Utah’s lacrosse players huddled in the north end zone of Judge Memorial’s McCarthey Stadium, waiting for their coach to finish a long talk with the Mount St. Mary’s coach and address them after a fifth straight defeat.

Opposing coaches often have a lot of good things to tell Utah’s Brian Holman after facing his team, and they’re not just being nice. They’re impressed with everything the Utes are doing in the program’s inaugural Division I season, although that’s not translating to wins lately. Saturday’s game clearly got away from the Utes, who lost 16-15 to the Maryland school after leading for most of the afternoon.

And the missed opportunity fit right into Holman’s approach to the season, with his ability to notice all of the little things while maintaining a wider perspective.

“Bigger picture? I love it,” Holman said. “I think games like this make it even more clear where we're heading.”

The Utes (4-8) were left with a lot to lament, after another loss. “Our goal was to have a winning season, which obviously we can’t do anymore,” James Sexton acknowledged, after scoring three goals.

Utah allowed two goals in the last 41 seconds of the first half, two more goals in the final 12 seconds of the third quarter and the last two goals of the game. That math suggests losing faceoffs was a problem; so were turnovers that prevented the Utes from scoring in the game's last seven minutes, after Josh Stout's third goal gave them a 15-14 lead.

Jared McMahon scored the winning goal for Mount St. Mary’s (7-5), as the Mountaineers repeatedly rallied. They apparently were not fazed when the public address announcer reminded the crowd about the altitude difference between Maryland and Utah during the fourth quarter of a one-goal game, and they made winning plays.

The Utes have done that themselves at times this season, earning two one-goal victories in early March. Utah couldn’t maintain leads of 6-1, 9-3, 12-9 and 15-14.

“Just little things,” Holman said. “We talk about lacrosse as being a bunch of little mini-battles all over the field, if you break it down.”

In a learning context, Holman said, “This game's awesome for us.”

But a win was not part of the reward, even on a day when Jimmy Perkins scored four goals and Liam Donnelly made 16 saves. The Utes failed to make a defensive switch on McMahon's winning goal, and Sexton's desperate shot in front of the net was blocked at the horn.

Utah entered April with reasonable hopes of winning its last four games and finishing 8-7. Now, 7-8 is the best the Utes can do, with a trip to Hartford and home games vs. Cleveland State and Detroit Mercy remaining.

Using the baseline of a season-opening 21-6 loss to Vermont on Feb. 1, “We’ve come a long way since then,” Sexton said.

Holman cites “a huge, upward trajectory,” adding, “Anybody who watched us play that game and sees us play play right now would say we're a different team.”

Mount St. Mary's coach Ton Gravante made that clear to Holman after Saturday's game. The collegiate lacrosse world likes what the Utes have done this season. As Holman related, “The constant comment is like, 'I can't believe you're doing what you're doing.' ”

In Saturday’s case, though, winning was not included.

Five members of the Utah Royals have been allocated to the United States and Canada’s women’s national teams for the 2019 season, the National Women’s Soccer League announced Friday.

For the U.S., Christen Press, Becky Sauerbrunn and Kelley O’Hara have been allocated, while Diana Matheson and Desiree Scott will be allocated for Canada.

Amy Rodriguez is no longer allocated to U.S. Soccer Federation.

Players allocated to the USSF or Canada Soccer have their salaries underwritten by the national federations.

Among the flurry of leadership appointments announced Saturday by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a familiar name for football fans emerged.

Vai Sikahema.

After starring at church-owned Brigham Young University, Sikahema, who now will be an area Seventy for the Utah-based faith, became the first Tongan ever to play in the National Football League, where he racked up yards as a running back and kick returner from 1986 to 1993.

He was drafted by the St. Louis (now Arizona) Cardinals, and also played for the Green Bay Packers and the Philadelphia Eagles. Later, he became a staple in the Philly media market and worked as sports director for WCAU-TV.

Henry J. Eyring, president of Brigham Young University-Idaho and a son of President Henry B. Eyring of the governing First Presidency, also was named an area Seventy.

Ten new general authority Seventies were appointed as well. That list included Peter M. Johnson, an African American born in New York, Benjamin M. Z. Tai, who was born in Hong Kong, and four Latter-day Saint leaders who were born in Latin America.

There have been other black general authorities, but the 52-year-old Johnson is the first African American to reach that level. He married Stephanie Lyn Chadwick in 1990, according to a news release, and the couple are the parents of four children.

The faith’s other top authorities won “sustaining” votes Saturday from members assembled in downtown Salt Lake City’s Conference Center. Unlike in recent conferences, no audible “no” votes were cast.

Washington • The president has received from one of his employees, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, a report that probably tells Ross’ employer what he wants to hear: that imports of cars — “The Audis are coming! The Audis are coming!” — threaten “national security.” This report is required by our lackadaisical Congress so it can pretend to be involved in setting trade policy. After the president’s yes-man says “Yes” to the national security threat, the president can unilaterally raise taxes (i.e., tariffs which are paid by Americans) to slow the flow of cars to Americans who want them.

Using national security as an excuse for economic foolishness, in the service of cupidity, is nothing new. What is novel nowadays is a legislator standing athwart foolishness, yelling “Stop!” Although it is impossible to imagine Sen. Mike Lee yelling.

The Utah Republican, he of the white shirts, blue suits, subdued ties and measured words softly spoken in stately cadences, lacks the demeanor of a brawler spoiling for a fight. He has, however, just picked one concerning a small sliver of something vast — crony capitalism disguised as patriotism.

The Merchant Marine Act of 1920, aka the Jones Act, was passed after one war and supposedly in anticipation of others. Its purported purpose was to encourage the development of a merchant marine sufficient for war or other "national emergency." Ninety-nine years later, the nation is in a "national emergency" (presidential disappointment regarding his wall); emergencies and national security crises multiply as the ease of declaring them increases. Never mind. The Jones Act has failed to achieve its stated aims while inflicting substantial unanticipated costs, enriching a few businesses and unions, and pleasing the 16 congressional committees and six federal agencies that have oversight jurisdiction under the act.

Lee's Open America's Waters Act of 2019 would repeal the Jones Act's requirements that cargo transported by water between U.S. ports must travel in ships that are U.S.-built, U.S.-owned, U.S. registered and U.S.-crewed. Colin Grabow, Inu Manak and Daniel Ikenson of Washington's Cato Institute demonstrate that under — and largely because of — the Jones Act, the following has happened:

One of the nation's geographic advantages — tens of thousands of miles of coastline and inland waterways — has been minimized by making it off-limits to foreign competition in transportation. This increases transportation costs, which ripple through the production process as a significant portion of the costs of goods. Because of the Jones Act's costly mandates, less cargo is shipped by water, merchant mariners have fewer jobs and more cargo is carried by truck, rail and air, which are more environmentally damaging than water transportation. Two of America's most congested highways, I-95 and I-5, are along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, respectively. Yet the amount of cargo shipped by water along the coasts and on the Great Lakes is about half the volume of 1960. Since then, railroad freight volume has increased about 50 percent, and volume by intercity trucks — responsible for 75 percent of federal highway maintenance costs — has increased more than 200 percent.

A hog farmer in North Carolina purchases corn feed from Canada rather than Iowa because delivery costs make the Iowa corn uncompetitive. A Hawaiian rancher flies cattle to West Coast feedlots and slaughterhouses to avoid Jones Act shipping costs. Although the United States is the world's second largest producer of rock salt, Maryland and Virginia buy theirs for winter use from Chile because of Jones Act shipping costs.

As for military considerations: Troops get to today's wars by aircraft. And the antiquated maritime fleet carried just 6.3 percent of the cargo in the 2002-2003 buildup for the Iraq War.

The Jones Act illustrates how protectionism creates dependent industries that then squander resources (ingenuity, money) on manipulating the government. The act also illustrates the asymmetry that explains much of what government does — the law of dispersed costs and concentrated benefits. The act's likely annual costs to the economy (tens of billions) are too widely distributed to be much noticed; its benefits enrich a relatively few, who use their ill-gotten profits to finance the defense of the government's favoritism.

