Bearded Gang

I’ve had a pebble in my shoe for some time.

A shoulder chip

Bitterness

Anger

A constant low simmering of piss and vinegar

Coming up to close to 40 years. I knew it was there but it had been there so long it became old mental injury. I walked around with it limping, frustrated at times when it got in my head. I’ve been carrying it around with me every single day. Some days I didn’t think about it while I did most others. It started on this day, 38 years ago. My father passed from a massive stroke. It did what a war over Germany and another one in Korea couldn’t do. Took my hero away.

I’ve written how I always felt my dad deserved better than what he received the last 6-8 years of his life and then some.

Lost his business, divorced, working terrible jobs up until he retired and spent his last living years in a in-law suite at my oldest sister’s house. Working as a cook part time in a little pub off of Mauldin rd.

Walked right out of that little pub and fell down. Never to get back up again.

My mighty father. Two time war veteran, widower, master sergeant. Took on a whole gang of Hells Angels with one pistol. Like the scene from Tombstone holding the pistol up to the main transgressor’s forehead and when the young punk said my dad couldn’t “get em all” he replied “no but you’ll be the first one to die.” They all left. Never to return but they had already destroyed my dad’s club and reputation.

He lost it all but you would never know it if you met him. He just kept plugging along doing what had to be done.

He died broke. Not penniless I still have his giant change jar/beer pitcher that reads “I bet you can’t” on my counter that he would fill up with loose change and let me pillage through to use for my candy and comic book purchases.

Small funeral filled with friends and family. I wanted a goddamn parade in his memory. He earned it. He should’ve been on the front of the Greenville News and a huge write up in Bethlehem, PA his hometown. Not an afterthought obit on page 9 behind the lifestyle section. Governor should’ve been there. Hell Reagan should have done his eulogy.

No one did.

I would’ve but I was 14 and doing my best not to let everyone see me cry.

I know my standards are ridiculous and not attainable. Most people probably feel the same about their dad’s passing. I get it. But at the same time I don’t.

It made me bitter. To the fucking bone. I deserved to have more time with him. He deserved to see me and bear hug me good night every night. Not just the weekends. 6 years – two days a week = 600 plus days out of 2200. I slept on a little cot by the foot of his bed those times. Windows stained with Winston reds. I could care less. Smoke em up pop. I’m just happy to hang out with you.

My dad did what had to be done. And he did it without a single complaint. I’m terrible at that. Maybe I’m making up for his silence.

My emotions over the years concerning my father are two very distinct opposites. One is filled with complete adulation from my memories and being around him and the other complete bitterness and anger towards how it ended.

I had no idea how long and heavy that bitterness had become. I had been carrying it along for so long that it just became a part of me. My personality, my essence. My own selfish thoughts and long yearning for retribution. And then this mini-series came out of thin air.

Literally

To say I was excited when I was approached on fb messenger that my father would be represented in a mini series from Spielberg and Hanks was amazing and a little surreal. But to be honest the whole time it was approaching my natural pessimism was that they’d show his face on camera briefly in a group and might see his name appear in a B-17 roster. Still, I was fucking excited. I really wanted people to see what my old man did. What he was a part of. Why he wasn’t just a hero to me but to a whole fucking generation. The greatest fucking generation.

Impatiently I downloaded AppleTV the day I heard the announcement and would log in weekly to see if a preview or trailer would come available soon. Did that for a solid year and a half. Even made some silent prayers to the man upstairs to please let me live long enough to see this series come to life. I’ve watched every episode immediately twice back to back and then I go back and watch it from beginning to end. Episode 1 I’ve watched a dozen times. “There’s dad! He’s flying over occupied France! “He’s preparing for a crash landing!” I can’t believe it! My dad is on TV! He’s actually on the show! I cried. Man did I ever. That kid resembles my father enough to make it as close to real as it can get. I even told my wife if I ever met that actor in real life and he told me to brush my teeth and head on to bed I’d probably do it without thinking about it.

Episode 5. Well I won’t say how many times I’ve watched it but I still haven’t quite got my fill. I lost my emotions on that episode. I got to see, beautifully and masterfully illustrated, what my father experienced on the plane where he was shot and then parachuted to narrowly escape death. The story I asked him to tell me a hundred and one times. It was right there on my TV. I got to experience it. Ball turret, leg injury and all. My wife paused the show to let me regain my composure.

I can’t put into words. I slept on it, full of anxiety and wonder. I woke up and watch it again. And cried again and then one more time. I wrote a little about it and could feel a heavy cloak of emotion and bitterness slowly sliding off of my shoulders. Bitterness that had been imbedded in my soul. My father had been honored on a worldwide scale. People all over get to see what he did to protect his country, his sacrifices, his face.. well sorta.

I finally got to put some visual experiences on those medals that I wake up and smile too every morning. While I was camping and still reeling from episode 5 I texted my wife “Babe, this series just closed so many open wounds and doors almost overnight”.

I had no idea it would do this to me.

What therapy couldn’t do. What sobriety was working on but couldn’t quite close the deal.

I literally feel lighter. Happier and for the first time in a long damn time, at peace with myself.

To try to put into words for what that series means to me

Imagine finding that cliche magical lamp in the sand. Pick it and rub it. That genie comes billowing out and says “you got one wish”

“I wish to see my dad one more time”

“Your wish is my command”

The genie nailed it.

Thanks Steve and Tom. I owe you one.

I shifted this morning. Felt it happen. I think it’s my third one in the last three years. This one I recognized immediately. The first one I had to look for but I found it. I just wasn’t sober yet at the time so it sat there for a bit before I realized it came and went. Wait, no not went because the whole meaning of these shifts, the whole fucking entirety is these shifts come to stay home and roost with me. The shift in the middle was my first year of sobriety under my belt. I felt that shift. I embraced it and it’s also the time that I acknowledged the first shift.

What the fuck are you talking about Chad?

Let me explain

Shifts for me are what I describe as leveling up in my mental health and life. You can use any metaphor you want it’s fun. If you’re into role playing my wizard went from gray robe to white robe, got a degree in Chad’s mental health awareness, added an extra plate to my mental bench press or went from bush to triple A.

My mental health moves up the healthy chain. Like a great big clock with a hand moving ever so closer to high noon. Three years ish ago I was around 11:01am on a clock that only has one hour on the ticker. Shifting means putting some putting some lifelong shitty things behind me, making a lifestyle change that has become permanent without the effort it used to take. Feels like you took off some ankle weights that have been around your legs for years and years.

I am a student to my mental health. Once I parted ways with my company I found more free time than I knew how to handle. Over these past three plus years my primary goal was to address my diminishing mental health. It was my thesis. Like anything else I get into I treated this the same way. I needed to become obsessed with it. Emotional outbursts were journaled, fights with people I love, my disposition, anxieties, drinking were addressed one by one. I had no idea as to how to fix or repair it the only thing I could do at the time was to write down and simply acknowledge it. Abridged insert “today I stomped on a pizza box half full of charcuterie because I forgot to order goat cheese” “acknowledge your outbursts, don’t act upon them”

I’ve known all along what my triggers are, vices but when you’re in perpetual motion you don’t take time to fix it. Or the effort.

My first shift was when I turned 50. I felt it coming but had no idea what it would entail. My mind was trying to prepare me for it. The closer I inched towards that half 50 my mentality started to push small thoughts into my head. For some reason I gravitate towards the number 5 and its denominations always have without thinking about it. Easy example, my wife and I were married on 5/15/10. Didn’t do it on purpose the show played out that way. I’m a firm believer that your body and mind speak to you if you listen. Up until the last few years I kept it on mute.

As I edged towards the big 50 all I kept hearing in my subconscious was

“it’s time for change”

“this is a good cornerstone”

“reinvention”

“let’s do better”

And sure as shit when I hit 50 I shifted. I climbed a mountain and had a come to Jesus moment with myself. There were no chills running down my spine, no hallelujah chorus or bright shining light from heaven. My head and I had a conversation all the way up and all the way down. We didn’t make one damn decision that day all I did was listen. And then I had a chat in my head for three months about throwing away my favorite toy- vodka.

That was my first shift. My first level up from the mental mess I had become. Also as I refer to as my reckoning

My second shift was a cool breeze. It was actually a shift from my heart. It smacked me in my face. All it took was my kid’s post on IG celebrating her dad’s first year of sobriety. I read it while we all were having lunch at a little sports pub in Asheville, abruptly left the table and cried in the restroom.

For a full calendar year I had dedicated my life to fixing myself for my family and goddamnit it was working. It was fucking working. I knew it and they knew it. I was still backpedaling from my perceived failures at Southern. I felt it leave. Almost like dropping a heavy shield. I sat back down and looked at my family and smiled. This is my family. I have them back where they should’ve been the whole time. My brain took a screenshot of that moment and now it’s been home screen on my soul ever since. There are no words that can describe what it feels like for your heart to come back home.

My third shift was also easy. It was a simple acceptance as I was sitting on my sofa with my headphones on and I’ll admit that I was crying at the time. I cry a lot honestly. I went a long way with no time to cry. I recommend it. It’s like an organic oil change.

After throwing off a 500lb weighted blanket of emotion I’d been carrying around of my father’s passing my mind started talking to me again.

“Good things have been happening to me”

“Am I being rewarded for doing better?”

It’s like a tiny new door opening inside your mind.

Awareness. New kind for me. It’s a little surreal for me and I leave my faith and pov about religion to myself because that’s how I go about my spiritual business and it is intimate to me. To put it bluntly I always believed your rewarded for good things and deeds but I never saw the reward. Always seemed to miss the mark. It’s dumb to focus on the reward. Its right under your nose.

My reckoning was my reward. The follow though. Not that shit of wishing my business doubled in size, bigger home, better roof top tent or golden brick mailbox post.

I’ve been rewarded with balance

I’ve been rewarded with love and peace of mind which is something I’ve been seeking since I left my childhood home in Belle Mead.

I shifted and this time I was fully present to feel it.

It’s fucking emotional. I was off all day yesterday and I dipped out to cry half a dozen times.

Tears of fucking gratitude

Listen

Listen to your body, your mind, your biology.

If I’m going to influence anything anyone let it be this

Sobriety is the magic wand, it’s the fucking potion to happiness.

I’ll never go back. This is just too fucking good.

Cheers

My emotions spike easily. I realize everyone gets emotional I’m not special in any way. The thing is for me is mine don’t come down like they used to. They’re like mental glitter. I hold onto things I shouldn’t and while others have brushed the things off I’m just getting started. They stew in me. My brain is a fucking crock pot for stewing toxic emotions. Usually the only thing it might cause is a little pettiness or a small outburst. If they sit long enough I explode. Rarely are their witnesses because over the years I’ve mastered handling it behind closed doors. I won’t go into details about my tantrums but they can get bad. Really bad. Almost childish and when they are done I feel like someone kicked the shit out of me. My body aches, my head feels like it’s going to explode. It’s almost like going into shock. If you video’d me during these you wouldn’t recognize me because I don’t even recognize myself. It’s not a “I see red” shit. I see everything. I feel everything. No one has ever witnessed these although my wife has been on the other side of the door to a few. My wife is actually the best person on this planet at keeping me from these. I won’t say she shields me but she has a remarkable ability to see it on the horizon and she calms me down. For instance I had a small episode from just reading comments in a negative Masters of Air feed last night. I felt the show was being misrepresented and spoke my mind in the only way I know how. Had some words with the moderator to the point that I wanted to google his address and talk to him personally. As comically as that may sound there was nothing funny about it because I was as serious as serious can be.

I have what I call trauma songs. Certain songs that will come out of your car stereo, mall musak or neighboring car with window rolled down, head back screaming the lyrics. I don’t keep them on my iTunes, Apple play, Spotify what have you. I have dispensed these songs over the years due to the memories they trigger. It could be a song I dedicated to an ex although after 16 plus years with the same woman/wife they’ve been mucho diluted and have become songs that I don’t turn to but also don’t try to punch the jukebox anymore when they play (only happened once). Now that I recall some of the songs they sound a little silly without the heartbreak and passion of a relationship. Actually some seem a little downright cringy now that sitting here over analyzing. Without a doubt we all have them. Some are musak pop, over played radio songs that might remind us of work when they would play the same 20 songs on repeat until the top 40 was able to find another 20 trendy songs to play during the next genre. Double bonus if it’s a musak song that you dedicated to an ex..

