My Way

Hi everyone. Been a minute, huh? The truth is I haven’t been inspired to write lately. I’ve had time, just haven’t written. I definitely don’t want to post some crap just so I have some words published. I guess that’s the benefit of not getting paid for this. I finally found some inspiration at a local coffee shop today after making some personal and professional progress.

I moved to Denver. Things are going well, but I’m finding it difficult adjusting to being static again. That’s probably normal. I’ve made some solid connections already and am enjoying  being close to the mountains and nature that I’ve come to love. But I’m not getting the feels like I would jamming the right song on the open road, or making instant coffee on a tiny backpack stove in remote Yosemite. I think that’s because I’m still in professional limbo and, more obviously, I’m static again. I need to transition from the high of being free and living out of a duffel bag to the high of owning my professional future and giving everything I have to something I care about. I learned that a permanent duffel bag life is not for me, which was actually a really important conclusion. This probably isn’t the last time I’ll give everything up and go be free, but that isn’t the primary lifestyle I want.

So what have I been doing in Denver? Networking, researching and exploring. I’ve been working the booth for a gourmet pasta manufacturer, Pappardelle’s, at a couple farmer’s markets. It’s a ton of fun and a GREAT opportunity to rub shoulders with people who put their heart and soul in to their small businesses. I’ve also connected with some restaurant owners of appealing places for part time kitchen work. I’ve been researching the steps to open a food service business in Denver, something that will take time. You know those “doomed locations” in Chicago and probably everywhere else? Those corners that have a new restaurant/concept every year that inevitably fails? I theorize that those individuals didn’t know their neighborhood. I’d be ill advised to move to a new city and open a food service business without a firm grasp of how shit works here. And of course I’m still exploring. It’s a big reason why I moved here. Christine and I still hang out and drive places humans weren’t meant to go.

Spending a month this Summer in Chicago and leading up to moving to Denver, during a period of weakness, I updated my corporate/tech resume thinking I needed to go back. Fun was over. I made some calls to old colleagues and said I was thinking about dusting off the Sales Engineer cleats and coming out of retirement. But then I visited and worked the markets and met farmers, artisan bakers and food truck owners. Then I chatted with the guy who put everything he had in to the brewery up the street from me. Then I met a girl who had to fund raise to attend the American Cheese Association conference so she could take the Certified Cheese Professional exam, which makes her the equivalent of a master sommelier in cheese. They all had in common that they were deeply passionate and proud of what they built. I want that. The wheels are finally in motion. It will take some time but that’s okay. Seeing though as I don’t have an endless supply of money, I’ll be working odd jobs to make ends meet. I’m not worried about it.

I found a journal entry, relevant to what I wrote above.

6/23/2018

“What’s my legacy? We’re all going to die. I want to be remembered as someone who lived fully but also as someone who built something good and worked hard for it.”

-Written from a pet cemetery at Best Friends Animal Sanctuary near Moab, UT. Think wind chimes and serenity, not Stephen King.

Moving on, I thought a lot about posting this next part and whether I should or not. I haven’t really slept well since arriving, probably due to all of the unknown. Unknown was fine when exploring the world living out of a duffel bag. That was all part of it. But now I need to transition. I wrote in The Relationship Blog in April while sitting alone in front of a fire that August 31st was the date I needed to re-enter the work force. August 31st is one year since starting all this. So as I lay awake now in the middle of the night, thinking about the upcoming milestone, I’ve been asking myself if I did it right. Did I use the time wisely? I started to think that I didn’t do enough. Why didn’t I become an expert in cheese with all that time? Why don’t I know how the constellations I saw all those nights work? Why don’t I have a theory of everything? I had a YEAR off. Did I not read enough books? Did I not plan this year well enough? Should I have planned better and come out of this with more knowledge than I have? Did I not progress enough? Did I WASTE all that time? I’ll never know the answer because it’s subjective. There is no book on what one should accomplish in my situation. So as I lay there, I started writing my own book, running through the things I DID experience and accomplish. And I’m posting them on my public journal so I never forget them. And so I can re-visit them and learn from them and plan and set goals for the next time I do this. If you see this as bragging, which is perfectly acceptable, just don’t read.