Spurious "national security" concerns tend to descend into slapstick ("The Audis are coming!") as with this hypothetical horrible imagined by a U.S shipping executive defending the Jones Act: "I wouldn't want North Korea moving barges and tugboats up and down the Mississippi River. If you don't have this law, that could occur." Huck's raft crowded off the river by Kim Jong Un's vessels? Make your blood boil? Or your ribs ache from laughter?

George F. Will writes a twice-weekly column on politics and domestic and foreign affairs. He began his column with The Washington Post in 1974, and he received the Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1977.

@georgewill

georgewill@washpost.com

Washington - President Trump really puts the “err” in knight errant.

Cervantes tells us that Don Quixote attacked the windmill with his lance. This week, Trump also attacked the lowly turbine -- with misinformation.

"If you have a windmill anywhere near your house, congratulations: Your house just went down 75% in value," the president told Republican donors Tuesday. "And they say the noise causes cancer." He made a circling gesture and emitted the carcinogenic sound himself: "Whirrr! Whirrr!"

How silly! Everybody knows windmills don't cause cancer. They cause autism. Much like vaccines.

The windmill wonder was just one way in which Trump has wandered off course in the past two weeks. Attorney General William Barr's reading of the Mueller report gives Trump a fairly clean bill of health (whether the report himself did so is another matter). Trump, unshackled, should be lord of the manor. Instead, he's playing the knight errant, bouncing from crackup to pratfall.

One moment, he informs us there is a "very good likelihood" he will close the border with Mexico within days. The next, he says he's delaying that a year and might first "tariff their cars" -- upending the trade deal he just negotiated.

One moment, he announces Republicans are "moving forward" with repealing and replacing Obamacare. The next, he declares that won't happen until after the election.

One moment, he's endorsing for the public release of the Mueller report. The next, he's offering reasons not to release the report.

One moment, he wants to cut off funding for the Special Olympics. The next, he's blaming staff for a dumb idea.

In other news:

Trump, complaining about hurricane aid to Puerto Rico, overstates the amount of aid sent by more than 700%, while his spokesman refers to the U.S. territory as "that country."

He declares that Republicans should be "more paranoid" about voter fraud altering the 2020 election and describes Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., as a "29-year-old bartender."

Unhappy about migration from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador (referred to by Fox News as three "Mexican countries"), he says he's cutting off anti-poverty and anti-violence aid to those countries -- all but guaranteeing more migration.

Meeting with the NATO secretary general, Trump declares that his father was "born in a very wonderful place in Germany." That's true only if you consider the Bronx part of Germany.

While Trump was relocating his father's birthplace, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., one of the president's closest allies, was reassigning Trump's gender. "Consider this possibility: If President Trump were to say, 'I am now the first female president,' who would celebrate that?" Gaetz asked at a hearing about transgender rights.

I would celebrate that if it takes Trump's mind off the windmills.

Trump has floundered since Barr's reprieve. This is because he defines himself by what he is against and organizes his presidency accordingly. For nearly two years, he has been against Mueller and the phony hoax rigged WITCH HUNT by angry Democrats(!!!). Now with this (ostensibly) behind him, he has a hard time figuring out what he is for, rather than just what he opposes. He struggles in the absence of an adversary.

Even before the Mueller probe, Trump largely defined himself in opposition -- against President Barack Obama, against Hillary Clinton, against Chuck and Nancy, against taxes, against horrible trade deals, often against his own appointees. His signature proposal, for a border wall, is really against Mexico and illegal immigration.

After the Mueller inquiry ended, Trump had a chance for a fresh start. Instead, he reached for a new foil. He attacked pencil-neck shifty Rep. Adam B. Schiff, D-Calif., but nobody much cared. He attacked Obamacare, but Republicans blanched. He attacked Mexico, but his aides balked. He lamented Sen. Elizabeth Warren's, D-Mass., fading worth as an opponent: "I hit her too hard, too early, and now it looks like she's finished." Trump, a man who once boasted about sexual assault, then attacked Joe Biden over his treatment of women.

Trump had attacked wind turbines before, saying people who live near them "go crazy after a couple of years." (His "natural instinct for science," acquired because his late uncle taught at MIT, has also led Trump to deduce that exercise is unhealthy, flu shots don't work, and climate science is bunk.)

Now the knight errant sallies forth again on his perpetual quest for confrontation, his Sancho Panza at his side. White House communications official Mercedes Schlapp tells reporters she's waiting for a "readout" on Trump's discovery of the windmill-noise/cancer link.

Thus turn the wheels of aimless opposition. Whirrr! Whirrr!

Follow Dana Milbank on Twitter, @Milbank.

Vatican City • Pope Francis blamed Europe and the United States for the deaths of children in Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan, saying Saturday that wealthy Western countries fuel conflicts by selling weapons in war zones.

Speaking to students and teachers of Milan’s San Carlo Institute, Francis said the reason there are so many wars around the world is “the rich Europe and America sell weapons ... used to kill children and kill people.”

Without such firepower, the pope added, there wouldn’t have been war in countries such as Afghanistan, Yemen and Syria.

“A country that produces and sells weapons has on its conscience,” Francis said, “the death of every child and the destruction of each family.”

Talking about the need for countries to welcome and integrate migrants, the pope refuted the crime concerns governments cite to keep out asylum-seekers.

Foreigners aren’t the source of most crime in Italy because “we also have lots of them,” Francis said.

“The Mafia has not been invented by Nigerians. Mafia is ours,” he said. “All of us have the possibility of being criminal. Migrants bring us wealth because Europe has been made by migrants.”

Minneapolis • From one-and-done to NCAA Tournament miracle men, Virginia will play in the national championship game for the first time after pulling off another last-second stunner on a disputed foul with 0.6 seconds left.

Kyle Guy made three free throws as debate immediately started over the call and Virginia celebrated its second straight can-you-believe-it play, beating Auburn 63-62 Saturday in the Final Four.

A year after becoming the first No. 1 seed to lose to a No. 16, these top-seeded Cavaliers now look like destiny's team. They will face either Michigan State or Texas Tech on Monday night.

The Cavaliers (34-3) reached the Final Four for the first time since 1984 with a wild buzzer-beater by Mahmadi Diakite to send their Elite Eight game against Purdue to overtime.

Beating the Tigers took an even crazier finish.

The fifth-seeded Auburn (30-10) had erased a 10-point deficit in the final five minutes and led 61-60 after Guy made an off-balance 3 with 7.6 seconds left. The shot snapped a drought of more than five minutes by the Cavaliers, who then sent Jared Harper to the line with 7 seconds left.

Harper made one and Auburn, with fouls to give, did so twice. On one of them, it looked as if Ty Jerome might have double-dribbled into a decisive turnover. But there was no whistle.

"We knew there was a disruption," Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said of the possible missed call.

With 1.5 seconds left and in need of some magic, Virginia got the ball to Guy in the corner. He turned and fired and Samir Doughty, hands straight up in the air, bumped into Guy's hip. The shot bounced off the rim. Game over? Auburn started to celebrate and the PA announcer in U.S. Bank Stadium even announced the Tigers had won.

Guy pulled his jersey over his face. But not in angst. He said he knew it wasn't over.

“I heard [the official] him call it right away,” Guy said. “That was me focusing.”

When the whistle blew, Pearl lost it on the sideline, pumping his fist and screaming.

"We kind of thought we had it sealed," said Bryce Brown, who led the Auburn comeback with three 3s in the final 4:30. "It's not why we lost the game. I just didn't agree with the call."

Pearl said he didn't want the final call to define a great game, but he did say the officials seemed to be letting physical play go throughout the game. So, he asked, why not then?

Guy swished the first two free throws to tie it and Auburn called a timeout to ice him. Didn't work. He hit one more for the lead.

"I just literally told myself that we dream of these moments, and to be able to make one happen was special," Guy said.

Auburn threw a long inbound pass to Brown, but his desperation 3 was short.

The Cavaliers mobbed Guy on one end. Brown sat on the court, head hanging on the other. Auburn, in the Final Four for the first time, had its season end in a most painful way.

Jerome scored 21 points for Virginia and De'Andre Hunter had 10 of his 14 in a stellar second half.