I’ll immediately change the station or shuffle my shuffler. “Waiting for a Star to Fall” and Baby I love your way/free bird” reminds me of Brendles, my only retail job in high school. I despise those songs due to them being shoved into my ears literally every hour for a year. Jars of Clay “Flood” and Tracy Chapman’s “Give me one reason” would play on repeat at the Steakhouse. They now make me scream when they play on the “radio”. You will never find these songs on my playlist. Some I’ve hidden for awhile due to burnout of being overplayed. I haven’t listen to a single Avett Brothers song or Mumford and Sons since I left Southern. I love both bands. We played their shit literally everyday. I might throw a waffle at someone’s head if I hear Little Lion Man. Sometimes it’s one song “Wagon Wheel” will make me crave genocide. Hardly traumatic but man, they burn my ears in a not so good way. Also the older I get the more genres no longer appeal to me. Nothing to do with the artists or genre. I’ve heard it too much it’s not as appealing. Classic rock from the 70s would be an example. The genre is legendary but bands like Aerosmith, ZZ Top, Santana and several other bands I enjoyed have been overplayed in my soul. I’ve given them a break. I’m sure they’ll make come back in time they always do. Some I will never tire of. 80s pop and Grunge will never die to me. These have absorbed most of my song data base that resonate and make me smile. Especially the 80s, to me the best decade of music to ever exist. Most songs that resonate with my ears are the good songs. Ones that make my soul sing. Coming from my favorite artists and genres, they play my soul. I make playlists for when I drive long distances and when I sit on a mountain top to watch the sunset. I have no playlists for sunrise. For some reason I like to listen to the sun as it rises. Sturgill, Isbell, Childers, Prine and recently Zach Bryan are my sunset lists. My shoulders slump, my lips smile and I am repaired when these combine with my environment. I invite my good friends anytime to try this with me. It’s contagious.

My driving playlists are sing alongs for me. I will croon at the top of my lungs singing until my throat hurts. And believe it or not I’m not too shabby at singing. 10 cups of coffee help..

My generation got experience Victrolas at home, tape decks in your car, walkmans – boomboxes, to CD players, satellite stereo to all these streaming shit now. We were the first to be able to carry our music with us everywhere we went. I had a cassette player attached to my waste from ‘86-89. Before that I lugged a ridiculously heavy boombox with 14 D batteries that would last for 8 hours without being plugged in. Those were the best of times. We’d all have those little briefcases with our top 10 favorite cassettes that went everywhere with us. I bet I can still remember mine

Can’t Slow Down – Lionel Richie

Frontiers – Journey

Purple Rain- Prince

Thriller – Michael Jackson

Born in the USA – Bruce Springsteen

Power Station

Whatever cassette that had Eye of the Tiger

Van Halen -1984

Footloose Soundtrack

And probably something from Duran Duran

I still listen to my albums and CDs until the new cars have made them obsolete. I might buy a discman..

Some of my hard trauma songs may remind me of death or a favorite song of a loved one who passed away. My brother loved Bob Seger. “Turn the Page” makes me think about him. Sometimes I’ll listen when I’m driving and we’ll chat for a bit in my head. You won’t find it on my playlist. He reaches out from time to time when he wants to. My mother is all 70s country. Dolly, Willy, Kenny and Johnny brings my mother to me. They aren’t traumatic thankfully I love that genre and I’m still fumbling with my mother’s passing and will for sometime.

I used to keep my boombox inside my little bookcase that also served as my head board. You know those old 80s beds had multi purposes and storage. I kept my favorite books inside that little cabinet and my boom box. Whatever storage left were probably cassettes and recordable ones when my cousins and I would record ourselves being radio DJs. Good fucking times.

I would fall asleep to music as a teenager. When I’d wake up in the middle of the night I’d flip it off. Just a little tiny lever right above the volume knob. I knew that box well. It was my support system during puberty.

The last few weeks for me have been extremely emotional. It took a mini series to cause this. It brought me back to almost 40 years back. To a new reckoning I hadn’t planned out or expected. Its literally indescribable. I know the difference between reality and Hollywood. I’m not that crazy.

But

Watching my father’s memories and himself resurrected on TV took the breath out of me. I’ve never experienced this type of emotions. It’s like seeing a ghost of my father on TV. I had two years to prepare. 20 minutes into the first episode I cried. Just a kid playing my dad.

I cried

When the actor got shot in the leg in episode 5 I bawled like I just saw my dad get shot. I was so emotionally involved in this show.

Heavily

I had to step outside to compose myself. This isn’t just a series for me. You’ll never understand because I can’t describe what it does.

I never made peace with my father’s death. I’ve always held it against the universe. I wanted more time and I didn’t get it.

Jesus Christ I’m bawling now.

Tangent

Sorry

The night my dad passed I went to bed and did my regular routine as best as I could. I turned on my little boombox and cried myself to sleep. I woke up a little later and listened to my radio. You know when you’re a kid and wake up after some crazy ass experience you would lie there and wish it was a dream a thousand times over.. I tried that to no avail. I listened to two songs that came on at that moment and I got angry sad. Not at the songs, they have absolutely no relevance to my father’s passing other than being on the radio at the wrong time. His death became a reality to me. I turned off my radio and went back to sleep. Exhaustion won that battle . When you’re a kid exhaustion won’t keep you awake like it does as an adult. Thank you for that.

As I was sitting on my sofa watching one scene I’ve watched literally 50 times now it has occurred to me that I haven’t listened to those two songs for 38 years. I’m coming up on my father’s 38 year anniversary of his death in 10 days. They’ve come on the radio on several occasions I always turned the station sometimes subconsciously. I haven’t listened to them. Period.

I turned off the tv and put my headphones on.

And played both those songs in their entirety back to back. And I cried like I did that night 38 years ago. But this time it was different. I made some peace with myself.

Those were trauma songs to me. I’ve managed to ignore them all this time to push them away.

I put them in my ears and now I’m putting them away. Along with a lot of grief I’ve packed over the years.

The last 6 or 8 years of my dad’s life should’ve gone better for him.

He deserved it. He fucking earned it.

I’m like Teddy Duchamp from Stand By Me screaming “MY DAD STORMED THE BEACHES OF NORMANDY” when I think and talk about my dad. Everyone needs to know he was a hero.

This show did that for me. On a worldwide scale.

And it allowed me to see my dad one last time. At least his character. It’s given me something I’ve been looking for most of my life.

Peace

I finally listened to those two songs. It took a damn mini series to do it but it did it. Will I listen to them shoot they find themselves on my radio?

Doubtful. They did their job well

Turn the page.

Want to read a good story?

Try this on for a moment

Journal your thoughts

Highlight the bad ones

We all know what our worst thoughts are better than anyone

Do you act on these thoughts or are they just cans on a shelf?

In my reckoning I wrote them down as they came

I don’t have cans or shelves

I’d read them aloud

Real loud

I’d pick one out

Let it drop like water balloon from a tower

Close that chapter

Wipe that slate

Turn that fucking cheek

Once that balloon hits

Sometimes that tower is higher than others

But

It will eventually will

Watch it all the way down

Pop

Make peace and then bombs away again with another thought

Make sure you watch them all the way down

Hear that pop

Don’t let that fucker bounce

Some healthy carnage left for the sun to mop up

Why? Because it heals

As does the sun

Symbolic

As each balloon drops your story gets better

As do your thoughts

You can control your thoughts if you try hard enough

Don’t let the tell you otherwise

Habits can be broken

With just a thought

Good ones

I didn’t have many of those

Until I climbed up that tower

Over and over

Each time I came down I’d write a new story

New thoughts

Positive ones

I didn’t force them they were waiting on me

Others started reading my stories

In my home

It’s true you know

When you’re miserable it’s contagious

When you’re happy it’s the same

I can’t count all the smiles I see

Not even my own

My story was a reckoning

It’s only starting

Pop

When I first created my account for Facebook I can recall thinking “this won’t last” MySpace is much better”. Its easy to recall. It’s literally my first Facebook memory because I posted it to my average engagement at that time – 2 likes, one of those being from my very first social media friend my wife, who still continues to be my fb friend today much to her chagrin.

My old partner and I had just opened up Fix, our little coffee shop adventure on 101 Wade Hampton. A name that was created from a bev nap, just as was my daughter’s name would be decided almost a year to the day later. Time has a way of making relevant coincidences in my life. Fix was a cool little spot in that little flat iron building across from Teeter. If you have never heard of it well, most of Greenville hadn’t either. I’d open up Fix every morning with my one barista, I was the back up just in case the line ever went to 4 deep (it rarely did) and during the slow sessions I’d hang out on MySpace and then I slowly transitioned to FB and refer to my daily squabbles in third person. 2008, we were pasting codes for songs on our wall, we hadn’t learned conspiracies, algorithms, snowflakes and cornflakes yet. Social media was just being social. My engagement was minimal. You’d see uploaded pics or an occasional video and short status update. I wasn’t exactly enthralled. I created a little fb page for Fix. I might’ve updated and refreshed that account 3 times. I think it’s still on fb I might take a look when I’m done. Most of our advertising we used local periodicals including Industry magazine or we’d stick Joe, our coffee mannequin mascot to the edge of the road to signify we were open for business. It seemed every month ol Joe would lose an appendage and after a few months we were dragging out Joe’s torso with his Moe from Three Stooges wig sideways on his polished egg shell colored head and sunglasses to hide his lifeless eyes. The more we lost of Joe the slower our business crept. Purely symbolic, Joe wasn’t brandishing an old archaic scarab of doom that would haunt the building forever we just couldn’t build up enough martketing steam to make Fix worth keeping. On top of that my wife and I decided to grow our family by one. Wasn’t the best timing but after looking back and seeing that pretty little face the last 14 years I’d say we did ok. The coffee business for me was short and sweet. I loved that little shop but I was also working at Zona full time salary. Coffee shop was a burden that was slowly draining my pathetic bank account away. Coffee would not be in my retirement portfolio.

I’d use my fb updates to advertise live patio parties at Az, post pics of heavily condensated margarita pitchers and the shitty little happy hour food I had created. IG was an account I’d use about once a month to post my mimosa in hand over the beach balcony or a nice looking tree I’d pass while hiking. Double bonus if it was fall. No one under the age of 50 gave a shit about fall leaves until IG came around. The birth of the fucking boomeranged, raised glass toasts. Are we still doing that shit? I had created some energy on the forgotten patio at AZ and Facebook was my first real internet marketing bundle. My pics were terrible even though at the time I was waiting for Bon Appetite to reach out to me for my magazine like elegance and charm. It was usually a pic of a margarita stem next to a spinach and artichoke dip with the sun shining directly above it. I hadn’t grasped the skill of natural lighting as of yet. Upon looking at my first few hundred pics of Southern it must’ve taken me awhile because most of those were terrible too. Never take a pic under a red heat lamp bulb btw.

Facebook was still mostly

Profile pic here <—— “is tired”

“Is drunk”

“Is hungry”

“Is hoping everyone shows up for work this time”

“Is sleepy”

Is cringy. No that wasn’t a status update it was an observation of my social media in 2009-2012. Social media was as deep as a puddle in a dessert. I wish it had stayed that way honestly.

I put myself in charge of Southern’s social media not because I was the best fit for it but I had the most experience for the local marketing side. We hired a marketing company to handle our branding but the dailies were mostly me and my partner. Branding and advertising firms have a imperative role in marketing and advertising. I’ve always preferred mine to be more organic. The branding should come from the creator’s heart. Not someone else’s content board. Purely my very biased opinion.

Southern soared through the social media rankings. I’d post updated construction pics, test menus with some solid engagement. People were excited! We opened with 2000 followers. Solid numbers for 2012. We done good kid. The only issue we had at that time and it was an important one, we couldn’t get more that 5% of those 2000 followers to come eat in our restaurant in a week. They all managed to show up fucking friends and family night and never came back when it was time to pay some bills.

We were big dick energy with only an inch worm to show for it.

After getting some momentum under our feet and hitting the bullseye on brunch, Southern recovered nicely but it was hairy scary for the first quarter.

Southern was on top of the food chain in a good way after that, making some money and headlines so with good vibes used that momentum and we started on the Dive M Boar chapter in 2015. I got caught up in all the social media relevancy then. We whispered “new concept” and Greenville creamed it’s pants. Dive jumped out of the gate with 4k followers. 4000 plus members of the upstate and then some were all on our new venture’s up and coming restaurant list. That’s a comforting number to have before you launch a ridiculously expensive business venture. As per the norm we had another successful friends and family night. We’d invite some popular faces that would make sure and goddamn well everyone in Greenville knew that this was the place to hang. Hell we even had some budding influencers ask to be invited so they could help make us the talk of the town with their online influences.. at that time I’d never heard of such a thing. I applaud it. It’s smart if you’re good at it. IF YOURE GOOD AT IT.

Dive started off ok but it didn’t come close to our forecast. We went accidentally viral two times. The first one was terrible. It was a review we responded to somewhat rudely but it stemmed from a ridiculous miss understanding. Looking back at it now it wouldn’t even make a whimper but when it’s your own place and it’s underperforming you don’t want any negative press. The other spectrum, our old burger restaurant neighbors did a dumb thing and pissed off some local firefighters. TR had just lost a fellow firefighter in a tragic accident and wanted to honor him by eating on of those “we betcha can’t finish” burgers that he always wanted to do. They wanted to share it and well that burger place wasn’t going to bend the rules for anyone and they stepped into a pile of shit that didn’t wash off their boot. I had reached out and told them I’d make a bigger, better burger they could all share to honor their friend. Then I found out the tragedy that had befallen their friend and I was heartbroken. He had died at an intersection after being hit on his motorcycle during a police chase with another vehicle. Just the wrong place at the worst possible time. All I could think about was his little family. And then about what would happen to mine had it been me? We held a little fundraiser for his family that became a huge fundraiser. It was truly remarkable to witness how we are capable of coming together as a community when the shit hits the shit. I met some incredible people. The parking lot was packed with firefighters and their families, we had a band and raised some good love and cash flow for the family.

