I’m fairly attached to this day. We were on “lockdown” during this time, all of my restaurants were closed and I’d spent the last three days assimilating to the “new normal” god I hate that term so much. I was home. It was a Saturday I had just gone for an illegal hike with a buddy of mine (we made sure we socially distanced ourselves from the trees while we hiked) showered, cracked open a can of Dales Pale Ale and sat under the giant magnolia tree in my front yard. My mind was on work as per the norm. Not the daily routine but its future. My third concept had just turned one. It hadn’t even started walking yet, it was building some momentum but that was lost in the shutdown. I was agitated from head to toe man I was not in a good mind set. We had just established Southern Culture Hospitality Group. Made a brand for it and everything. We were trying to grow, grow and grow!

We were halted. Momentum is hard to obtain in this business there are no rivers to ride down and coast you’re always crossing them instead. My partners and I were a little tired of each other for a while. Relationships are hard in this industry shake ups don’t need assistance but covid was there to help with that.

I had spent the last three days with my hands in my pockets. Everything was closed so I hung out at home. I had some projects that had sat unfinished the day I decided to open my own business. Shored a few shelves, painted some old walls I even painted three paintings I sold online. And why not? My businesses were shut down with no direction. Each day one of my places were shut down it’s $1300 a day in operation costs. That was also stressing me out.

I made breakfast for my family every morning, we’d share time for lunch and cooked out for dinner. We’d play video games, card games and watch marvel movies. In three days time I’d spent more quality time with my family than I had in 10 combined years.

We watched our 10 year old daughter running and dancing over a sprinkler head on our lawn. She was laughing and screaming as the cold water made its way over her head. I was half listening and half panicking over my vocational demise.

“Daddy look!”

“Daddy look!”

“Daddy watch!”

She was having the time of her life. She was home with her family. Her family was home with her. She was oblivious to what was happening and I was a little jealous of that.

“Daddy come jump over the sprinkler”

I watched her and I smiled.

And then my brain went a little sideways.

On this particular day April 4th 2020 my mind asked me a question that shook 30 years of my existence

“What you thinking about there Chadly?”

Me- “I feel like I’ve wasted 30 years of my life for absolutely nothing”

Noggin- “what you gonna do about it Chad”

“Rewrite my story”

This is completely paraphrased btw for the need of brevity. It was much more intense than this but I gotta work in an hour.

It’s journaling like this that allows me to playback moments in my life that help me see some of my old trail markers before I started to recognize them.

This was the first time something else touched my mind. I always referred to the time when I turned 50 that a little light in my head started to navigate my new journey but this was it. My head was still too addled from all the drinking. I thought I was having a slight mental breakdown (been there done that) but it wasn’t a breakdown just a download. The more I look back on things in my life the more I’ve come to accept that some of my emotional breakdowns have in fact been downloads.

Anytime I’ve experienced one I come out redefined, reinvented. It makes sense. It’s painful emotionally, physically and spiritually. Shedding that old soul skin. I firmly believe it. You feel overwhelmed it’s ok. You’re molting into the next step of who you’re supposed to be.

I recognize this pattern because my last download was my awakening on hunting island and well holy shit did that change a few things in me.

This download was a foot brake on life. Like what you’d do if you crested a hill and saw a highway patrol waiting on the other side.

*SCREEEECH

Season one of – You need to slow things down (I’d write that in a notebook over twenty times in about 5 months)

You could almost hear the heartbeat in my body go from fast to slow. For a moment that’s all I heard. Life stopped for a split second and my daughter jumping over the sprinkler freeze framed in my head. My vision went panoramic. I sat there and my mind said “hey Chad, this just ain’t it anymore bud”

I shut down. I suppose you have to do that for the big downloads. Plug yourself up, restart your phone and do what the prompts tell you to do. The only problem was there were no prompts. No instructions, no tools.

I had mentioned a little ways back that I had lost all my confidence in my trade. I no longer see it was that. I was going through a transition. I had to be separated from my abilities to dissociate from my old life.

“Hey Chad sorry for this inconvenience it’s going to suck for a bit but we need to take away your skills for a few months so you can restart”

And that’s what it did. Need proof? Fast forward to my first month of boxes when I had lost all my skills. And then watch them progress. My skills changed from fast, high speed tempo to more deliberate slower methodical pace. Every week for almost a year I went through a “I can’t fucking do this” while my other guy was telling me to take my time and it’ll all be just fine”

I got my groove back. It’s just a different beat now. I’m good

I don’t have to tell the rest of that story. My partners and I would say farewell in September of that year. I was hell to deal with while I dealt with that change. My passion walked away from me that day. I’m sure if my partners read this they would see the exact timeline of when I mentally started to back away. It wasn’t a fun time for either of us.

There is nothing negative to be shared on my partners for this. Just to be clear.

This day. This fucking day. 6 years man it feels like 100 and yet it feels like yesterday.

Fresh and stale

I started building that cocoon that day.

Broke ground.

6 years later I feel like I’m still coming out of it. If I could show a timeline of progression over the last six years it’s been quite a ride. There’s still more to come.

That’s not me talking. That’s the other guy who took over. He gets louder each time.

Or more aware

I have a love/hate relationship with Covid. I hate what it did to me and have to admire it at the same time. Some say they made Covid to start a new reset and well it worked. Maybe not the way they anticipated but that’s a whole ‘nother story.

This felt good to let out. Have I mentioned how therapeutic writing can be?

Cheers.