Doughty led Auburn with 13 and Brown had 12 for Auburn, which nearly beat Virginia at its own game — with tough defense and big shots in the halfcourt.

But the team that made UMBC a household name — at least for a little while — in the first round of last year's tournament would not be denied. It has been Virginia's cross to bear all season. Even after beating Auburn.

"I feel like I get asked this question every single round, every round we advance, and every round I say the same thing almost," Jerome said, "and it feels a little bit sweeter, a little bit sweeter."

Then Guy said: "Not much to add. Just you guys can ask that question again on Monday."

___

More AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/MarchMadness and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25

Put down the remote, get up off the couch, talk to the women in your life, and wake up from your “spiritual slumber.”

That was President Russell M. Nelson’s emphatic call to repentance Saturday night at the all-male priesthood session of the 189th Annual General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Men can “do better and be better in how we honor the women in our lives, beginning with our wives and daughters, our mothers and sisters,” the 94-year-old “prophet, seer and revelator” told the assembled men and boys in the Conference Center in downtown Salt Lake City or watching the proceedings via satellite, TV or the internet.

“Brethren, your first and foremost duty as a bearer of the priesthood is to love and care for your wife,” he said. “Become one with her. Be her partner. Make it easy for her to want to be yours.”

No other interest in life, Nelson said, “should take priority over building an eternal relationship with her. Nothing on TV, a mobile device, or a computer is more important than her well-being.”

Men who need to repent of how they have treated women “should begin now,” he said. “It is your responsibility to help the women in your life receive the blessings that derive from living the Lord’s law of chastity.”

Jesus Christ is “inviting us to change our mind, our knowledge, our spirit — even the way we breathe,” he said. “He is asking us to change the way we love, think, serve, spend our time, treat our wives, teach our children, and even care for our bodies.”

Too many people see repentance as “punishment — something to be avoided, except in the most serious circumstances,” Nelson said in his only sermon Saturday. “But this feeling of being penalized is engendered by Satan. He tries to block us from looking to Jesus Christ, who stands with open arms, hoping and willing to heal, forgive, cleanse, strengthen, purify and sanctify us.”

Henry B. Eyring, Nelson’s second counselor in the governing First Presidency, urged his listeners to support and “sustain” the church’s faithful yet fallible leaders.

“You make a promise with God, whose servants these are, that you will sustain them,” Eyring said. “These are imperfect human beings, as are you. Keeping your promises will take unshakable faith that the Lord called them.”

Church members across the world “are generally loyal to each other and to those who preside over them,” he said. “There are, however, improvements we could and must make. We could rise higher in our power to sustain each other. It will take faith and effort.”

The counselor agreed with a pioneer-era apostle who said, “God has chosen his servants. He claims it as his prerogative to condemn them if they need condemnation. He has not given it to us individually to censure and condemn them.”

That earlier Latter-day Saint leader went on to say, “No man, however strong he may be in the faith, however high in the priesthood, can speak evil of the Lord’s anointed and find fault with God’s authority on earth without incurring his displeasure. The Holy Spirit will withdraw himself from such a man, and he will go into darkness.”

Dallin H. Oaks, Nelson’s first counselor, addressed the need to think of the future, always assessing where a decision will lead.

“We make countless choices in life, some large and some seemingly small. Looking back, we can see what a great difference some of our choices made in our lives,” he said. “We make better choices/decisions if we look at the alternatives and ponder where they will lead.”

Members should always “begin with the end in mind,” Oaks said. “For us, the end is always on the covenant path through the temple to eternal life, the greatest of all the gifts of God.”

Apostle Gary E. Stevenson opened the priesthood session by describing the change that allowed boys who are turning 12 in 2019 to be ordained to the priesthood starting on Jan. 1 at age 11.

For some boys — and their parents — the move was a big surprise.

“Welcome to the brotherhood of the priesthood,” Stevenson told the boys. “This change makes this meeting an historic one — it is likely the largest group of Aaronic Priesthood holders ever to attend a general priesthood session of General Conference,” he said. “In light of this special occasion, I direct my remarks especially to the young men of the Aaronic Priesthood.”

Being in a priesthood quorum is like joining a team, he said, where the “playbook” is “the holy scriptures and the words of modern prophets,”

The gospel, he said, has a game plan, coaches and a role for each person to play.

Stevenson showed slides of Latter-day Saint athletes: in baseball, Jeremy Guthrie and Bryce Harper; in basketball, Jabari Parker and Jimmer Fredette; in soccer, Ricardo Rojas; in rugby, William Hopoate; and, in football, Taysom Hill and Daniel Sorensen.

“While they are extremely successful in their sports, these athletes would be the first to admit they are not perfect athletes or perfect human beings,” he said. “Like each of us, they work hard to be the best in their sport — and to live the gospel. They get up if they stumble and strive to endure to the end.”

Stevenson urged the youthful priesthood holders to “listen to your coaches — your parents, bishop and Young Men leaders,” to learn the playbook and “create your own playbook of how you will prove yourself as a disciple of Christ.”

Do this, the apostle said, “and God will use you.”

Cheyenne, Wyo. • Scientists have completed the most detailed map yet of one of North America’s most spectacular geologic faults with the hope of providing a better understanding of the earthquake risk at a popular vacation destination.

Millions of tourists visit Jackson Hole, Wyo., every year to sightsee, hike or ski the Teton Range, which was formed by the Teton fault.

Upward slippage of the fault’s western edge has pushed the mountains to their present height of some 7,000 feet above Jackson Hole in Grand Teton National Park.

The fault ranks among the fastest moving in the Rocky Mountain region. Scientists think it could produce an earthquake as powerful as magnitude 7.5, which would cause serious damage.

Research shows the Teton fault last ruptured more than 5,000 years ago. Whether the fault is overdue for a big quake is unknown, geologists said Friday.

"We're always speaking in geologic time, which is thousands of years or hundreds of thousands of years," Wyoming State Geologist Erin Campbell said.

Earthquakes are common in the region. In 1959, a magnitude-7.3 quake in a different fault area west of Yellowstone National Park in Montana killed 28 people, many of them buried by a landslide that blocked the Madison River.

The Wyoming State Geological Survey released the new map of the Teton fault this week. Copies may be downloaded for free or purchased online for $25.

Researchers created the map with equipment that involves using laser pulses to measure distances precisely.

Aircraft with the equipment flew up and down the Teton fault to create precise images of the terrain, helping geologists pinpoint the fault's location.

Geologists who study the fault often focus on scarps revealing the fault line at the foot of the mountains. There, they have dug trenches to look closely at how the fault has moved since the last glacial period ended 15,000 years ago.

Landslides and lakes cover the fault in places but scarps up to 125 feet (38 meters) high make its exact location obvious in others.

"It almost appears like a wall in the forest in some spots," said the map's lead author, Mark Zellman, of earth sciences consulting firm BGC Engineering Inc.

U.S. Geological Survey research geologist Christopher DuRoss and Idaho State University geology professor Glenn Thackray also helped create the map, which extends the fault about 6 miles (farther south than was previously known.

Seth Wittke of the Wyoming State Geological Survey and others reviewed the work and went to the field to check its accuracy.

"This is a good kind of starting point in defining the fault itself, and some work that's been done along it, for future research," Wittke said.

One long streak came to an end and another continued Saturday for Utah’s sixth-ranked gymnastics team.

Utah finished second in its regional in Baton Rouge, La., to advance to the NCAA Championships April 19-20, in Fort Worth, Texas.

Host LSU won the regional with a 197.5 while the Utes were second with a 197.25. Failing to qualify were Minnesota (196.9) and Auburn (195.725).

Utah is the only team in the country to qualify for all 44 national championships.

The Utes made it to the NCAAs despite the first big mistake of junior MyKayla Skinner’s career as she fell from the uneven bars, her first fall of her career, ending an NCAA record streak of 161 made routines.

Even with Skinner’s mistake, the Utes were in second place throughout the meet and came close to knocking off the heavily favored Tigers.

“Talk about a competition,” Utah coach Tom Farden said. “I’ve been involved in a lot of meets now with Utah and I don’t remember one being that hotly contested.”