We would last 7 more months. Rebranding in between. Dive n Boar went 0-2 at the plate. The last swing the bat went flailing into the stands.

That was my first experience of closing a large scale business that I had a big hand in creating. It left a bad taste in my mouth. Falling on your face sucks. Doing it in front of the whole upstate hurts even worse. Especially with my ego. I knew I had to improve on multiple levels and I wanted to step up and work on our brand recognition. Starting with my own. Reluctantly I put my face out there as the face of the company. The best way for me to market my brand was to become the brand. After Dive shut the doors I began creating LTO although my initial concept was called “Elbow Grease” I wanted a late night burger dive. A roll up door in the front and back amd go full tits sports and late night bar. The dive theme shook my partners up. They envision an environment straight out of a hells angel movie whenever I brought up late night bar. Guys in leather, getting drunk and knifing each other over a game of 9 ball or darts. In hopes that Clint Eastwood would walk in with his pet chimpanzee and scare them all away. Elbow Grease didn’t make it. So I went Grease Lite and created LTO. A concept of milkshakes and kid filled dining rooms. Y’all should’ve figured out by now that just ain’t my bag baby.

One night I got on Facebook and I went through and friended (requested) 500 people. The only guidelines were they had to have at least 25 mutual friends and their profile pic couldn’t be something that would resemble a troll account. I actually did this twice, the second time not quite as much but I was trying to build my personal brand to help market my professional brand.

I called that first corralling of friends my “Facebook 500”. I went outside my comfort zone and invited 500, mostly complete strangers into my life. I slowly changed my Facebook material to be more engaging and to gain popularity. I wanted to use that energy to market my company. After I ingested those new 500 friends I introduced myself. Felt like a monkey when I did that but I did it.

It was a good move. Marketing wise and socially. I can’t give you an accurate percentage of how many actually accepted my request. On occasion I’ll see an account with “friend request pending” and if they’re public I’ll go and heart a few pics just to fuck with them. Fuck y’all, you’re missing a hell of a show.

Of those 500 or so I’ve met at least 300 to 400 in person. I’ve hiked with a lot of them, shared coffee, stories, supported their businesses, watched their families begin and grow. Lot of amazing talent and love with these guys. And they all support each other. I have three generations of friends. My childhood friends from diapers to graduation, my friends I made from Zona’s and this group along with my Southern family. Truly thankful for all three. Once I had that accomplished I went and friended about 200 more. No clue who you guys are to this day. I think you’re the lurkers. You’re on there but you stand in the corners and observe. I’m actually jealous.

LTO was about to hit the press. I wanted to reignite that trouble child next to Southern. I built up my social media presence to build up my business’s presence. Dive had closed and knocked the breath out of us. I had already built up a brand as Southern’s cocky, arrogant ranting chef. Wasn’t the legacy I was looking for but it sold tickets to the show. Even that old monicker Dr. Puddin’ was a good branding for me. I changed my IG handle to that name for instant recognition. God I cringe when I look back at that. One of my chefs called me that and it went mini viral. Jesus I thought I was hot shit on a cold golden rock.

I started engaging more on social media. Tried to do the same on IG on a smaller scale but thought I could be more relevant on FB. I’d publicly share the progress of opening restaurants, some fun opening stories to share and teasing the public with pics of our test kitchen and new burgers. I’d do polls for burger names and toppings and received solid engagement. Posted weekly specials for Southern and they’d sell out. Sales improved, engagement improved and I made connections with the all those faces on see on fb.

My ego would feed off the growing popularity on social media. That thumbs up dopamine is something y’all. The more I grew on social media the more I felt the need to post “entertainly” on fb. It was no longer “what’s on your mind?” It was “what do you want people to think is on your mind?” Got to be more engaging. Gotta sell tickets.

I found myself rating my restaurants performances by their social media engagement. Sales too obviously but right underneath it was the social media promotions. It’s a full time job. Molding your businesses online for all the public to see. It’s the real deal reality show. You want the locals, the general public within a certain radius to become intimate with your branding. Get on that platform and you make goddamn sure you make yourself relevent to your 5k followers, even if it’s for 10 seconds. That’s all you need to get into their heads to get into your wallet. Using exciting trigger words like BOGO, SIN NIGHT, LIVE MUSIC and quirky shit like BIRKENSTOCK BINGO or TRIVIA for some long forgotten TV show.

Nostalgia sells tickets.

More often than not those food specials you post online that recieve comments like “GET IN MY BELLY”, SAVE ME A SEAT”, “OMG THAT LOOKS HEAVENLY” but you never see those mother fuckers in your restaurant.. Likes don’t sell tickets. They are like a crowd standing outside the box office discussing buying tickets. You see the large crowd gathering in front of the ticket booth. You leave because that line appears to be too long. Soon they do to because another shiny new ticket booth opened and they must go see what’s playing.

I’d post 5 or 6 days a week for my businesses. Always trying to engage whether it be a holiday milkshake the size of your leg, some ridiculous waffle concoction or patio event. I choose 6:30 to post. AM or PM.

6:30 am you’re sitting on your sofa or fav chair, coffee in hand and cellphone in the other hand scrolling on social media. Your brain is just waking up and stomach is growling. Your hungry. I’m gonna get your ass with a solid food pic to get in your head. 90% of my current business posts come at 6:30am. You might’ve procrastinated on a last minute gift. I got you now.

Book club event just doubled. Hey look at me look at me!

Football game tomorrow and Costco sold out of wing platters? Yo here’s my post to save the day.

6:30 pm if I’m posting for my bars, I’ll get you when you’re thirsty. Or when a friend pops in town and you’re looking for a watering hole. Shit! LTO has trivia tonight! Just saw a reminder! Fuck I love All In The Family trivia, Carroll O’Connor is the fucking man! let’s go!

Business social media peeps will get this. You post up. The first 20 people that like your shit are the same ones that like all your shit. Let me add quickly that I am not dismissing those 20 people. I react in kind and like all your shit. It’s balance. Like for a like. Eye for an eye. We can both throw thumbs at each other all day. We’ll go broke but goddamnit we got those thumbs pointing up up and UP. The support is very much appreciated.

Back to rant

Sometimes you feel let down by your posts and engagement. You’ll wake up in the middle of the night screaming “I’ve got it! That’s it! My shit gonna go viral tomorrow yall! I’ve got something that will blow your fucking ‘net socks off!

Create!

Post!

Sit and wait for the engagement and likes!

BAM!

9 likes

Sometimes it’s the algorithms that get you. You could have great engagement all last week and suddenly it’s like someone parked a big ass semi in front of your business and no one can see it. Fuckerberg is being petty. You haven’t posted a sponsored ad in months. He’s thrown all these $5s at you for ad inspiration and you keep turning him down because he threw you in internet jail for 30 days just because you called a total stranger online a Cunt face McGhee (true story). So now only a small, select demographic from rural Pakistan gets to see your posts for the next month. Sometimes you gotta throw a silly meme in their to wake your audience up.

That’s always been a brain fuck to me. If you were to judge our country’s cultural taste for arts by social media engagement here you go – my memes get 5 plus times more likes and engagement than say a grazing table I spent 14 hours creating. Yep I can photoshop my head on a banana holding a Swift album or some shit and get 300 likes. Took me 30 seconds to create it. Post a catering event set up that took all weekend, lost sleep from the amount of stress and my wrists are cramped from turning cheese into origami and get 9 likes. God bless America 🎶

You get caught up in it. When you do it for this long, you really do. You gotta sell those tickets.

Social media was an arm wrestling event everyday with my old partners. We were quite the opposites when it came to a social media position. My partners were missionary position and I was reverse cowgirl. I like to shock, make fun, engage. I want you to see my shit and say Holy Shit! I built that brand around me it was like a well trimmed hedge around my yard. They liked white washed pics, table clothes, stemwear, they were more focused on what their friends might think of my posts than what the consumer wanted. I always told them “I don’t cook for your friends I cook for the public.” Same would go for my posts. My partners wanted the Walton’s doing our social media, fun little slo mo videos of me tossing tots in a stainless bowl while seasoning them, slo mo videos of me tossing fries in a stainless bowl while seasoning them, slo mo video of me flipping an egg in a pan over an open flame, slo mo video of me flipping my shrimp fucking flambé for shrimp in grits in my pan. After my 12th retake for a video for Radical I told the camera guy he was one more retake away from my shoving my flambé up his ass in slo mo. I would no longer be a part of those videos.

As I stated previously, your business social media should come from the heart. Not some tack board that is on page one of every marketing class textbook. I annoyed my partners. Southern went from fun, bluegrass vibes to pics of elevated proteins, wine dinners and table cloths. That is not the Southern I created not even the same goddamn ballpark. I take fault in all of this too. I’m not always pointing fingers.

My social media presence for the restaurants were essentially stripped from me when Covid hit. It was a great time to address some of their issues with me without me being present that is. Before I paint this ridiculous villain portrait of my partners let me add that for the first month during Covid I was transitioning into someone else. I wasn’t as present as I should’ve been but that was only because I didn’t find it necessary to plagiarize a 48 page rewritten handbook for the company. The one stating employees can’t post on social media regarding work including partners. Yeah I took it personal.

That week I began my own rebranding to Bearded Gang on IG. I had already begun my personal, soon to be individual engagement for whatever I laid out in front of me the next few months. My partners were giddy when we announced the reopening of Habitap (their fav because they had the most involvement in). They despised the LTO I created. We(they) posted this wait for it, slow motion video of us sanitizing tables, dusting the covid germs off the faux blinds and all these wonderful smiling employees. My partner made the comment that her phone wouldn’t stop buzzing from all the engagement from the video Radical posted and I thought it might be the first time anything has ever vibrated in her pants. I was taking a video of the new dining room set up and one of my partners remarked “that better not get posted on social media” and my initial response was going to be “I’m going to post a slow motion video of this phone going up someone’s ass” but in all honesty half of my passion for my business had already died. I did post that video though because, fuck you. All I thought was just wait and see what happens when the other 50% leaves me.

When I parted ways with the company for some reason they still monitored my social media. I guess when something was posted about the restaurant group and it was made like I never existed I sort of threw my middle finger out at my old company. The post was removed rather quickly but not before 25 screenshots were sent my way. I found that odd behavior so I blocked every single one of them to give their eyes a break. Regardless if there is anything negative said about my old company I can assure everyone it ain’t me. I absolutely will not be a proponent to helping or hurting my old company. I actually still advocated them up until that moment.

I think Radical lasted about 6 months after I left.

Not sure as to why. Nothing against them. Really nothing against my partners either. Listen, I get it. My mouth and mood can be a mouthful. Can’t blame them for being uptight. Careful for what wish for though..

In retrospect I did create quite an obnoxious monster on social media. Tones are hard to read on here. People take shit the wrong way and I know I rile some people up with my words although I’m trying to tame that guy. Blame that damn school bus. Two things I try to stay away on here religion and politics. Two opinions best shared on their own individual platforms.

If I didn’t need it I’d probably quit it. Although I’m just as addicted to this as I am/was anything else. I’m not sure how my company would do without it. Word of mouth just isn’t enough anymore. Arguing on here was entertaining but I’d wake up thinking about some jackasses rebuttal and it would stay in my head. I even had someone make a remark about my daughter years ago (who was in my fb profile pic). I googled their name (they had a criminal record just imagine) found their address, screenshot their house and sent it to them on messenger. I told them to circle the window of the bedroom they slept in so I wouldn’t wake everybody else in the house when I came over. They blocked me.

I had no intention of doing such a thing I just needed them to know keyboards aren’t as safe as you think. 20 years ago I was that guy who would have driven up there.

After that ridiculous exchange Ive started responding to online lunacy with “k”. Its genius. People lose their mind. Try it next time your significant other sends you a long text it’s great.

I’ve found I’ve created this image/character that doesn’t really represent me in person. I’m not that raging red faced chef I come across to be. Don’t get me wrong I’ve lost my temper a few times and have made an ass of myself but it was never my persona. In person I’m actually rather reserved and prefer to be left to myself.

When I started my sobriety journey it wasn’t my intention to “influence” on social media and I’ll touch base on my fun poking at influencers in a moment. Sobriety brought the influence out of me. All I do is share intimately what putting that vodka bottle does to me. How it’s changed me. How it feels like my brain is in high definition now. I’d never be writing all this mumbo jumbo blog shit if I was still drinking. It’s 5:30 am. I’d have my head in my hands right now. What a life man.

Sobriety has also mellowed me the fuck out. And maybe my testosterone is hanging by a thread but I’ve been hitting that backspace button more often than not. I try not to attack “foodies” as much, only if they pop off first. Sorry I can’t erase my complete assholeness. Chadcuterie is interesting because I recognize my clientele is 80% women from 30-50 years of age. So I keep it clean and fun. Y’all don’t know how hard that is for me.. all those phallic chubs of salami and no puns to share.

Influencers, it took me a while to get this I guess because I’m old and don’t grasp the whole new world thing sometimes. Also I’m not completely oblivious that I’m referred to one at times too. I don’t do anything for monetary value except for work obviously and they do too. I’m all for working your hump off and using the growing strides of tech and trends. I get it really. I guess the lack of transparency bothers me the most. Or it’s because their tits get more likes than my grazing boards. *see earlier reference on American culture.

