I can't wait to challenge her to a thumb war to see who does the dishes then helping her anyway. I can't wait to find the girl that becomes my perfect 10.

I can't wait to make her proud. I can't wait to protect and provide for her. I can't wait to finally feel at home when I'm next to her.

I can't wait to be in love.