The Utes were impressive in the way they handled Skinner’s error as they trailed LSU 148.2-147.9, going into the final rotation, while Minnesota was third with 147.775 and Auburn was fourth with 146.475.

Instead of being rattled, the Utes finished strong on the balance beam, earning a 49.35.

Senior Kari Lee had a 9.9 and Skinner, MaKenna Merrell-Giles and Sydney Soloski all had 9.875s to close out the solid effort for Utah.

Merrell-Giles finished with a 39.6 in the all-around, tying LSU’s Sarah Finnegan for the meet high.

Farden said Skinner has been fighting a virus.

“She saw the LSU doctor and got some medicine but she just hasn’t been at her best,” he said. “We knew this day was going to come for the streak to end sometime and we told her to just brush it off and that the team had her back and they did, they fought to the end.”

Thanks to a pre-determined draw, the Utes opened the meet on the power event of floor, normally not a desirable opening event because scores are often low in the opening rotation and teams sometimes have trouble opening on such an adrenalin-fueled apparatus.

But the Utes did a nice job, earning a 49.375 led by MaKenna Merrell-Giles 9.9 and Skinner’s 9.95.

LSU had its own strong opening rotation, posting a 49.5 on the balance beam to take the early lead over the Utes while Minnesota had a 49.275 on the bars and Auburn had a 49.05 on the vault.

Unlike in Friday’s session, when the Utes failed to stick their vaults, they hit them on Saturday and earned a 49.425, a big improvement over Friday’s 49.2. Merrell-Giles and Skinner both had 9.925s.

“It was an entirely different event for us,” Farden said. “Their legs had a lot more pop in them. I don’t know if it was because we competed in the morning yesterday or the long travel day or what, but they weren’t firing like they were tonight.”

In the second rotation, LSU posted a 49.35 on floor, giving the Tigers a 98.85-98.8 advantage over Utah while Minnesota remained third with a 98.65 and Auburn was fourth 97.45.

Without Skinner’s normally high score on the uneven bars the Utes had to settle for a 49.1, but in the end the low score didn’t harm them.

“I’m really proud of us making nationals and the progress this team has made on the balance beam,” Farden said. “To finish like that just shows the hunger this team has.”

Tuesday, Gov. Gary Herbert proudly signed Utah’s new hate crime bill into law. It was a legislative effort that stalled for a number of years, but grew wings after the infamous attack at Lopez Tires, where a man brutally beat an 18-year-old and his father with a metal pole, shouting “I’m here to kill a Mexican.”

The new hate crime law allows for increased sentencing in horrific cases of racial violence like this one. At the same time, it muddies the meaning of a hate crime by stretching into areas far beyond what most of us would normally consider.

Many Utahns are rightfully relieved that the state can now treat crimes motivated by prejudice more seriously. Hate crime laws are an important tool in protecting public safety. They can lead to increased crime reporting from members of vulnerable communities. They reflect our lived cultural realities and ensure that serious offenders don’t get off with a slap on the wrist.

But hate crime laws aren’t supposed to apply to everyone — they are meant to offer additional protection to members of a targeted community who aren’t sufficiently protected by a facially neutral law. A hate crime is an offense against a member of a historically persecuted group, committed solely because of a person’s membership in that group. With the exception of religion, membership in a given group is generally outside a person’s control.

Utah’s new law includes many traditionally protected categories: ancestry, disability, ethnicity, gender identity, national origin, race, religion, sex, and sexual orientation. Homelessness, though not a conventional protected category, also fits here: homeless individuals are sometimes attacked because of their homeless status, and being homeless is not typically a choice.

However, Utah’s law also includes many other categories that should not merit special protection: age, familial status, marital status, matriculation, political expression, military service, emergency response and law enforcement. These groups are all important, but they shouldn’t be included in a hate crime law because they have not been victims of systematic persecution. They are already sufficiently protected under the law. In fact, Utah already increases penalties for attacks against law enforcement officers and military servicepeople.

These extra categories were included because Republican lawmakers could not grasp what a hate crime law is supposed to accomplish or who a hate crime law is supposed to protect. Instead of sticking to a list of historically persecuted groups based on immutable characteristics, legislators added in eight other non-persecuted groups to make the law more palatable to them. Firefighters are not subject to random violence based on their status as first responders. The same is true for married people, college students and every other unnecessary group included in this law. Some lawmakers even pushed to include teachers and ranchers. Not because teachers are at an increased risk of random violence by anti-teacher zealots — just because legislators like teachers.

The category of political expression was added on the House floor because GOP representatives wanted to “send a message” encouraging political civility. One lawmaker implied she was a hate crime victim because of threatening messages she received after torpedoing a popular bill to reduce LGBTQ teen suicide.

While it was unconscionable that she was threatened, that was a regular crime, not a hate crime. She was not randomly targeted to instill fear in the broader ultra-conservative community; she was targeted because people disagreed with her words and actions as an individual. A hate crime isn’t motivated by dislike for an individual; it’s motivated by dislike for an entire group.

Penalty enhancements are serious business. They are measures of last resort to help members of a community who aren’t already adequately protected under the law. Tossing on extra penalty enhancements willy-nilly dilutes the purpose of a hate crime law and does a disservice to the legitimate categories Utah is trying to protect.

While I am relieved additional sentencing can now be applied in instances of racial, religious, homophobic, or transphobic violence, I am concerned additional sentencing will be improperly applied to cases where there is no history of categorical persecution and no reason for special protection. In a year when Utah made great strides on criminal justice reform, the frivolous parts of this law set us back by introducing sentencing enhancements where they are not appropriate. The watered-down law we are left with has the potential to set us forward and set us back, all at the same time.

Lauren Simpson is the policy director for Alliance for a Better Utah and a graduate of Brigham Young University’s J. Reuben Clark Law School.

Real Salt Lake head coach Mike Petke put a challenge onto his team, his coaching staff and himself after losing 1-0 to the Seattle Sounders on Saturday night at CenturyLink Field.

“We all have to grow up a little bit,” Petke told KMYU after the game. “The days of saying we’re a young team — which we are — it has to be pushed a little bit in the past. We have get a bit more savvy in situations. We have to get a bit more clinical.”

Petke’s remarks came after a game in which RSL, despite conceding a goal in the 18th minute, had plenty of prime opportunities to pick up a point on the road. Sam Johnson, Jefferson Savarino or Albert Rusnák each had shots that narrowly missed finding the back of the net.

Instead, even though RSL finished with 11 men on the field for the first time in four games, Real have lost four consecutive games, and extended their road winless streak to four games.

“We just didn’t get it over the finish line,” midfielder Kyle Beckerman told KMYU after the game.

That’s exactly the kind of sentiment that Petke said he has grown weary expressing after close losses. The losses where RSL creates good changes, plays solid defense, does plenty of things right, but still comes up empty.

“I’m getting sick and tired after these games, to come back and say we deserved more out of it, we did enough,” Petke said.

Real outshot the Sounders 13-11, and with four of their attempts coming on goal. Seattle had three shots on target.

RSL keeper Nick Rimando picked up two saves, both of which came in the first half. Stefan Frei tallied four saves for the Sounders.

Sounders midfielder Nicolás Lodeiro scored the game’s opening goal on a left-footed volley while falling away from the goal. Cristian Roldan delivered the high, floating cross that found Lodeiro and gave the Sounders a 1-0 lead in the 18th minute.

Savarino’s opportunity to tie the game came in the 73rd minute. He took a shot from inside the 6-yard box that pinged off the left post. It was the closest opportunity RSL had for a goal the entire evening.

RSL struggled in the first 45 minutes, but found its rhythm as the second half wore on. Beckerman said there was a lot of good RSL can take from Saturday’s game and he thinks the team can build off it.

Petke said he wants the team to collectively take the next step to get some of these results that tend to slip away from RSL over the last couple of years.

“We have to take a look inside ourselves now,” Petke said.

Rehab assignment

Joao Plata and Justen Glad started for the Real Monarchs earlier Saturday in a 3-1 win over Reno 1868 FC.