Look if you’re good at it then good on you. It’s a return investment for your new puppies. The ones that aren’t good at it are the ones I cringe. The ones that do it just for the followers. I always ask exactly what are you influencing? What’s your pedigree for cosponsoring that toilet paper brand? That big smile for gram has to be exhausting. To put on that face every single day to get likes. Some will hide the like tickers when their posts under perform. We all look at the amount of likes to see how good they are. They aren’t dumb.

It’s the fake engagement I can’t stand. The robots on their pages liking shit to get your attention knowing your post was never even read. Those stupid ass old comments “great post!” “Epic shot!” Gtfo off my page. Following and unfollowing right after you follow back. What a dick move. Be transparent be fucking real and they are not

and that’s my biggest shit with them.

I see them as those giant milkshakes I posted for LTO. I’d post them in all their glory, perfect lighting, all adorned in their delicious accessories. Lauded by all of IG and Facebook. 100 shares, Star of the day! Irrelevant the next day. Any conversation I’d have with my partners about bringing in an influencer would make my toenails itch. We brought in one “foodie influencer” to Habitap and you’d think goddam Elvis was coming back from the dead. They had the perfect table set up for her and the lighting. She was nice don’t get me wrong. Nothing against her personally. All this hoopla and we got a post reading something along the lines of “this pizza rocked my world.” Hey influencer, thanks! Now get the fuck out of here. I don’t acknowledge any food blogger or writer unless they are established or have been in the shit. Hosting for 2 months downside count. I want bloggers with knife scars and fryer burns up to their armpits. Then I’ll listen. And not to sound shitty y’all their are many food bloggers and writers I enjoy up here and respect their accounts. And they don’t allow their opinions hurt who they are writing about.

Don’t DM me with “we have 100k followers and are swinging through town! If you’d like to make us a box we will share it and your brand on IG.”

Me- “Sure! Which box?”

“How about the Ladies Night? We are doing a post on Guuurl Dinner!”

Me- “you bet! It’ll be $30”

“Oh.. well were hoping to collaborate. You give us the box and we give you free advertising!”

Me- “isn’t instagram free already?”

“We’d use our influence on our followers!”

Me- “you live in San Diego and 60% of your followers look like a after credits roll out from a movie in Cambodia”. $30 or get the fuck out of my DMs.”

Also sorry if it appears I’m bullying some of yall. I’m really not. Just judging. It’s not much better I know but I never said I was a fucking role model.

If I’m influencing anything over my business it’s sobriety. I’ll scream on the big stage for that. I’m terrified of public speaking but I wouldn’t hesitate putting a 100 microphones in my mug to shout it out. That’s what influencing would be for me. To assist, to help and give guidance. Not to sash my ass around with a paid photographer up my thong. Dudes, you aren’t any different. Put a fucking shirt on. You’re selling insurance not dick for shit sakes.

Ok, not sure where I went with this. Three days of writing and an entirely different mood each day. I might’ve made a point somewhere in here for the 4 of you that read these things. I think the subject matter started with social media and the faces we put on to sell tickets. Tickets to our businesses, our personal lives because we all post that fake shit too to sell the tickets to the shit shows they are just as fun to watch.

I’m gonna wrap this one up and get ready to go camp. I might post some things to sell some tickets to my adventures.

Lort. First off if and when anyone reads this I’m running off of cliff notes. My career their spanned around ‘93-96 ..I think. If this gives you any indication of my time there. It was a blur. No I’m not referencing how fast time went by it was literally a blur due to my shift into some not so good habits here. Like any of my vocational stories I’ll focus on the beginning, some fun stories in between and the departure. Still friends with a large handful of these folk and I won’t throw anyone under the bus just for a good story. If you ever heard any rumors of some dumbass shit I did during my tenure here chances are it’s true. Some of my habits I formed here took decades to wash off. I’m not in anyway bashing the establishment, I’m friends with Charlie. It’s the system that grabbed ahold of me. If you’re a long time patron or employee there you’ll understand.

‘93ish

I had recently left my serving job at Fatz to move over to the Blockhouse. One of my best high school buddies put in a word for me and I got hired relatively easy. Service industry in the early 90s was a tad different. Hard to believe there were restaurants and bars that you had to know someone on the inside to get a job. Turnover wasn’t nearly as bad as it is now. In comparison that is. I sure as hell dealt with it in that kitchen every single shift but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Andy brought me in to talk to Tina and I was hired on the spot. My only experience with serving had been my one year of calabash and yeast roll slinging at Fatz. I was still somewhat awkward serving due to Fatz had been a write on a ticket, hang the ticket and then let the hostess/cashier take care of the transaction. Blockhouse introduced me to working with a POS and carrying my own bank. Also I was encouraged to not write orders down and memorize them. I was actually quite good with remembering orders before I started going 3 days at a time without sleep. I was still rooming with half the defensive line at Furman, I was single and the Blockhouse seemed like a great fit for me. 23 years of age, I was sheltered from a somewhat unremarkable childhood and at that time still managing to hold on to most of my scruples and morals. At 23 I was a clean cut kid, no tattoos and my only vice was the occasional late night binge and some weed. I’d start smoking a pack of Marlboro daily within the first 6 months. Blockhouse was fairly strict on uniforms at that time. We all had the iconic, heavy polos, khakis for bottom fans white tennis shoes. Converse were not an option. Mondays were casual and we got to wear the Blockhouse branded t-shirts. I had to be clean shaven or goatee, no beards and only one piercing per ear. Yes I had my ears pierced right after high school to thumb my nose at the system.

I’m fairly certain I came in under Charlie’s radar. Most of the servers were female and Charlie preferred it that way. When he saw me for the very first time he asked “Who the hell are you? Do you work here?” I looked down at my blockhouse branded polo and apron and looked back up to see if I missed the joke and Charlie was already on his way to the bar. This literally happened three times in one week. I started to question my existence but my friend Andy had already warned me that “Charlie will take a little while to get used to.” so I just kept my mouth shut and stayed out in the dining room when Charlie was around.

The Blockhouse, in case you’ve been living under a rock for the last 40 years is one of the oldest staples on Augusta road. That irritatingly. narrow ass four lane of constant congestion where Jesus Christ himself doesn’t have the power to widen or hell just add a goddamn turning lane. It has two entrances. both will cause you to stop as soon as you enter to allow your eyes to adjust to the low lighting. The only window you can see out of throughout the entire restaurant is the window that runs along the hallway into the dining room from the front entrance. Every other window is encased in stained glass. It’s fitting. There were nights you wouldn’t want to peek in and see the goings on after closing. It got wild in there. Much more so once I was given a key to the building. You would walk into a smoke filled, low ceiling bar with brick arches low enough to stump a basketball player’s noggin. As you gaze down the bar you’re most likely to come across the same bar regulars sitting in their respective stools that have been occupied by the same jaundice, ridden boomers that have been coming in since the Reagan administration. If one passed another was right behind them to take their stool. Sometimes that legacy is taken over by their children that were most likely graduates from Greenville or JL Mann high school. This is true it’s written in all the scrolls carefully hidden behind all the annual Blockhouse party collages that roam all over the walls of the restaurant. Patty Mize? Was that the short lady that did all of those? Does she still do that shit? On opposite ends of the dining room were intimate privacy booths almost euro bunkerish, that surrounded the room. Lounge that had a giant three seat poker machine that took up half the dining room and probable brought Charlie in more money than the lounge itself. Poker machines were legal at this time. They came with mid 90s and left with Y2K. The back dining room was more spacious, better lighting. The long back booths were usually usually filled with servers rolling silverware or napping. There were two stained window doors that led into a sizeable private room for banquets. The cooks would go in there to watch afternoon tv with the lights off.

You can see the kitchen from the bar if the kitchen doors are left open and I don’t think I’ve ever seen them close. In my era Willy would stand by those doors waiting for all of his bar regular friends to arrive. We’ll get to Willie soon. Willie or Willy, I can’t remember how I spelled his name on the schedule but it should’ve been spelled Will he? for will he show up for work? Don’t worry my man. You get your own chapter.

The heirarchy at the time was Charlie, Cindy the GM/bookkeeper and Tina the FOH manager. Tina was a bundle of energy and upbeat. The way she could familiarize herself with the bar regulars should be written in text. She read the room quite well and at only 20 years of age she managed a handful of hardheaded servers stuck in their ways and all much older than her. She carried herself like she was 30.

Cindy the GM/bookeeper and I got along fairly well. She was a shorter lady full of spunk. Everyone that managed there at the time was full of spunk. Not sure if it was the energy or the cocaine but there was energy to be had there and as a manager the level of anxiousness seemed to thrive in that position. Cindy was the manager that kept me around. Charlie stayed pissed about my gender for about three months until he finally learned my name and accepted me in his restaurant. After awhile once he got past the reality that my white shoes would never be clean enough for him he started warming up to me and after about 6 months I liked him back. We’d make it about 2.5 more years.

The System

This is how I refer to the environment of the service industry. Not the establishments, companies, departments although they do have a bearing on how you are introduced into it. Take for example and the service industry folks will get this, the system and environment you may absorb at a sit down Pizza Hut or Golden Corral is going to be hella different than say Fiddler or Corner Pocket and especially the Blockhouse. There are multiple layers of systems you can fall into in the service industry. Depending on your level of position, tenure and department. Some of you are capable of working your shift, smoke your cigarette while you roll silverware, turn in your paperwork and walk out the door without a second thought. You don’t show your face at work on your day off unless it’s to grab your paycheck and most of the staff have no clue where you live. Others blend in smoothly. Hang out on special occasions, talk and learn about coworkers and their significant others. You’re engaging and will sit at the bar after your shift and have that one decompression cocktail or shift beer and head your way home. These folk slowly build their way up to the ones that get completely absorbed into the environment. That shirt on your back is how people recognize you at grocery stores or late night bars when you don’t bother changing after a double. You work several doubles a week. Work is your life. Hobbies are work and hanging out with work friends. If you aren’t home it’s because you are literally at the ‘House all the time. That’s me. It’s always been me. I absorb my surroundings like a slow soaking sponge. I don’t grasp things quickly. If you show me how to do something I’ll need you to show it to me again. And then maybe again. Even then I’ll just say “got it!” and walk away thinking “I don’t got it”. Somethings you can show me a hundred times and I’ll never get it. If I’m given time to absorb it then I’ll consume myself with it. If you sat me in a room full of astrophysicists for a week I could talk to you like one of them. Carry on a conversation about astrophysics. Don’t get me wrong, I won’t have a fucking clue as to what Im saying but I’ll pick up your mannerisms, verbiage and keywords to fit in with the rest until I know how to at least physically handle an astro. I realize that this makes zero sense the point I’m making is most things I’m not as smart as I may appear. I excel in bullshitting until I figure it out. The service industry was one of the few things that came natural for me and why I excelled in it. I think the only reason why I stuck with it over the years was because I didn’t have to be shown how to do anything more than once. It could also have something to do with I don’t like going out of my comfort zone and I got real comfortable with the chaos of the industry . Unfortunately for me

This side of me also absorbs the energy and atmosphere of a room, establishment and company. It’s why I’ve always been considered a company man. I’m all in once I’m in. It makes for a good employee once you’re patient with me enough to allow me to get into a groove. When I would first try out for sports I was always one day away from getting cut from the team until i got it. I absorbed it. Then I was decemt. My daughter shares this trait. I love watching her start slowly on a team and by then end of the year she’s a completely different athlete. She gets absorbed. Hopefully she learns to pull away when necessary.

That’s my issue. And yes I know that paragraph was quite the tangent but to better explain myself and how my mind attaches itself to things I need for you to understand. I go all in to everything once I’m comfortable with it. It’s not just work. It’s relationships, friendships, lifestyles, current events, hobbies etc. Once I embrace it I don’t know how to quit it. It usually takes something substantial to pull me away or I become some consumed it pulls itself away from me. No that’s not meant be stalkerish. I just don’t shed things very well. It’s the whole “all eggs in one basket” theme for me over and over.

Blockhouse brought me into the trenches of the system. My sleeping habits flipped. That is when I did sleep. All it took was a bar regular pissing in the urinal next to me offered me a toot for my first taste of cocaine.

I’m definitely not a good cocaine person if there’s even such a thing. I still get accusations of being on cocaine to this day. Nope, haven’t done it since I was 25. This is just how I’m wired and why people like me should never do cocaine. Bi-polar goes quad-polar. Just a brief example because I’m not here to glorify eras of my shitty behavior. I don’t dance. Like I’ll leave if someone tries to get me to. One evening I danced for two straight hours during a Doors cover band at Henni’s late night. I was literally the only person there dancing. I don’t remember any of this but my coworkers were nice enough to watch me make an ass of myself the entire night.

A couple of years later I’d have a doctor recommend that I stop the cocaine or die. So I took his wisdom to heart. Go big or go home.. I finally went home on this one.

