Codes and Keys (Death Cab for Cutie)

     We live by rules.  Codes.  Honor systems.  We stretch them at times when we feel it is justified.  We push boundaries.  We break things.  We drive too fast when there are no cops around and like model citizens should an officer be sitting at the opposite light.  We act one way in front of others and a very different way when there are no witnesses.  We forget.  We bend.  We push.  We alter.  We lie. We subjugate.  We control.  But why?  People are scared and fearful of losing control.  It is in the very squeezing to keep it that we suffocate the truth. 
     The tricky part is figuring out why we bend when we feel we have to.  Is it out of hurt? Is it because we are lazy?  Maybe we were raised without the ethics and code systems of others.  A word that crushes one person is ignored by another.  There is no master set of rules.  Not even in religion.  Not even the list of things we should've learned in kindergarten fixes it all.  Those rules are up to you.  Does a mother steal the loaf of bread to feed the starving child?  Does the husband get to murder the man who killed his wife?  Do you break the "no visitors after 8pm" rule when someone is breathing their last breaths?  If these answers were simple we wouldn't have jails, courts, lawyers and a bazillion systems of codes and rules and laws....plus the complications of things like temporary insanity.
    We have to find a code we are safe with...safe from.  It's all relative.  We can probably all justify anything if we really wanted to.  Find good cause for bad decisions for one reason or another.  I think the challenge is finding a code for what we believe in...what we will stand for...what we will allow to happen to us.  If we are solid in ourselves than our rules become bright and bold.  It's in the falling down we find the breaking down.  When our backs are against the wall we can no longer read the sign that is hanging behind us....and without the words we forget all of the details.  Make sure the rules are simple.  Make sure you can see the sign. Make sure you know the punishments for the crimes.  It is only then that we can make the decision to follow the rule or challenge it.  It's in the clarity that we find the strength to uphold the laws.  It's in the vague that we falter.