Both Plata and Glad played 59 minutes, and Plata scored a goal in the 15th minute.

The pair have been unavailable to RSL for several weeks due to injuries. Their time with the Monarchs suggests they are close to returning to the MLS side.

As she got texts that her friends and classmates were being shot, Lauren Hogg sat in a classroom. It was dark, and they were silent, afraid to make noise because then the shooter might notice and come for them.

That Valentine’s Day, just more than a year ago, 17 students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., were killed. Seventeen others were injured. It had a profound impact on Hogg and many others in the school.

“Once I got out of there, I knew I didn’t want to be silent anymore,” Hogg told attendees in Utah on Saturday evening during a Gala For Gun Reform. So, she and the other survivors started advocacy work that became March For Our Lives.

That group has spread across the country, urging gun violence prevention measures. On Saturday, Utah’s chapter of the group held an event at the Ladies Literary Club Clubhouse, 850 E. South Temple, to celebrate gun reform victories and to raise money for future advocacy.

Through a silent auction and ticket sales, the group exceeded its goal and raised more than $4,500. Art Access, a Salt Lake City nonprofit group that wants to build an inclusive arts community through “creative opportunities” for people who are disabled or otherwise marginalized in society, will get 10% of the proceeds. The rest will go toward funding the March For Our Lives Utah chapter, covering trainings, transportation and clerical costs, like maintaining its P.O. Box and website.

The funds will also be used for suicide prevention training and scholarships for student activists who are in need, said organizer Elizabeth “Lizzy” Estrada-Murillo.

Before the speakers at the gala, people moved through crowds in the historic venue to mingle, or bid at the silent auction, or take a photo in the photo booth or grab dinner and a drink. Two men stood across the street protesting as bouncy background music pulsed softly indoors.

But for all the revelry, there were the somber reminders of why everyone had gathered.

It was on posters that listed the names of Americans killed in mass shootings last year: Adrian Jashawn, Xavier Parish, Freddy Wheeler, and on and on and on. It was the #NeverAgain scrawled at the bottom of signs for the photo booth, next to feather boas and comically oversized sunglasses.

Estrada-Murillo summed up the event as it wound down and the group prepared to announce the silent auction winners: “This is a real issue for us. For all of us, this a life-or-death situation."

At the gala, the group also named this year’s Legislators For Our Lives, Utah lawmakers who the group said took steps to preventing gun violence by either proposing or passing gun reform legislations.

They honored Democrats Reps. Joel K. Briscoe, Brian S. King, Elizabeth Weight and Republican Rep. Raymond P. Ward, in addition to several lawmakers who didn’t attend.

Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski was also at the event and spoke as the gala’s Mayor For Our Lives.

Biskupski told organizers she was impressed and inspired by their efforts to reform gun laws in Utah, and said the student activists follow in a long tradition of other young people who got things done, from the civil rights activists who fought for equity at lunch counters and on buses, to the students at East High School in Salt Lake City who two decades ago fought for a Gay/Straight Alliance.

She said it can be easy to be frustrated with slow change and laws that don’t help the cause. She pointed to the killing of Lauren McCluskey, who was fatally shot on the University of Utah campus in October by a man she’d previously dated. The man got the gun from a friend.

“I am frustrated,” she said, “But we cannot let frustration get in the way of progress. We have work to do.”

In the months since state lawmakers took control of a massive swath of land in Salt Lake City’s northwest area, concerns about possible health impacts, environmental damage and degradation of quality of life have often overshadowed conversations focused on economic opportunity.

But rather than dissipating with time, the main group opposed to the inland port development appears to be taking a harder line.

“If you go back and you listen to how I was describing [the development] last spring, it was, ‘We need to make this sustainable,’” said Deeda Seed, a campaigner with the Center for Biological Diversity. “And I still think everything out there should be sustainable, whatever it ends up being. But also we learned that it’s [misleading] to suggest that you can have a port that’s sustainable at this time.”

Seed is one of the leaders of a port opposition group previously known as the Coalition for Port Reform. In keeping with the involved environmental, health and conservation organization’s changing stances toward the port, the group recently changed its name to what almost seems like a mantra: “Stop the Polluting Port.”

That goal is one Seed believes can be achieved — with a little organization and sustained opposition.

“We can make the kind of development that happens out there a lot smaller,” she said. “As I’m seeing more and more people engage in this issue, I’m more optimistic than I’ve ever been that we can stop it.”

Chris Conabee, interim director of the Inland Port Authority Board, said the newly named Stop the Polluting Port group has brought positive attention to sustainability challenges within the development and that every voice has a right to be heard in the public engagement process.

“But, you know, at what point do they come into the process and help us solve things?” he said. “Because that’s the part that never gets told. That’s the frustrating part I think for me and maybe others.”

Conabee noted that the group’s members represent only some of the stakeholders that need to be heard in the port process. The board is working to get more people involved through six working groups that will look at issues ranging from corporate recruitment to air quality, and Seed and others in the group have been invited to take part in those, he said.

“Sticking your head in the sand and thinking you just don’t want [the port] to come, that defies the logic of what we’re seeing in terms of package delivery growth and population growth," he said. “And you can’t ignore that — you have to plan for it. So if they want to help plan as much as any other citizen that wants to come plan, we’d love to have them at the table.”

The board, which will oversee development in the area, has argued that the land will develop with or without the board’s direction and that it could actually be more sustainable under state control.

Seed contends its projections for what could be built there under Salt Lake City’s zoning are “completely exaggerated.”

She also believes it’s impossible to have a clean port and says rhetoric implying otherwise is “green washing” — the practice of making misleading or inaccurate claims about the environmental benefits of a company or its practices in an effort to make it appear more sustainable than it really is.

“If you put it to taxpayers, do they really want to pay for something that’s going to pollute their air?” she asked. “And what is the urgency? And what is the need? We have a booming economy. Why do we need this?”

‘A people-powered movement’

More than 50 people filled a meeting room at the Corinne and Jack Sweet Library Branch on a recent Monday night, taking notes and listening attentively as Seed covered issues ranging from Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski’s litigation against the state’s creation of the inland port to the Legislature’s passage of a bill that would allow the development to branch beyond Salt Lake City.

“Really, the port is about people wanting to make money,” she said passionately as people in the audience hummed in agreement. “Private interests wanting to make money and wanting to use our public resources to facilitate that.”

People have questions. They want to understand how they should speak to the Inland Port Authority Board, where county and Salt Lake City Council leaders stand on the development and how they could put pressure on any private interests that look to invest in the port in the future.

Seed, a former Salt Lake City councilwoman who has worked as an activist in one form or another for more than three decades, answered their questions patiently and urged them to stay involved in the process.

“This is a people-powered movement and to win, we need more and more people to engage,” she said. “I mean, it’s truly remarkable with mostly volunteers what we’ve been able to accomplish so far in terms of pushing back against this.”

The group has more than 30 volunteers working on the inland port, but Seed is the only person paid full time to work on the issue.

Jon Jensen, a Salt Lake City resident, told The Salt Lake Tribune after the meeting that it gave him hope “it was possible to have a say” in what he sees as “a disaster waiting to happen in every way" — but particularly when it comes to air and water quality.

“I’d like to see a campaign, a coordinated campaign, that draws in a lot more people,” he said. “Because as more people learn about what this really is about, they’ll see that it’s something they disagree with. It’s not in their interests; it’s in a few private companies’ interests.”

‘In it until the end’

Rain drizzles across an empty field on a windy Tuesday afternoon as Seed and other leaders of the inland port opposition movement scope out an area that one day may be covered in warehouses or a rail yard.

Without a business plan, it’s hard to know how, exactly, this area north of Interstate 80 will develop. But Seed and Dorothy Owen, chairwoman of the Westpointe Community Council; Heather Dove, president of the Great Salt Lake Audubon; and Michael Cundick, executive director of SLC Air Protectors, share a common aim: protecting this landscape and its wildlife.

Visiting the landscape, where birds flew overhead and antelope crossed by, reiterated for Cundick the need to help people understand what could be lost here.

“The wetlands are a place where lots of bird habitat and food for them to eat is present,” he told The Tribune. “It should be open space in that area for sure. It makes me think about all the things that made this valley great."