Late night was the theme early 90s. Private bars would stay open until daylight and if they pushed you out well hell Blockhouse was right down the road and I had brass access. During that era I was banned from Casablanca’s no less than four times. Encouraged at least three bar brawls (one I managed to get a large portion of my furman football roommates involved) *banned

Shoved a bouncer’s head through the little front door window *banned

Punched my fist through same door 3 months or so later *banned

There was another instance I just happened to be present and they thought I was involved. I retain my innocence to this day.. Casa B’s had terrible turnover I’d just wait a few weeks and there would be a new crew and the internet wasn’t around to bash me like the hotdog water kid. Iykyk

This wasn’t my behavior all the time. I was just feeling out the crowd.

Was asked to leave Blue Ridge for head butting some guy. No clue as to who he was and tried to break a glass over an obnoxious bartender’s head.

Got banned from Boardwalk/Henni’s Late Night for trying to steal a surfboard off the wall. It was tied up too tight so I was using my lighter to burn the rope holding it up. .

I behaved myself at Gargoyles. I loved that spot. Crocs, I don’t recall anything bad happening there..

Some nights we’d get high and climb up the second floor of the old Poinsett hotel, kick in the blocked up windows and explore. Sit on top of the tower next to the air raid siren and watch the stars. That was actually pretty amazing. Coming back down from there, on all levels, not so much.

That late night “system” doesn’t mix well with me. I became a morning person over time to save my life.

I served for a bit and Cindy, the GM asked me about becoming a key and I said sure, why not? I had some management experience from my Hyatt days, buck an hour raise to do a server schedule ain’t shit but I was team ‘House by this time. I was one with the system and I didn’t have shit to do anyway. Hobbies aren’t important when you’re buzzing like a hornet 20 hours out of the day. The week I was promoted by Cindy she was fired for embezzlement.

I enjoyed bartending there except for Mondays where I would only shuck oysters for 8 hours and pass the Bud light down to Bruce or Mike. Hard to shuck when your hands won’t stay still. I’ll admit I wasn’t the best bartender to ever tend at the ‘House. I did not engage with most of the bar regulars. Well, I kinda hated half of them. The Blockhouse had some characters in the 90s. I got there when the bar wall was littered with open tabs for weeks and weeks. I’m willing to bet there were in the upwards of around $6k in open tabs at one time. One person that always seemed to have one was Sam. Sam was a red-faced self entitled twit that never worked and would write checks from his mother’s checkbook to pay his tab. He was at least 40 years of age but looked much older. His thick glasses were always sitting crooked over his little nose and beady eyes. His face, beet red from his lifestyle choices. I didn’t like this man and he in return didn’t like me. One day I suppose he grabbed a check from the wrong book and it bounced. So I hung it up behind the bar and wrote “Do not accept checks from Sam’s mommy.”

This sent Sam into a fury. It took a 5 foot tall Willy holding him back to keep us from fighting. I had no intention of fighting Sam, it would’ve been like breaking a beer bottle over a pillow. When Charlie found out we had a brief discussion about “you sure this is the right fit for you?” But with Charlie it was probably closer to “don’t do that shit again Chad.” Not all the bar regulars were terrible obviously. I’m still friends with a few and Randall, who I met from there is one of my inspirations for going sober and was the first person I reached out to when I had considered buying a food truck.

I had a good gig going there aside from the extra curricular activities.

During the slow times I’d hop on the kitchen line and cook my own orders. Usually it was because Willy was nowhere to be found or Moe was making one of his soups. I enjoyed cooking for a bit. I had no intention of actually working in the kitchen. I worked a few shifts on pantry when needed. Slow lunch days servers made their own salads and desserts anyway. I remember mostly Moe and Willy. Moe and I got along fairly well and I’d watch him make his soups and learn his techniques. He’d hold back some ingredients when I watched and would add them when I wasn’t looking so I couldn’t copy his recipes. After awhile I’d figure them out. Moe’s she-crab and potato soup to this day are the best I’ve ever had. (The gumbo is not traditional gumbo sorry y’all) I watched him make them on several occasions and still can’t get them the same which means he managed to hide a few key ingredients from me one being a tablespoon of ham base I would later find out. There was Tony who worked fry. I believe his brother or cousin was the poor kid that was held down by a few police officers and died by asphyxiation a while ago at the detention center. He had also worked there for a bit. There was little Ronnie that worked pantry who always called me Richard because the Micros printer printed my name as R. Chad (my first name is actually Roland) and G-man who I thoroughly enjoyed as a human would come in to make the turtle pies. His were always unblemished. Perfectly smooth. G-man always talked about his nephew. He was going to be the greatest basketball player that ever played the game. He was only in tenth grade and they were already talking about he would go first round. G-man had a flair for some good stories so I took it with a grain of salt. The “g” in G-man stood for his last name Garnett. His real name was Robert. Robert Garnett. You might’ve heard of his nephew, Kevin. He ended up being a decent basketball player after all..

Curtis was my dishwasher for a few years. He still washes dishes downtown. He would get mad when I took his beer away from him in the dish pit. “I paid for it it’s mine!” It didn’t occur to him that drinking at work was frowned upon.

About this time Brian started working there. I think he’s still there to this day. I tried to lure him to Arizona and later Southern. That’s how much I thought of this kid. I say kid but he’s probably 46 years old now. Quiet unassuming kid. Long hair, skinny but started a savings portfolio at the age of 18 while washing dishes. I loved that guy. The world needs more of him.

One day the KM at the time decided to call in sick and play some golf instead. He was like that sometimes and I guess he played one too many holes because Charlie fired him.

I was placed into his KM role without so much of a notion of thought or planning . Charlie didn’t promote me he drafted me. Not like the NFL draft either. More like Vietnam.

The Blockhouse became my first KM job. By this time I could cook just about anything on the menu at a slow, SLOW pace and I had zero grasp on the financial aspect. It was never shown to me. I’d sit in financial meetings with Dawn and Charlie and he’d let me know that food cost was sky high

Me -“Charlie I have no idea what food cost is.”

Charlie – “it’s the money you spend on food purchases.

Me- “.. I don’t get it. I’m buying food and people are eating it at the prices you printed on the menu. So why is it high?”

Charlie “Do you not know how to do your job?”

Me- “obviously I don’t.”

I’m good at playing dumb. It comes natural I guess. What I told Charlie was his buddy at Bigger Bros was padding my orders to get his quota in. Charlie knew this and told me not to worry about it. I also told him Willy was feeding half his family out the back door and the kitchen staff was eating prime rib like they were at the Golden Corral. Charlie was also aware of this. I still didn’t know how to do my job.

He wasn’t wrong though. I was a terrible KM. I had no set of kitchen skills, could barely work a slicer much less a grill. I learned from the hip. I watched Willy and Moe. It took me years to lose some of the bad habits I got from watching some of those guys. I didn’t know right from wrong as far as the kitchen “rules of conduct”.

The kitchen rarely observed me as their KM. Willy did his own thing and Moe would tell me he didn’t take orders from “crackers younger than him”. My era of never having kitchen staff began. This seems to have been the bane of my existence. My kitchen staff, when you take away Moe and Willy were usually drunks that lived in shelters or halfway houses. One of them, his name was Bo, resembled John Amos from Good Times. Big guy who was on work release. As long as he kept his job he wouldn’t go back to jail. He would relay this to me on a daily basis while his eyes widened like I was going to call his parole officer at anytime to come pick his scary ass up. I’m not usually scared of humans but this guy had me. He would jokingly say if I ever fired him he’d stuff me in the smoker outside and cook my white ass. That’s some solid job security.

One day Charlie came in and said “Bo! You’re out. Get the fuck out of my restaurant.” Charlie would do this from time to time with my kitchen staff. There were no memos, emails or staff meetings to discuss personnel. I rarely fired anyone. Charlie made that easy on me I suppose. Who does Bo turn to with his crazy ass John Amos eyes blazing? Yours truly.

I took a gun to work everyday for 4 month after that.

Willy

Ok. Let me say this. I loved Willy. He was charismatic. He was fun to work with at times. He knew that kitchen better than anyone. And he treated his mama well. That carries a lot of weight with me. Charlie for all of his huff and puff sometimes treated Willy like his stepchild. He was loyal to Willy to a fault. They’d fight like family sometimes and you’d think to yourself “this is it! Charlie is about to fire Willy!”

Nope

Willy was a handful. When he’d get pissed at me he wouldn’t show up for the one shift we didn’t work together just to make me work on my day off. This wasn’t paranoia he would tell me this if I got into his ass. “I’m callin’ in tomorrow Chad fuck you!” We had some good exchanges. There were a few occasions I had to pick his ass up and walk him outside to keep from beating his ass. Yeah he was a character. He’d deal outside with the bar regulars on the back dock during the dinner rush while tickets were running 30 minutes. Even had one of the bar regulars come in the kitchen and yell at me because Willy served him cold prime rib. He was literally talking to Willy for 20 minutes outside while his plate sat under the heat lamp. He slammed the prime rib plate on my finger at expo. I missed his head with the slab of beef by about three inches. I may have missed but the back splatter from the meat hitting the wall next to his face didn’t. Words were exchanged. Willy saved him.

I literally caught him (Willy) and his brother smoking crack on the back dock. Both were working for me at the time. I was told to not worry about it. Great!

The first rule for the bartenders were they were not allowed to leave the beer cooler unlocked because Willy would get drunk. I was present for quite a few of these. He’d stand by the bar walk-in shoveling beers out and sliding down to his friends out the back door. Sometimes one of his bar regular friends would sneak him a beer or 5. You can throw the whole fucking shift away after one of those nights. Willy’s primal scream was “TA DOW!” when he’d get excited. You could hear it across the restaurant. Or the other one “FUCK YOU CHAD!”. When clean, if he ever was, Willy could cook. He actually could’ve been a great cook in another life. This life had already taken over Willy for good.

Willy had a good heart when it wasn’t dredged with alcohol and god knows what else. He was a charismatic little shit when he wanted to be. I don’t have that soft spot Charlie had for him though. I loved Willy like everyone else. There was never a boring day with him there unless he was hungover and quiet but if I had to do it all over again? Nah.

I got a text a few years ago from a number I didn’t recognize letting me know Willy had passed away from cancer. It took it way harder than I thought I would.

Moe and I got along much better. We had our head clanks every once in a while but I’ll give credit where credit is due, I learned quite a bit of technics from watching Moe. I picked up many of his cooking procedures because I was raw as shit in the kitchen. I absorbed Moe’s cooking instincts and some of his palate. Moe has an amazing palate. Or at least did. My cooking style is fairly unorthodox to any classic style. I’m a kitchen mutt. I absorbed what worked best for me.

Moe was the biggest influence on my cooking style. There’s a lot of soul in my food because of him. Take that as you will. Moe will always have a plate at my table anytime.

I lasted about a year in that kitchen. I made a good line cook, I was doing enough extracurricular things off of work to wear it like a badge of honor. I finally told Charlie I had enough and went back to serving. Charlie brought in an old employee of his from Harper’s named Yogi to run the kitchen.

Yogi was an odd cat but he was organized and had his shit together. I learned some techniques watching him run the kitchen. I had never worked with a real KM before. I come from a long system of KMs (kitchen managers) before everyone started labeling themselves as chefs. While I can respect both, KMs have always been easier to work with and are much better with balancing administrative and creativity. Sorry to some of my chef friends, no offense but the more talented the chef I’ve come across the less money my bank account have at the end of the month.

Yogi was talented and respected. I wish I had spent more time in the kitchen when he was hired. I might’ve fixed some of the bad habits I’ve picked up over the years. He was sober which seemed an impossibility in that environment.

He came to apply for prep at Southern right after we opened. I hadn’t seen him in 20 years. I ran up to say hey and he didn’t recognize me. Yogi wasn’t sober anymore. He was in fact drunk at 10am. It made a little sense to me then why I never saw him drink at the Blockhouse. That’s a lot of talent in that bottle. Yogi I hope you’re still fighting and winning some of it my man.

I write these like my daughter will them some day. Definitely not now but in a few years. Some stories will always stay in my head. Some are rough and probably shaved a few months off my life from absorbing dumb shit I should’ve never done. I’ve orated a few of these to some good friends. Others I think I might’ve only dreamt them. Hard to tell the difference some days.

I do recall a bachelorette party in the banquet room that got a little rowdy. By rowdy I mean 20 screaming women, a stripper named Caleb hanging out like an Evian bottle and then an orgy proceeded while I served oysters and wings to the party. All they asked was I didn’t leave the door open in between cocktail rounds. It was a week day for fuck sake. Something tells me that marriage didn’t last very long. If anyone complained about hair in their food for the next month all I could do was smirk and I’d want to say “let me tell you what happened in that chair two weeks ago.

See?

Even this story may get removed.. and that’s a just a 5 out of 10 for my experience at the Blockhouse.

Blockhouse brought out the ego in me. It didn’t turn me into a terrible person but my habits that I developed during my time here sure as hell did. If I could erase any era of my persona it would be during this time. I was reckless, selfish, drunk, fucked. It brought out my demons. My wiring got all absorbed into that system. You wouldn’t believe how long it’s taken me to shake off those demons from almost 30 years ago and a lot of them still live in me. It’s almost cancerous. I lived somewhat a sheltered life growing up. Sure I had my drunk days like some young adults, went to some parties, stayed up all night to keep the high going. But this was every single day for over 2 years. It took a toll on me.