I was a Beach bum in Laguna Beach for two weeks. I tried surfing (and sucked), something I’d always wanted to try but never had the time.

I went to Iceland and climbed a glacier and swam between two continents. I lay on my back, watching the northern lights. I went to Reykjavik and had pizza and a club night with an Icelandic model, all while wearing my hiking boots because I never expected that night to happen in a million years. Then on zero sleep I flew to Ireland and went to cooking school on a farm for 3 months and accomplished something I never thought was possible, something I never thought I had the balls to do. I met lifelong friends there I’d do anything for. I thought I fell in love there too. Maybe it was just wonderlust, I’m not sure. But whatever it was, it was good to feel that way. I almost forgot what that felt like. I don’t think I was capable of feeling that way in most of my old life and it was a good reminder of why love (or whatever you want to call it) can make us do funny things. Of why having someone to think about every night as you fall asleep can motivate you to be your best self. Why it’s just plain motivating.

I flew to Colombia for a month with a duffel bag and hung with a group of the most interesting people I’ve ever met. I spent New Years on a rooftop in Cartagena watching fireworks explode over Old Town. I got shaken down by the Colombian police night 1. I played tejo deep in the Colombian jungle at a kite surfing hostel. I hiked an hour in the jungle in the dark with no guide to another hostel in the mountains of Colombian coffee country. I broke my phone on a boat in Tyrona National Park, drinking rose and living my best life. I ate arepas off the street.

I read Ernest Hemingway.

I went to Nicaragua for a month by myself. I went to a rave on a volcano island and slept in in tree house. I learned the sprawling local market. I learned the local bus system. I saw lava for my first time.

Then I asked a girl to go to Costa Rica with me for Valentine’s Day as a half joke and we did. We drank Flor de Cana rum and popped champagne and cooked fish and seafood from the local fisherman’s co-op. I got “iced” and had to chug it while “I wanna know what love is” by Foreigner was blasting in the background.

I woke up and decided Oaxaca, Mexico sounded good so I went there and asked for a job in a restaurant and mezcal bar. I learned true Mexican ingredients and how to navigate the markets. I made mole sauce at someone’s house on the outskirts of the city. I saw how textiles are made after I was invited to the house of an artisan in Teotitlán del Valle. I took the bus to the Tlacolula Sunday market to have real Mexican lamb barbacoa. I also saw the young lambs being reared for the Spring during my 7 days in the mountains, hiking from village to village, each one a time capsule of pre-hispanic, simple life. I learned what real mezcal is and the passion the producers have for it and how integral it is to Oaxacan culture. It’s sad to see it growing so fast here because I know what that means for the small producers. I met Dany there and we did everything together until she had to leave. We visited an artists colony. We cooked and ate everywhere. We had late talks about deep stuff. I lived with a James Beard nominated author. I spent a week partying my face off on the beach in Puerto Escondido in a house overlooking the ocean with a group of other misfits that I love and miss.

Then I picked up a 1992 Land Cruiser in Seattle and drove the Western US. I named her Christine. I visited my Aunt and Uncle in Portland. I saw The Revivalists in San Francisco. I saw Yosemite, Kings Canyon, Sequoia, the Grand Canyon, Arches and Rocky Mountain National Parks. I spent a week in Mammoth Lakes, California, a place that still resembles a small ski bro town that revolves around the mountain. I know what a slot canyon is. Hell, I know what the DESERT is. I slept alone in a truck or tent under the stars in the wilderness and conquered that fear. I learned a lot about myself doing that. I’m still a novice, but I am significantly better at the outdoors.

Now I live in Denver, a place I hope is more fitting for me. We’ll see.

As I said above, I don’t know if there is a way this was supposed to be done. I’ll never know. But I do know that I did and I’m doing it my way.

Thanks for reading. Here are some photos from the past month or so.