Cundick, who said he has long been involved in efforts to protect the state’s environment and wildlife, has been pushing for the coalition to shift from reform to a more radical position. And now that the group has what he sees as a clearer position, he believes it will “open the floodgates for a lot of community involvement."

As the group escalates its opposition efforts, members are considering signing on to Biskupski’s litigation with “friend of the court” briefs and are scoping out opportunities for future suits based on environmental damage, wildlife preservation or air quality attainment.

They’re planning mayoral and City Council candidate surveys and will possibly host a candidate forum to put pressure on those who are running to lead the city to oppose the port, like Biskupski has.

They’re also looking to broaden their movement beyond Salt Lake City, engage young people and canvass areas in the west side to bring more communities of color into their cause. They want to empower more opponents to come to meetings and speak to the port board to help create a record of public concern.

“We’re in it until the end,” Cundick said. “And by pushing this resistance and providing an alternative paradigm for the health of the planet, we’re going to be influencing the bulk of our population here in Utah to really think deeply about the role of living in Utah and what [the port] means for our environment and our families and our community.”

With pre-emptive apologies to grammarians everywhere, today we ponder the following question:

Who is "we?"

That syntactic atrocity is prompted by a recent colloquy between Laura Ingraham of Fox "News" and former GOP operative Patrick Buchanan. They were talking on Ingraham's podcast about what they see as the impossibility of America absorbing more newcomers from what Buchanan called "the second or the third world." Then he dropped this gem:

"African Americans have been here since 1619. They've helped build and create the nation. They're part of its culture and history, and yet we haven't fully assimilated African-American citizens."

"We?"

Presumably, he means the country, which raises an obvious point. What does it say about America that black people have been here 400 years, "helped build and create it," are integral to "its culture and history," yet are still considered outsiders?

Here's something equally obvious. When Buchanan says "we," he does mean America. But when he says "America," he means white people. Not that he's the only one to rhetorically ostracize people of color.

Journalists do it all the time when they use terms like “evangelicals” to refer to religious white people, “southerners,” to denote white people in Dixie or “working class” to designate white people with blue-collar jobs — as if people of color did not go to church, live below the Mason-Dixon Line or punch time clocks.

Donald Trump did it when he recently tweeted that politicians in storm-torn Puerto Rico "only take from USA." As if Puerto Ricans, who gained citizenship in 1917, were somehow separate from "USA."

Too often, then, people of color live in other people's blind spots, unseen in the shadow of their assumptions. Some of us have a default image of what constitutes "American" and it rules out Spanish surnames, dark skin and prayers to Allah.

Which stands in stark contrast to the values America claims to hold dear. For 243 years, the country has balanced in the tension between what we claim and what we are. In 2019, though, that tension is ramped up by a sense of the demographic clock ticking down on white primacy. It's not too much to say that in some quarters, a kind of panic has set in over the notion that someday soon, white people will no longer hold numerical superiority.

It's that panic that made a woman cry, "I want my country back," that sent people hunting for Barack Obama's "real" birth certificate, that inspired ponderous think pieces on the demise of the WASP establishment, that elected Trump president, that made white evangelicals betray their stated convictions. It's that panic that has Buchanan and Ingraham fearing the future.

He sees the country becoming "a giant Mall of America." She thinks the English language might disappear.

The irony is that if the country is, indeed, doomed, it is not because immigrants flock here, drawn by its ideals. When have they not done that?

No, if America fails, it will be because people like Buchanan and Ingraham lacked the courage to live up to those ideals. It will be because it was still possible, as late as 2019, for a white man to regard African Americans, progenitors of America's music, fighters of its wars, tillers of its fields and redeemers of its sacred values, as somehow alien to America. And it will be because he and people like him still arrogantly arrogate unto themselves, as if handed down from the very hand of God, the right to determine who "we" is.

And, more importantly, who "we" is not.

Leonard Pitts is a columnist for The Miami Herald. lpitts@miamiherald.com

My youngest kid is on the autism spectrum, my oldest is a moody (and moonstruck) teenager. Neither can sit through a movie. They both hate bowling. They’re not big on museums. Needless to say, it’s hard to find family activities.

But last night, I scored. Or, I should say, my ex-husband scored. He bought tickets to see P!nk in concert.

When he told me he wanted to take the boys, I was all, “Sure! Too bad you don’t have a fourth ticket for me.”

It was a line met with awkward silence.

I said, “Um… do you have an extra ticket for me?”

It wasn’t for me, but I used my guilt skills and invited myself to the P!nk concert (Is everyone OK if I just spell it Pink from now on?) with my ex-husband, my autistic son and my moody teen.

But I thought, hey, it’s Pink! How cool is that?

To which my teen informed me that it would’ve been cool 10 years ago. And even though he “didn’t like” her music, he thought it could be “possibly fun.”

My younger son asked me all day, “I wonder if I will like a concert, but I wonder if I will hate it too.”

So, this motley crew went together.

The pre-show took a while, and during it, both sons played “Clash of Clans” on their phones and the older one asked how long this whole concert thing was going to take. I told him Pink would probably start her set around 9.

He was all, “So, like... an hour????”

Pink finally made her grand entrance (she literally danced mid-air around a flying chandelier.) As a mother, I thought it was slightly irresponsible. As a fan, I was omg omg omg!

The first song was “Get the Party Started,” and something strange happened. My teen put away his phone. I mean, like out of sight. He started singing and banging his head.

He sang so loud, and so off-key, that everyone in our section turned to look. (Afterward, he told my ex that everyone was looking at him because they were so impressed. I did not correct him.)

After three songs, he declared himself “vibin‘.”

And I was like, “Rad!”

And two generations automatically understood different languages.

My younger son, who has never sat still for an hour in his life, let alone three, sat the whole time. Granted sometimes it was on his knees, sometimes it was perched on the back of the chair like an eagle, but he was sitting.

When Pink sang the lyrics “Pretty pretty please, if you ever feel, like you are nothing, you are perfect to me.”

I told my teen that’s how I felt about him, because I can be sentimental that way. And he said, and I quote, “That’s how I feel about you too! Love you, Mom!”

I turned back to the show, pretty sure that at that moment, I could also fly mid-air around a chandelier.

“Pink’s, like, your age, right Mom?” the teen son said. He was looking at her dancing around in a catsuit, bending acrobatically around another dancer and a street lamp. “Wow.”

I took that to mean he was surprised how much Pink and I had in common, appearance wise. That’s how I bend when I’m sweeping: acrobatically around the counter and twisting cat-like around the table legs. Because that’s how I took it to mean so there are no give backs. Do not correct me. Of course that’s what he meant.

There was one moment of tension. After the concert, we attempted to jaywalk, but my younger son screamed that the cops were gonna get us and if they did, we owed him a hundred kittens. (Kittens are his jam right now.)

Since we can’t afford a hundred kittens, we thought better about jaywalking, and returned from halfway across a four-lane road.

My older son was still elated about the concert. He said, “You know, Mom, Pink for our time was like Beatrice for Shakespeare’s time in ‘Much Ado About Nothing.’”

And that’s when I knew aliens had abducted my child. You thought this was going to be a column about the concert?

Nope. It’s about body-snatchers.

OK, maybe it wasn’t aliens, but he really did say that.

All of this is to say who knew the only overlap in our family Venn diagram would be Pink?

I don’t know, but the next morning I told my teen I felt like a gnarly mom.

He just rolled his eyes and pulled out his phone.

Oquirrh, a new fine dining restaurant in Salt Lake City, opened in February — but it was at least 10 years in the making.

Chef and co-owner Andrew Fuller once worked in the kitchen at Copper Onion, where he met and proposed to his future wife, Angelena.

Later he became the sous chef at Pago, and eventually worked his way up to chef de cuisine. He also spent time in the kitchen at Coi in San Francisco, studying under the restaurant’s well-known chef and owner, Daniel Patterson.

In opening Oquirrh, 368 E. 100 South, and serving New American cuisine, the Fullers say they are living their dream. “American food has a lot of different influences,” as opposed to cuisines such as Japanese and French, Fuller said. “It gives us freedom to play with the menu.”