My relationship with Charlie sort of deteriorated over time. It came to a head one night while at a party at his house. Drinking went wrong and we had a falling out. A very public one. Some things were said and well it was time to go. I left my key on his desk and we had a short professional phone chat. It was a good decision for both of us.

I still enjoy the Blockhouse, grab dinner there as often as I can when I’m on that side of town. Love to say hi to Charlie when I hear him running around. He even brought one of his sons to come work for me at Southern a while back. I take that as a solid sign of respect. I still see the same faces at the bar they’re just a little yellower now, many have passed. I made some solid friends working there with Tina, Bruce, Mike, Holly, Terry, Angel, David, Randall, Cindy, Christie, Andrea and quite a few more.

Nothing but love for the ‘House. It might’ve taken off a few years of my life but many lessons were learned. Would I do it all over again? Hell no but life’s an adventure sometimes and I can definitely say I absorbed quite a bit from that time. It gave me some primal energy for the hard times.

Wilbur burger will always be in my heart.

A forehead kiss from a 14 year old

Feels so much better when it’s not poisoned from the night before

Your other’s smile is bigger

When you’re smiling back

I find myself doing this more

Sometimes I’m embarrassed because of how big it is

I feel silly and it makes it even worse (better)

Watching my family smile at me

Is my biggest reward

I could live next to a distillery

And all I would see is their smile

It’s all for them and it always has

Just took a reckoning

Now everyday feels like a slice

Not the golf kind I’ve always been a cake guy

Heavenly are what my soles feel when I walk

Whatever guiding hand flipped her for me

Thank you

I am a student of observing people’s behavior. What makes them tick, laugh, cry, angry. I’ve met, worked and mingled with literally hundreds of individuals that have their own special quirks, habits, personalities, faults, gifts, addictions, anxieties and so on. You build up quite the card catalog of personality references over 30 years in the service industry. With high volume turnover you may only get a brief glimpse of some of these characters. Some may come through like a hot plate on a pass and others stick around like sharpie graffiti in a dive bar bathroom. I’ve been knee deep with service industry peers for my entire career. Even after parting ways with my old company I still find myself surrounded by this menagerie of dramatis personae so to speak. The brewery had them and the meadery folk I rub elbows with also fall into that category. The spectrum of personalities has no limit in the service industry. You may awkwardly walk into a new building, new concept, new vibe with new faces and background but after a brief time we all start speaking the same language. We all have one thing in common. We embrace or at least try to control the chaos.

These are my people.

We operate under pressure better than most. Some of us embrace it and ride it like a solid west coast wave while others tether along on an inner tube and hope to god the line doesn’t break. The service industry brings these types of personalities together, corrals them into efficient herds of hospitality driven, worker bees, buzzing with high volume stress and the quest for consistency. The ones on the surfboard are the lifers. The others keeping their heads above the surf are the brief glimpses of holiday season help and part timers. Often times they get a taste of service industry and think “nope” I’m good while others are fortunate enough to leave their apron at work or in the trunk of their car when they get home. Some of us forget to take it off and find ourselves, sitting on the couch, eating Taco Bell drive thru at 1am with our apron still on, sharpie behind our ear and probably a discarded nylon glove in our pocket. That apron becomes your security blanket. The weight on your body feels disproportionate when it’s not tied tight around your waist. Somedays it feels heavier. I’m writing a fairly complex essay on lifers that will touch base more on this subject. This may actually fill in as a chapter.

I’ve met so many different personalities over the years through hiring and training. Hundreds of orientations, interviews and exits. After a hundred dozen of these or so I could tell you within 5 minutes of conversation whether or not if this individual would still be employed by me within the next 4 months.

I didn’t ask the standard questions like “what motivates you?

“Why do you think you would be an asset to this company?”

“How did you hear about us?”

“What are you key attributes?”

My first question was always-

“What prompted you to want/get into the restaurant business?”

I’d get two reactions. One would be an eyebrow raise and a look of surprise like “wait? I’m actually just here for a job! I’m passing through until I find my real job.”

The other would offer a wince and a smile, lean back and say “let me tell what happened.”

Majority of the time the passing throughs did just that. The service industry vocation was chosen as a quick way to make some cash until you paid that last car note or you’re trying to pad some income for an upcoming purchase or vacation. Occasionally from that majority a few may slip through the cracks and find their home in the service industry. They’ll embrace it. It will adopt them through proxy.

I am one of those people.

The others have already been baptized into the chaos. They might’ve washed dishes or bar backed in their teens. Hosted part time in high school or bussed tables just to have some extra cash to spend or pay for the senior week beach trip. And then 10 years later they’re out back on the loading dock, chugging a blueberry Redbull, smoking a camel wide and asking if the new hostess really has chlamydia or is it just a rumor because the pantry cook is trying to ask her out.

Wiring

We are all wired differently. We have our own circuit boards that relay experiences, emotions, trauma and stress differently. Hard to categorize it would be like categorizing snowflakes. The actual wet cold ones not the ones on social media. It’s our hard wiring that makes us truly unique. It’s how we find our tribe, our friends, ourselves. I’m not referring to enneagrams, astrology or gatorade moons although if that is your thing I’m sure there may be a common denominator. I’m basing my philosophy and perspective 100%, on organic, first hand experience.

I have a few groups of friends I have maintained over the decades – the ones I’ve made working inside the annals of the service industry and all the others. Both groups are filled with amazing humans and personalities that I would give my dominant arm to assist in any situation. My oldest dearest friends I grew up with. Some amazing people I’ve met through my hobbies and social interactions or creating activities online with friends I’ve never met before until social media came about and we hit it off online. We all have some of these friends. You get to know them online, you see their posts when their genuine and you discover your wires cross quite frequently. You engage with them online, randomly run into into each other out in public and next thing you know you’re laughing your asses off over coffee.

Your lifelong friends have had years to adjust to your wiring. They’ve seen you at your worst. They know how you react to certain situations. They may not share the same hard wiring as you but they understand your electrical current. In return you understand theirs through years of intimate exposure and experiences. You know their pressure points and principles. Their quirks, scruples, morals. Sometimes you choose these friends because of these. They are the ying to your yang. The p to your j sandwich. Your wires have crossed overtime, your positives and negatives vibe well. These peeps are an integral part of your life.

My service friends I have made over the years probably compound the other two in sheer numbers. Some of the friendships aren’t as close as my lifelong friends but we’ve built a bond over working in the trenches together during the rushes, abrasive environments of high volume and the constant awareness of controlling the chaos that ensues. That’s what the service industry is. Maintaining hospitality, comfort and consistency in a war zone. Keeping your game face on while your ears are ringing at the table your specializing. You’ve have to piss for an hour but every time you try to pull yourself off the grill the expo printer spews 12 more tickets. A grill unmanned for 2 minutes can fuck up the whole momentum of the chaos building up. I’ve watched grill cooks hiding their sickness on the line because they couldn’t afford to miss a day of work. They’d pull an empty sani bucket on the line and use it to throw up in when no one was looking. There are no savings accounts in the service industry. No money stashed away for a rainy day every fucking day is a rainy day financially. Everyone has roommates out of survival. If you’re lucky you found a significant other to bunk with. That’s about the only benefits that will occur in the industry.

You bond from sharing the chaos. Your shared sections are your foxholes, the kitchen line are the trenches. When the work is done we all sit down together and discuss the chaos. We have to get it off our chests. The half hour of long ticket times, the campers, Karens, militant managers and shitty tippers. That’s how we put the chaos to sleep at night. For lifers your shift doesn’t end after you roll silverware or mop the dish area. It continues in our favorite barstool, hole in the wall or your rotating apartments to party in. Most of us are communed in the same apartment compounds due to geography and affordability. Great for carpooling the ones with multiple DUIs and can no longer drive for the unseen future. Every restaurant has at least two or three of these.

After the chaos we sit, open our favorite poison and discuss. Its therapy.

Its our therapy.

The first hour of conversation will always be about work. Scattering the chaos out of our souls so we can sleep. That’s were the bonding starts. You share your work trauma experiences with your coworkers. Your foxhole stories we all have them and love to hear about the others so we don’t feel alone. Alcohol has a way of bonding people together after a shithole night. After a few drinks we are all on the same wavelength, same pedestal. Managers are comrades and dishwashers can comfort your post work anxiety once that third or fourth round hits. Once the numbness takes over you don’t hurt anymore. You know it’ll all be waiting for you once you hear that alarm clock in the morning. That’s why you’re already focusing on that cozy barstool before you get out of bed.

We shed and share a lot of things when we have these moments. It’s our therapist sofa. Enough late nights in our little herds and we will bare everything to each other. We become family.

This bonding is necessary when that high volume shit hits the fan. There’s no place for singularity or selfishness. The whole team carries the restaurant or the whole team sinks with the ship. The alignment from hostess all the way to general manager has to be balanced and well executed. You want 400 butts in and 400 hundred butts out happy, fed and full. Anything less is a failure.

Lifers as I call us usually come from broken homes or families. Some come from backgrounds of childhood abuse physical and or sexual. Some have anxieties and other mental disorders and find their havens here. Others have been spit out of the system of halfway homes, rehabs and even sleeping in the streets. We take them all in. Race, creed color religion all get put on the back burner here we just want a crew of caring, hard workers. Often times they are spurned from home and use the service industry as a quick fix for income. Restaurants are always hiring and firing. There’s good money to be made if you hustle. If you stick around long enough there’s always a new ladder to climb with a 10% raise as your carrot. You can make a solid income in the service industry. I have managed it for years but it takes it’s toll on your body. The vocational part aside the after work environment is just as debilitating. After a 12 hour shift we may prolong our evenings another 6 hours of drinking and whatever else it takes to melt the pain away. Morning shift be damned we have to medicate first. We bond through the pain, the $15 lunch shifts and the Friday night campers that left 10% at your best table. We cover the griller’s back when he needs nicotine and a piss, we bail out the dishwasher if he bogs. If he goes down we all do.

Service industry lifers are the land of misfit toys. School didn’t work out for us or our degree went to shit. Desk jobs make us want to pull our short hairs out but we yearn for that comfort zone and soft happy feet that comes with it after years of athletes foot, fucked up arches from wearing shitty shoes because you didn’t want to ruin that one good pair you own.

We go home every night smelling like the food your company represents. Sushi restaurants you go home smelling like hibachi, smokehouses destroy your sense of smell for most of the day and you can still smell the smoke on your chef coat after you wash it, Southern I’d go home smelling like a KFC chicken bucket.

The scariest part for me had always been the afterlife. No this isn’t theological what I’m referring to is life after the lifer life. The older you get the less is available for you. Service Industry is youthful and energetic. It’ll hold you at maturation peak of your 20’s full time. That part of the system was the hardest for me to shake. My maturity never evolved after so many years of the industry. Yes I had to behave differently as a manager and then owner but that environment makes you different.

Simple example, place a lifer manager who’s 50 next to a bank manager who’s the same age side by side and have a conversation with both. They’ll look different, they’ll act completely different. They’ve both been chiseled from two completely different stones.

No one wants to be a grill cook in their 60s. Sure if it’s your place, family owned diner and your dad did it, you’re doing it and your son rest next you is along for the legacy ride but if someone else is signing your paychecks it’s different. You don’t see 65 year old men grilling on a Saturday night that often for a reason. You’ll come across the occasional unicorn bartender that’s been at the same place for 30 years but if that place closes down he won’t find another gig that even comes close. As a manager you eyeball the older generation and ask yourself “can they handle a bar that’s three deep?” “How long can they hold up in a 110° kitchen?”

Like a forgotten toy you get cast out of the industry. It’s nothing personal. Just like old milk in the back of the fridge your time expires. Yes there’s some strong loyalty in this industry but all it takes is a hard night of comps because you’ve gotten too slow.

It’s time to make that break. At the end of the day it’s still business. It’s still capitalism.

At my age I’m starting to see some of my old colleagues struggle. Lifers aren’t there for life just the juicy parts. Where do you go when your milk has expired? You don’t think about that in your 20s and 30s. You start sweating it on your 40s. One day you may find yourself spit out. Your body is broken, your mind is mush from all the extra curricular activities that you still crave. Your social circle is broken. You haven’t been outcasted. Like I said, you expire. There’s no date on your arm to reference. Its like retiring from a sport. You wake up one day and realize your body can’t handle it anymore. Your mental health echos the same.

Downside is there’s no fantasy island to sail off to. Alot of my old service friends are living alone in tiny duplexes starting their lives over and not in a comfortable way. They are having to learn new trades or working those jobs they tried to avoid for years but had to make amends. Some went retail, grocery store clerks, office jobs if ther had admin skills. Some went to restaurants that they’d never dream of working in but now they are left with no choice. Others have disappeared or passed too early from decades of hard living. A few others took it upon themselves to retire eternally. God I want to hug all of those. That’s how hard it is for some to let it go. Like Brooks Hatlen from Shawshank when we was released after spending so many years in the system. He had nowhere to go and lacked the skills to fit in. He’s life and family came from the system he was thrown in. When it’s gone some of us have nothing left. Maintaining a happy family life in this industry is hard. Mine was saved from my abrupt departure. I’d go out on a limb and say my life was saved as well.