One example is the confit chicken pot pie — a twist on classic confit with leg and thigh, winter mushrooms and sautéed vegetables ($18). There’s also the curry-fried lamb shank ($38).

While Angelena works the front of the restaurant, Andrew handles the cooking, something he has done since he was young.

“I grew up in a family who had a large garden,” he said. “Cooking brought us together.”

Oquirrh Restaurant • 368 E. 100 South, Salt Lake City; 801-359-0426. Open Wednesday through Sunday, 5 to 10 p.m.

Dear Ann Cannon • My husband and his sister are at a point where they’re not on speaking terms. How do I support my husband without having to take sides?

— Hoping to Hear From You

Dear Hoping • I’m sorry. Family feuds are difficult for everyone to navigate.

There’s a lot of information I don’t have here. What caused the estrangement in the first place? How bitter are the siblings? Because I don’t know your husband personally I can’t predict how he’d respond to friendly overtures from you toward his sister. I’m assuming, however, that because you don’t wish to take sides, you must have affection for both of them. Am I correct?

My answer? Unless you think being in contact with your sister-in-law will seriously harm your relationship with your husband, I would be kindly upfront with him. Tell him you love him, but that you don’t want to take sides for the sake of everyone else in the family. Let him know you’d like to maintain some kind of contact with his sister, but he doesn’t have to be involved. Then meet her for lunch when he’s not around. Or whatever. You get the idea.

A word of caution. Don’t try to fix their relationship. That’s their job. Not yours.

Dear Ann Cannon • My husband and I really enjoyed spending time with a couple who were both at least a decade older than we are. We met them as a fun couple around eight years ago and didn’t know either individually before that. Nearly a year ago, the husband of this couple passed away unexpectedly. We were all heartbroken and worried for our friend.

Since then we have endeavored to include her in our plans, inviting her to the same cultural events, outings and holiday gatherings that we all took part in before. But nearly a year out I am struggling with the fact that when we do anything as a threesome, I feel guilty that my dear husband is alive and hers isn’t — a kind of survivor guilt. It’s strange, but I feel hesitant to show much affection with my hubby when she is present. We feel subdued and stuck in the past when we go out with her. Is that dynamic normal? Should I just try to do things with her as a girlfriend? It’s hard also when she just seems angry that her husband had to go and die rather than grateful for the time they had together. How do I help my grieving friend but still enjoy the life I have?

— Survivor

Dear Survivor • Over the years I’ve heard widowed individuals say that once their spouse died, they fell off other couples’ social radars. Props to you and your husband for maintaining a relationship with your friend, even though the group dynamic has dramatically changed to the point where things feel awkward to you.

You ask if your reaction is normal. I suspect it is. I also suspect that’s part of the reason why couples stop inviting a suddenly single friend to join them. It’s easier for them that way. Seriously, it’s awesome that you continue to reach out to your friend. And, in fact, I would keep reaching out to her. Eventually, doing things as a threesome rather than a foursome will become your new normal and all of you will feel more comfortable. Think in terms of what she needs more than what you need right now. And if you think she’d enjoy some one-on-one time with you, then go for it.

And now for a word about her anger. I think it’s pretty common for a spouse to be angry with the partner who’s died and left them alone. This is especially true when the death was unexpected. Those feelings dissipate somewhat over time, though they can (and do) flare up now and then. Give your friend the space she needs to grieve.

I hope this helps.

Ann Cannon is The Tribune’s advice columnist. Got a question for Ann? Email her at askann@sltrib.com or visit the Ask Ann Cannon page on Facebook.

The Salt Lake Acting Company and playwright Kathleen Cahill are trying something different. Their new production “Silent Dancer” mixes drama and dance — but not music, for the most part.

“This is using dance as a means of expression. To express an intense emotion,” Cahill said. “Usually in plays when there’s dance, they have what’s called the dance break. There’s kind of a showbiz moment where they dance and there’s music. But this isn’t like that.”

The play is about a Jazz Age interracial romance between Rosie Quinn (Mikki Reeve) and Perry Branfield (Darrell T. Joe) and features fictionalized versions of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald (Noah Kershisnik and Alice Ryan). There’s the sort of dialogue you’d expect to see in a play, and there’s dialogue that’s expressed in “silent” dance.

There are a couple of traditional dance numbers in a jazz club, but they’re the exception.

That non-verbal dance language — they’re calling it “choreo-text” — was created by Christopher Ruud, who recently retired from dancing after two decades of performing with Ballet West.

“I emailed him thinking, ‘Oh, he’ll never answer me back,’ but he did,” said director Cynthia Fleming, who is SLAC’s executive artistic director. “We were all blown away with how he choreographed to words so beautifully.”

“He takes a sentence and he goes, ‘OK, what does that look like physically?’ He thinks that way,” Cahill said.

It’s a departure for her and for SLAC. And with the Wednesday premiere approaching, it’s been nerve-wracking.

“Every step of the way, it’s been — can this really work?” Fleming said. Cahill added: “It’s beyond scary to me. ... It’s extremely ambitious and it’s extremely crazy, but it’s working.”

How does she know? Because, while “Silent Dancer” has yet to be seen in its entirety by a paying audience, various versions of it have been seen by select audiences over the four years that Cahill, Fleming and Ruud have been working on it.

And a recent performance for a small, invited audience — just weeks before the premiere — resulted in further changes. The actors now speak during the early dance sequences, then speak less and less while dancing as the play progresses.

That recent performance was “when we realized that we should have some of it spoken,” Cahill said. “People said that it started out weird, and then they became used to it. That’s when we discovered that we’re educating the audience. ... I wouldn’t have come to that if I hadn’t been able to hear it in these other situations, like a reading.”

Using audience feedback to develop plays isn’t new. SLAC has been doing public readings for 25 years. Plan-B Theatre Company has been doing its “Script in Hand” series for at least 15 years. (Most recently: A reading of “Balthazar” last week.) And Pioneer Theater has been presenting its Play-by-Play series since 2014. (Next up: “The Way North” on April 19-20.)

SLAC had a reading of playwright Elaine Jarvik’s “Four Women Talking About the Man Under the Sheet” last month, and the theater was near its 160-person capacity. (Readings are generally free at SLAC and Plan-B, though tickets must be reserved. Pioneer charges for its readings.)

The format was fairly typical for readings: The actors stood side-by-side onstage; they weren’t in costume; they were reading from scripts — but they were acting.

“That’s when the play comes alive,” Fleming said. “If the audience isn’t hearing the right things, you have to make adjustments.”

“At the end of the day, playwrights need to hear their words and they need to hear them in front of an audience because it’s not alive unless it’s read,” said Plan-B artistic director Jerry Rapier. “You can read it over and over on the page, but until you hear people speak and observe people listening to what’s being said — that’s when you really know what works and what doesn’t.”

Many of those who stayed for the post-play feedback session for “Four Women” weren’t shy about expressing their opinions. Jarvik actively solicited feedback, asking “Should it be longer?” (It came in just under an hour.) “What would you want to see? What characters should be more fleshed out?”

Some of the responses were unexpected, like the man who was hoping for a Trump joke in a play about the day after Frederick Douglass died. The play features Douglass’s widow, his daughter and suffragettes Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

“You never know what the audience member is going to say,” Fleming said.

One woman tactfully criticized the “unusual amount of bickering” a day after Douglass’s death, suggesting it might have been better set a week later at a reading of the will. “I’m not quite sure I agree with that,” said another audience member, whose comments made it clear he didn’t agree at all.

“I love it when the audience starts kind of disagreeing with each other,” Fleming said with a laugh. “That’s always good.”

There were differing opinions about which characters deserved more attention, and about the length. And there was a certain element of performance in some of the questions.

“Are you writing for this piece to be at a theater that welcomes authentic, great voices like Salt Lake Acting Company? Or maybe theater like Hale Theatre?” one woman jokingly asked Jarvik, to uproarious laughter and scattered applause.

Jarvik worried aloud that her portrayal of Douglass’s widow is “too negative”; she was reassured it is not.