My intention when I had succumbed to that lifer life was to embrace it, control it, win with it and retire from it. I got two out of four. I wasn’t anywhere near the top but by god I came close but to mo avail and no cigar.

I found myself at the doorstep of 50 years of age looking down the barrel of irrelevance and becoming a museum relic. Opening another restaurant would’ve destroyed me mentally and physically. I lost the desire and my confidence. I still had all the tools of my trade in solid shape but my mind was rejecting all of it. There was no way I could go from where I was to going back to being a line cook, bartender, even a GM. I hadn’t been a GM since I was in my late 30s. When I left my old company I was in the top 5 of hundreds of employees. I pretty much managed myself. The thought of moving backwards at 50 gave me chills of the shitty kind. It takes momentum to reinvent yourself, it takes time and takes a long path of rewiring. I had done it once already in my mid 30s.

A different kind of reckoning.

I don’t use the word luck that often but I was lucky to recognize little signs in my path and journey that resonated with what I had to do.

I had a long talk with myself and recognized that my life in the service industry was over. I had a big reckoning with my ego along side of my liver and brain. The ego lost that fight. Hard one to swallow. To tell yourself that being a multiple level restauranteur dream you had for years was over. Not because I would never have the opportunity again but because I lived that dream and journey and become repulsed by it.

I had been hardwired into that system for so long I became the system. I had no life the industry was my life. My actions, my mental wiring were those of someone that lacked maturity on multiple levels. It was no one’s fault but my own. This isn’t to declare universally that everyone succumbs to this in the industry. I had and I’m the author of my own perspective.

Intimately.

It took a great deal of effort for me to change that intimate perspective. I knew I couldn’t leave the entire service industry. A desk job would put me in a straight jacket. I had to rewire my approach. I had to dig my nails into what broke me.

High volume- man this was my jam my mantra. I used to get off on high volume. My energy level spiked like a quarterback on Super Bowl Sunday. My restaurants couldn’t be too busy for me. I wanted record numbers every fucking year. Not due to financial aspect I was in perpetual competition with myself. And I pushed my staff to beat that fucking guy every year. I could be hard to work with at times due to my drive. I expected everyone to sacrifice themselves as I had. That energy shit the bed when Covid hit. All it took was a break from the service matrix. I created chadcuterie to control my volume. When I get tired or agitated I close up my orders. If I need a few consecutive days off I close my kitchen. Even as a I prepare to expand slightly that will remain the same. I’m no longer chasing Chad from last year.

Staffing- every day I waited by my phone to see which restaurant needed me the most. My day off didn’t exist unless I closed all restaurants for one day and that’s exactly what the fuck I had to do. All restaurants eventually closed on Mondays but that day usually ended up used for meetings. I loved all of my staff. Many of them were like family to me and then some.

But

Being a dad to 100 employees wore me down. I got too attached. I did my best to help them financially, counsel them, hug them if they were going through hard times.

When I’d lose good ones to other jobs it felt like a child leaving the nest. If one passed away it was like losing a sibling. Laying off 83 of them during covid took my heart. I hugged as many as I could and 80 of them came back. That says something about my company.

At the time.

The hub of my staff made my world easy. It was the outer banks of staff, the unreliable ones that came and went that beat me down. I still love all of my work family like we never parted ways. I know I’ll need employees soon but my set up is going to be wired to work with just me and others if needed. Not the other way around.

Financially the bigger we grew the more baggage we had to bring with us everywhere. Three restaurants we created a little restaurant group. It wasn’t even necessarily but looked cool on paper. We opened an office. Created a COO position, extra accountants, more professionals to be paid at our disposal. Our dreams were out growing our checking account.

When we split I wanted to burn all my excess baggage. I was busting my ass for luxurious luggage with nowhere to go to enjoy it. I’ve rewired my business plan into a damn shrink a dink. I maintain all my operations with my wife. I write a lot less checks nowadays.

Pursuit of happiness- my life, my family now comes first. I may take a hit financially from some of the decisions that revolve around that but I no longer care. The past three years alone have been a different life for me. My bond to my family has been cemented. Which has compounded my rewiring for the sake of good. No more war zones at work or at home. I’ve found peace through my deliberate rewiring, lifestyle changes and deflation of my toxic ego.

Also deliberately it exactly how I’m approaching Grazeland. I’m taking my time. And I the business will evolve around me not your other way around. A lot of passion will be involved. It has to reflect that but it’ll take a backseat to my mental health and relationship with my family.

Even though I have a large foot out of the service profession I’m still involved. I making it revolve around me. Not the opposite.

I’ll always be a lifer. By profession and by choice. I’ve mad a better choice of rewiring the chaos instead of containing it, not embracing it. Keeping it at bay, arms length away at all times.

When I open Graze I hope that’s it. I know that may sound odd but I don’t have any interest in building an empire. My rewiring is focused on my legacy as a dad, hubby and individual.

Yes I wish and hope for success but my head is much more level now.

I’m keeping that old lifer unplugged for good.

I meditate for 15 minutes before bed every night. I have these ridiculous goggles I put over my head that massage my temples, plays some barely audible spa musak. I mostly listen to the gyrations of the little electric gears compressing and humming on my face. Aesthetically I look like an idiot. Mentally I’m at so much peace that aesthetics < mental health.

I can somewhat self hypnotize myself when I get locked into a memory mode. I can pick and choose a certain era in my adolescence and or childhood, slow my breathing down and I’m there. I will float along these memory lanes and lie in my bed with a giant smile on my face, sometimes there will be tears of joy running along the sides of the goggles from an old memory usually involving my mother, father or my 100 siblings that used our family homes as revolving door hotels.

Our old home in Piedmont on 86 was my base from 8 to 18. 17 actually is when I first moved out but I came back briefly before I moved to Colorado for a few. I too used that home as a revolving door at times. In between breakups and DUIs mom and my stepfather Tom always welcomed the kids home when they broke. We’d come back home to heal and once we felt it was safe to go back out we did. Sometimes without saying goodbye, other times with a boot in our ass when we wore out our welcome. This was my home. I have the most memories from that old bungalow.

In the early years most older homes like these didn’t have central air conditioning or a furnace. It wasn’t unusual to sleep on top of the covers without turning down your quilt. We had quilts, usually handmade to sleep on. No comforters, duvets, high sheet thread counts or any of that fancy shit. Cold winter nights you got two of em. Or a throw blanket that someone got for Christmas. Summer nights we’d sleep with the windows open. If I was lucky I’d have a box fan to pull some of the cooler muggy night air into my room. Fans were louder then. Not in a good way. They were heavier with metal and would shake and clatter as opposed to hum. The blade for some reason would work its way closer and closer to the fan guard and one occasion would clip the fan. Just enough to never allow you to relax. Almost like a smoke detector with a weak battery. I’ve always said Gen X started the sleeping with the fan of phase out of necessity and passed it down. I’m not sure if I slept fine during the hot summer months due to acclimation or to the hot southern nights. The first summer I didnt have a fan. I could hear the old peacocks crooning a quarter mile down the road at the old Agnew house. When I first heard them I used to think it was a young girl crying for help.

Usually the air was tolerable by the time I went to bed. I recall many a daytime of reading on our old sectional and when I’d get up my shirt would be stuck to my back. I can’t see my daughter enjoying a home in August without central air. Somehow I managed.

Winters would be heated with an old gas stove that sat in our hallway of the house. This thing was about the size of a semi engine block. It took up 50% of the hallway. Wasn’t much of a hallway, it was a small square shaped room that functioned as the hub of the home. Small, windowless with 4 doors on each side. With the doors open you could do a little 360° curtsy and tour the whole home. Parent’s bedroom on the left, 7×7 bathroom straight ahead, my bedroom (mostly) on the right and the living room/great room/kitchen is sitting right behind you. To make the hallway even smaller my mother would put a little vanity table across with a mirrorfrom that heating engine block. It was the backup bathroom vanity. It was needed because at times with all the chickens came home to roost (my siblings) that one little bathroom would get congested. Sisters would yell at you when they were running behind and needed to blow dry their hair and you’re trying to finish the newest comic book release of the X-Men (they were fighting the Brood at the time, it was intense) while doing your business on the only squatting piece of porcelain in the house. No interior doors locked in this house. Privacy was a dare.

My brothers would always fuck with me and walk in the bathroom when I was doing my business and I hated it. They’d turn to leave and carefully leave the door open just wide enough for it slowly open on its own. It was like a Perfection timer ticking slowly until my bare ass popped off the toilet to close it before anyone could see me. It didn’t help that you could see the bathroom toilet as soon as you walked in the house.

Thanks bungalow architecture.

That little joke stuck with me over the years. I won’t use the public toilet if there isnt a stall. I don’t care if the door has a lock. I won’t go.

That little makeshift vanity would be cluttered with varied hair brushes., The brothers all shared one, sisters all had their individual, personalized brushes that rolled, frizzed and picked at their humongous 80’s hairsprayed ‘dos. Vidal Sassoon mouses, sprays, conditioners, moisturizers cans splayed around the top of the counter like they were knocked over by a bean bag at the fair. During holidays or untimely divorces you have up to 8 of us in that house at one time. Neither my mother or Tom drank which surprised me considering the shit we could put those poor folk through. If the population got too big for two bedrooms we went to bungalow 3.0 which meant turning the mud room into a bedroom. Cold ass concrete floor with old chipped black and white tile. Coldest and hottest room in the house. It wasn’t insulated I guess that’s why it was a mud room. Didn’t need a fan for background noise. Behind the wall of the bed was our laundry room. I never walked in that room when the washer or dryer wasn’t running. If we all convened at the same time which we did one winter we’d pull the old camper from the back yard and hook an extension cord up to the house. My brothers and I would stay in that little camper. I got the little loft bunk. We’d sleep with a little space heater that wouldn’t heat more than 12 square feet of that camper. I would shiver all night regardless of how many homemade quilts you stacked on top of me.

School mornings my mom would drag my ass out of bed on cold winter mornings and I’d walk out with my quilt and lay down in front of the furnace to warm up. Peggy would always fix me pillsbury cinnamon rolls for breakfast and we’d eat the whole damn tube. My wife buys them for thanksgiving and Christmas morning and when I smell them it immediately takes me to that warm little pad in front of the heater in Piedmont and I smile. I started to get chubby in 7th grade and those cinnamon rolls would be put away in storage for a bit.

Peggy loved to rearrange furniture. Not seasonally, not monthly it was daily. So mom spent a lot of time by herself when I went to school. She didn’t work often except for working as a receptionist at a hair salon in dt Piedmont for about a year. She left stating the women there were too gossipy but I think that’s why she went to work there in the first place. She’d get bored and move things around. Sometimes it was something barely noticeable like the coffee table would move on its axis and face north for the day. Sometimes I’d come home from school and the dining room would be in the living room. There was no sneaking in late from a party in my house. You didnt know what fixture labyrinth was laid out in front of you when you returned home. My mother had to the ability to conjure up a dining room table the size of a four door Cadillac within two hours of my departing the house for a high school football game. I’d come home 3 minutes past curfew and reckon with one piece of sectional sofa that my mother decided looked better nestling up three inches away from the front door. When I did my chores I knew better than to sweep anything under anything because anything could have a new location at any moment. One of my cousins left his Playboys in my bedroom one summer so I hid them under the rug that rested under my bed. Next day my bedroom had been rearranged and those playboys were no longer there. I never asked what happened to them. As far as I’m concerned they were never there..

Sometimes she’d take our only TV and move it to her bedroom when Tom was working out of town. We’d lie on her bed and watch A-Team, Remington Steele, Matt Houston (my mom loved Lee Horsley). We loved the Cosby Show and we’d watch old westerns together. Not that spaghetti shit I mean Eastwood, The Duke, McQueen. I was surrounded my Louis L’amour literature every where. That’s where my love for westerns came from. I’d pop some corn, shaking the pan over the eclectric coils, careful not to burn the kernels and melt butter on top. I’d pour my mother and I each glass of milk and we’d sit in front of that tv until it was time for bed. I cherish these moments with all my heart. My daughter and I will watch Marvel movies, play cards and eat pizza when Jess is out of town. God I hope she looks back at these as I do.

I never had a chance to enjoy them. Did I mention none of the doors locked in my house? I miss my big bedroom when it was just my mother and I. Those rooms were probably 15×17 at least. I had my 8 track stereo and weight bench in that room with plenty of extra room for activities. I’d listen to Prince 1999 on 8 track by my bed and I’d wake up when the track would pop out to flip over. My bedroom floor would be littered with X-men comics, Elf Quest graphic novels and David Eddings books. Winter months I’d stay in that room all day. Summers I’d explore the woods and pastures behind my home. We had a big ass yard I’d cut with a push mover. It would take 14 hours to cut. If I did a piss poor job my stepfather would make me go out the next day and make me do it all over again. He’d lift up low lying branches of the trees that marked our property to see if I pushed the mower all the way up to the trunk. I rarely did unless he was home. The side yard used to be tilled for gardening so I’d bottom out on those humps and while pushed the mower and it would stall. It was as an old mower and I’d pull on the starter handle over and over until my hands bled to get it started again. At the age of 11 I could take a lawn mower apart and put it back together again. Not sure what happened to that mechanical capability. I can even change oil on my truck now.