“Elaine got some very good feedback and is making some changes to her play based on some of the audience remarks,” Fleming said.

It’s a mixed bag at readings.

“Most of the time people ask questions seeking information rather than critical questions,” Cahill said. “But somebody says something every once in a while that I hold on to. They have a perspective that I wouldn't have thought of.”

After putting a draft of “Silent Dancer” that featured an older incarnation of Rosie as the narrator in front of an audience, Cahill learned “it just didn’t work.”

She rewrote the play to make the younger Rosie the narrator — a significant change, but not a massive overhaul. Although that’s not unheard of after a public reading.

Rapier recalled working with playwright Matthew Ivan Bennett on a play that was a series of monologues about gender and ethnic identity. But a reading made it clear the play wasn’t working, though a transgender character, Eric, stood out.

Bennett wrote a second play, but that “also didn’t work” at a subsequent reading. “So Matt scrapped that entire play” and focused on the Eric character in “ERIC(A),” which became “one of the most, I think, truly unique and successful shows that we have ever produced,” Rapier said. “He had the opportunity to listen to that character over and over again in various situations and realized what to do with this connection. It was an incredibly, horribly painful journey for Matt that is now one of his greatest joys.”

Constructive feedback benefits playwrights, but what do patrons get out of readings?

“You get to be a part of a new play development process, and see a play in its newest form,” Fleming said.

“Even comments that don’t actually make their way into the writing process are still helpful for a playwright,” Rapier said.

Patrons aren’t required to provide feedback; it’s entirely voluntary. They aren’t even required to stay after the reading ends — some do, some don’t.

“If you don’t want to give your feedback, just your presence in the room and your reactions to the reading itself is so extremely helpful to the playwright,” Fleming said.

“There is certainly that,” Cahill added. “I mean, you can tell if people are interested because they listen. And if they’re bored you can tell that for sure.”

And there’s a certain excitement that comes with the reading of a play that’s still in the development stages.

“Readings don’t get a lot of rehearsal, of course,” Rapier said. “They’re really run on adrenaline, and I think that’s what draws some people to them.”

Including a group of adrenaline junkies.

“There’s a handful of people that just love readings,” Rapier said. “They just love to be in on the ground floor of the writing process.”

“There are some people that have come to most of them,” Fleming agreed. “These are people that are used to seeing and then articulating and responding to what their experience was. ... They ignite your imagination in a whole different way.”

First-timers are also welcome, however. The readings are a way for theater companies to build relationships with ticket buyers. But the events are not merely for show, so to speak.

“Some people placate writers with readings,” Rapier said, “but I really feel like everyone that’s doing readings in Utah is really trying to give the writer space to experience their pieces with an audience, more often than not for the first time, to see what shape their play is in and where to go from there.”

SEEING ‘SILENT DANCER’

Salt Lake Acting Company will debut this new production on April 10.

What • “Silent Dancer” by Kathleen Cahill

Summary • This tale of interracial romance, secret identities, maids, dancers, criminals, silent movies and the most famous couple in New York — F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald — combines drama and dance.

When • April 10 to May 12. Wednesdays–Saturdays at 7:30 p.m.; Sundays at 1 p.m. and 6 p.m. Additional performances: April 20 at 2 p.m., April 23 at 7:30 p.m.; April 30 at 7:30 p.m.; May 11 at 2 p.m.

Where • Salt Lake Acting Company, 168 W. 500 North, Salt Lake City

Tickets • $25-$44, with discounts for students, 30-and-under and seniors at saltlakeactingcompany.org, 801-363-7522 or at the box office.

CATCH ‘THE WAY NORTH’

Pioneer Theatre Company is offering the third and final play reading of its 2018-19 season on April 19 and 20.

What • “The Way North” by Tira Palmquist

Summary • When a lost pregnant young woman stumbles on to Freddy Hansen’s rural Minnesota homestead, the county’s former sheriff doesn’t hesitate to take her in. But when Freddy’s guest turns out to be a Sudanese refugee making a run for the Canadian border, what it means to protect and serve becomes a more complicated question.

When • Friday, April 19, and Saturday, April 20, at 7:30 p.m; Saturday matinee at 2 p.m.

Where • Babcock Theatre, 300 South 1400 East, Salt Lake City

Tickets • $10 at 801-581-6961 or pioneertheatre.org

In 2015, the Animas River in Colorado turned orange as three million gallons of water containing high concentrations of heavy metals and other toxins gushed from a site where the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was attempting to clean up an abandoned mine.

The agency’s immediate response was a near-complete failure: officials delayed disclosing the spill to the public for nearly 24 hours; they significantly underestimated the size of the spill; and they downplayed the potential harms. A year later, a House Natural Resources Committee report lambasted the agency’s handling of the massive spill, accusing it of failing to take reasonable precautions, not responding adequately, and obstructing Congress’ efforts to investigate.

New Mexico, Utah, and the Navajo Nation sued EPA to recoup their costs of mitigating the spill’s ill effects. Last month, a federal court in New Mexico rejected the agency’s effort to dismiss that suit, holding that the agency can be liable for the spill, just as any private party would be.

Although the prospect of EPA paying for the damage may seem fair in this case — especially if the congressional report’s accusations are true — the court’s rationale underscores why so little progress has been made in cleaning up abandoned mines. The court did not cite EPA’s alleged negligence in determining the agency’s potential liability. Instead, the agency could be on the hook for the mere fact of trying to clean up the mine in the first place.

In this respect, EPA was treated no differently than ordinary people, who routinely face crippling penalties for innocent mistakes. Many environmental laws take a “strict liability” approach to imposing fines and even criminal penalties, meaning fault and intent are irrelevent. In theory, this makes it easier to punish truly bad actors. But, often, it means innocent landowners or environmental do-gooders can be punished severely, even if they did everything right.

Under the Clean Water Act, for instance, the EPA has threatened landowners with massive fines, accruing at a rate of $37,500 per day, for perfectly innocent activities. This includes Wyoming’s Andy Johnson, who faced nearly $20 million dollars in fines for building an environmentally beneficial pond to water his horses — all because he did work on his property without asking the agency’s permission first. In a strict-liability world, there will be lots of Andy Johnsons.

It is one thing to hold someone responsible when their negligence causes environmental harm. But, too often, strict liability deters people from taking steps to improve environmental outcomes.

That’s the case for abandoned mines, where the threat of massive liabilities discourages any would-be good Samaritan from remediating pollution. As Chris Wood, the president of Trout Unlimited, and Mitch Krebs, the president of Coeur Mining, recently explained in a Denver Post op-ed, “[a]s written, the law for abandoned mines is if you touch it, you own it.” In other words, anyone who tries to clean up an abandoned mine must accept complete responsibility for it.

Poorly designed incentives have led to a considerable environmental problem. There are thousands of abandoned 19th-century mines in the United States leaking pollution into streams and groundwater. In many cases, the individuals or companies responsible are deceased, dissolved, or bankrupt — and have been for decades. The cost to remediate these sites may be as high as $50 billion dollars.

If the responsible parties are long gone, who’s going to pay for this clean up? So far, the answer has been a clear, and disappointing, “no one.” The federal government does some of this work under EPA’s Superfund, but the program lacks the resources to address the full scope of the problem. Conservation groups, communities, and industry would like to pitch in too, but can’t justify taking on the liabilities.

The Western Governors’ Association has urged Congress to enact “Good Samaritan” laws to encourage voluntary cleanups by shielding those undertaking them from this counterproductive liability threat. Several bills have been proposed in recent years to make this change and have generated bipartisan support.

This is a sensible change. Environmental laws should discourage environmental damage and encourage environmental improvement. When they fail this test, they should be reformed. Imposing massive liability on groups that want to clean up a persistent source of pollution clearly fails that test.

In fact, there’s a broader lesson to be learned here about environmental regulation. Too often, we rely on heavy-handed and punitive regulations without considering the incentives for the well-intentioned. What’s needed is a free-market approach that encourages the clean-up of polluted sites, restoration of species habitat, and technological innovations that reduce environmental impacts.

Jonathan Wood is an attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation and a research fellow with the Property and Environment Research Center.