I can remember a thousand summer memories but only a handful of winter ones from that house unless it was a holiday. I hated school and pushed most of it out of my mind and there wasn’t much to do in the winter months in Piedmont. Summers I’d have that little camper hooked up by a 100 feet of extension cord and I’d camp in that little trailer. I’d bomb it with bug spray every year to kill any and every little bug that made it home during the off season and then set up camp there all summer. I’d have filled with books and we had several “barn” cats that weren’t feral and I’d grab a handful of them to hang with me at night in the camper. I loved the solitude of that little camper. When it rained I’d place cups all over the floor to catch the leaks from the old roof. I’d end up putting a tarp over it the last year when it was falling apart. My mom would wake me up by turning the power off so I’d get up and eat breakfast. I pleaded with my parents to get another camper when it finally went to shit. Loved that camper. Easy to see it left a lifetime impression on me. So did the cats seeing as I’m a cat person now. We had dogs too. My first family dog Beau was a black lab mix. I loved that dog. He was a damn car chaser when we let him out. I watched him chase towards a white van and get run over, I can vividly recall seeing the van’s back tires leave the road when it hit him. I screamed and ran for the road. He was already gone but his tail was still wagging at the very tip. I dragged him off the road by that tail crying. There was an older couple coming over the top of the road as I was pulling off into the ditch. That poor woman saw my dilemma and covered her mouth with her hand as tears rolled down her face. They kept driving though..

I was by myself not sure where my mom was but I spent the morning digging a hole in the woods to bury my dog. I stayed by the hole with my dog in a trash bag without covering it for about an hour. He might not have been dead or so I hoped. He might come back to life. I still believed in miracles in 6th grade. We know how this ended. No miracles were to happen that day.

That closed the book on my love for dogs. We’ve had some since that day and I love the whiny shit head we have now. She’s an awesome companion I just refuse to get close to her. Dogs should last forever. Or at least longer than we get with them.

Cats are different. They’re independent. I don’t have to get close to them. In fact they prefer for me not to. We are similar in that regard.

My mom liked toy dogs too. We lived 30 yards from essentially a drag strip of highway where vehicles could be clocked going over 90 mph. I got my parents old Pontiac Lemans up to 115 on that stretch one time. That half mile of highway was a death trap for our pets. We’d bury at least 4 dogs due to that road. Can’t tell you how many cats. Or they just wouldn’t come home to eat anymore. We had one cat that we never named because they wouldn’t last that long but he made it 9 years. That cat looked like it was going to die at any moment for years but he kept fucking ticking. I think I called him Sylvester because of his markings similar to Sylvester the cat.

I miss that old house. It’s no longer a house now it’s an office for a storage center now. I’ll rarely drive by it now it’s sad to see those memories asphalted and surrounded by cold storage roll up doors where I used to practice kicking footballs between Tom’s old Comets that sat covered in weeds. He wouldn’t make me mow under those. Brush was too thick. But I had my field goals backed up to 40 yards. I was dreaming of kicking for the Falcons while doing high fives with Billy “White Shoes” Johnson, my favorite player at the time. I bet I could still kick a 30 yarder if called upon.

That home will always be THE childhood one for me. Belle Mead had me for the first 6 years but memories don’t hold as much as the bungalow. I’ll be curious as to the memories my daughter will recall while she’s my age about her childhood home. Or if it’ll be divided like mine. At least when she reads this she’ll get a small vision of mine which is why I write these memories. When I fully encapsulated in my memories I can smell those cinnamon rolls, the petroleum form the furnace. I can hear my mother singing Dolly and Kenny playing on the old Victrola while hand washing dishes after breakfast. It’s fun to see how old childhood memories become so important to our daily routines now. I love music playing in my home on a record player during the day. I’ll clean to it or just sit on the sofa listening to the same albums listening to my mother sing. Man she had a voice. Her old southern Alabama accent and old adages were so unique. No one talks like that anymore. I still use some of them to this day. Thanks mom. No I really mean that.

My mother’s passing anniversary popped up last week and I was so enthralled by the Masters of Air series that I didn’t have a chance to honor it. She’s been on my mind this week and that house always exuded my mother. Without realizing it my mother’s memory and spirit was talking to me through that old bungalow.

It felt good to write this.

I try to do two epic trips a year. One that I can trek to in under 24 hours. I’ll set up a camp hub and take in as much of a region as I can. I did it with the Florida Keys one year, Vermont/ Maine, West Virginia and already have plans to hit up Michigan Great Lakes area sometime early fall. My long trips are a little more intense and involve thousands of miles nomadic one night camping stands with gas station parking lots, Dyrt reservations, Hipcamp, state park campgrounds or my favorite, dispersed camping on public land. Both style trips do my soul justice although I’m swaying towards the shorter ones more and more. Driving for 16 straight hours, sleeping for 4 and then driving another 12 takes a chunk of your free time and is mentally exhausting. But there’s just so much shit I have/want to see out there..

My last big fat one I got a little greedy and tried to squeeze two trips into one. I had Glacier on my mind and I wanted to dip down to Tetons and hit my fav outdoor destination station Colorado.

10 days

It’s 33 hours to Glacier Park from where my ass is sitting on my sofa. It can be done in two days but I don’t suggest it. Nashville, St. Louis, Kansas City will see to it that the 33 hours will extend a little longer. I don’t play in big city traffic anymore. My last job before I got into Southern would send me to Atlanta every week. Southern Atlanta so I could drive through the heart of 85s to 20s and then some. Now I want to claw my skin off my bones when I hit congestion. I time my trips around the lull time of traffic when possible. I’ll hit the likes of of those cities before 7am or after 8pm whenever possible. I’ll drive 100 miles around the state to avoid the Jersey Turnpike in its entirety. I salute those of you that deal with that shit.

These epic trips are always adventurous because I rarely make plans only destinations. There are two extremes to traveling. The ones that map out their entire trip with stops for food and hotel stays, passes have already been purchased, reservations for dinner at the Laundry were made 8 months ago. They have everything budgeted out. If everything goes according to plan they’ll have a keychain for all 9 states to give to their in-laws. Then there’s the hobo train jumping style travel that see a pretty picture online and say “fuck yeah let’s do it!”

That’s me

Sometimes it works out great, every once in awhile it shits the bed. I get it. I don’t expect the other 300,000,000 residents of this country to stay out of my way on my trips. Weather can shit on your day, road construction, bad tourist destination traps, food poisoning and even expectations, actually it’s the expectations that can really kill your buzz. Some places just aren’t as fun as they look on the post card. Some spots everyone had the same post card so you are all standing on that ledge overlooking an amazing valley, all with your phones out, elbowing your neighbors or waiting in line to get that #headintheclouds #wanderlust hashtag to sell tickets to your IG life (hey I’m guilty as shit too). I pick destinations for a certain experience. It may to achieve epicness or to decompress for a few days, enjoy a solid dinner at a local cafe and walk the little downtown streets and take in the local culture. I drove to Maine to experience the sunrise on Cadillac Mtn and to eat a real lobster roll. I also wanted to climb Katahdin Mountain, the last peak on the Appalachian trail.

I drove to the Keys to watch that epic sunset in Mallory Square. I drove to Sedona for the vortexes, took my daughter to Mt Rushmore to start her own bucket list. Drove through New Orleans to eat at the Turkey and the Wolf. Drove up to Crested Butte, CO just to camp on the Washington Gulch, twice and always try to climb the Manitou on the way out. I have an adventure in mind and most of the time there’s one to be had.

On my last epic trip I had decided last minute (literally) to take a detour from my long trip. I was up towards the South Dakota border and made a quick decision to head sideways to the Badlands up there. Don’t sleep on South Dakota. It doesn’t get the rep it deserves being surrounded by the great state of Montana and right below your left knee is Yellowstone country. Lot of beauty in South Dakota. Take away the brutal winters and that might be where I could call home.

As I have mentioned I love dispersed camping. I don’t like crammed camping, bureaucratic picnic tables, rusted metal fire pits, rangers doing their interval drive bys to insure you aren’t petting the chipmunks or leaving snickers bar wrappers out for bears to sniff. I get it. It’s a necessity because most humans can’t behave themselves and think buffalo are cuddly. I always say let em learn the hard way. I’ve always got my camera handy.

For me, give me an unregulated camping pull off. Old BLM (bureau of land management) gravel roads that pull off to vistas, secluded tree lines out in the middle of nowhere is my vibe. No peeps or creeps, no electricity or water. When I travel I carry the same shit for one day as I would carry for 10. My truck is loaded for bear 24-7. No I’m not a doomsday prepper I just forget shit constantly so I keep it all in my truck at all times. The only volume of stock that changes are grub, water and clean socks. This is my ultimate jam. There’s something about making your coffee over an open flame and eating bacon and eggs on a mountain top with the sun in my face and wind through whatever I have hairy on me just resets my everything. It’s how the fuck we are supposed to live we just have forgotten how to. Scrolling through things to do when in SD I saw an article online about dispersed camping in an area aptly named “The Wall.” Aptly named due to the town’s name is also Wall. Yep Wall, South Dakota. It rests outside the badlands and it’s a good place to buy your 50/50 cotton poly biker tees with “Badlands” across the chest, Souix dream catchers, multicolored cigarettes lighters and since you’re in South Dakota you can find a good Ribeye steak at any gas station/hotel/tire center/movie theater/constaple. I drove next to the badlands my last trip up to Rushmore and decided to detour to check them out. I was more excited to camp on the outskirts of the badlands than to run around and play outside with them. It was currently 96°. There’s no shade if you are taller than a blade of grass. I did my diligence and toured the badlands and man, yes they are incredible. A must see. All the multicolored gulches, ravines, buttes and hoodoos. It’s like michaelangelo ant hills from a distance (this is why I don’t write poetry). I took pics, drove around in circles and stopped at a little “diner” inside the park. I have one form of advice for you travelers- don’t eat inside national parks. The food is always terrible. It’s barely edible and you’ll pay three times as much for whatever you’ll end up digesting terribly in the next several hours. Well, I did anyway because it was too damn hot to make lunch and I was taller than a blade of grass so I cooled off at the local food house and ordered my very first Indian taco. Bacon soda fried bread with whatever appropriate toppings that would make Taco Bell seem Michelin star worthy. Mine had 2 cups of sour cream, a pinch of bagged cheese (no origin known) a dollop of process guac, some ground beef? and some buffalo meat that must’ve been freeze dried during the mass slaughter of buffalo in the 1870s. Think of a deep fried taco pizza. It was underwhelming. I had two bites and threw it in my little truck trash bag I keep in the passenger seat floor. This is why I rarely eat out of my comfort zone.

I found my coordinates on my overlanding app for the locally famous, dispersed, camping area the Wall. A little dirt road pull off right outside of town , winds for a mile or two up a some rolling grass hills (they are indigenous in that area) and you crest over a left hand turn to see a long stretching vista that sits about 30-60 feet above the badlands. This goes on for miles. Its a popular spot to camp. There were RVs, campers and cars all along the horizon so I knew I had found the place. Some of these spots you have to depend on coordinates and not street signs. They can be tricky to find.

I found a spot to wedge between two other campers. There’s a healthy respect for solitude amongst overlanders in these undesignated areas. You pull off and give them space and distance. I try to keep at least 30-50 yards away if possible from my neighbors. There’s no protocol just don’t pull 20 feet away from another camper only because you like their spot. They got there first they earned it. Get there earlier next time. When I camp up in Linville I have 6 spots I try to land and they go in that order. I hit my favorite one first to see if it’s available. I don’t share that location with anyone.

I found a solid overlook right in the middle. I was about 15 feet from the cliff that dropped about 30 feet, on each side of me two other campers far enough away that I couldn’t hear their conversations or smell their camp food. I set out my little camp chair, heated up an MRE and melted into the sunset. It was hot but I didn’t care. I knew the winds from the plains would kick up soon and give me some free fan electricity. I waved at some of my camping companions and watched some cattle scattered down the rolling hills grazing behind me. Free range grazing is a thing here. You don’t speed in these areas. You think hitting a deer can fuck you see what happens time your Honda Civic t-bones a 1200lb steer. You’ll both become hamburger.

I have two camping set ups when I travel. I have my RTT (overland abbreviation for roof top tent) and I have a nook in my truck for quick naps in gas stations or if there are thunderstorms. You never read any advertisements concerning RTTs and thunderstorms. You’re fine inside the cab of your car during lightning storms. Not inside a tent on top. Those rubber wheels will not save you. There is a scientific explanation for this. You can look it up yourself just like I did. Learning is power just like the School House cartoon would teach us. Also I don’t have the typing energy. I’m sure I can link on here but I might fuck something up.

I crawled in my tent around 9pm, all windows unzipped because it was probably in the upper 70s still. I had a long drive ahead of me I wanted to pull up to Glacier around 3 the next day which would mean leaving right as the sunrises. I have no trouble falling asleep. I can go from smile to snore in 3 minutes. It’s staying asleep that’s always been my issue. Camping in the outdoors rarely allows me to sleep all night. Even in the safest of environments things can go bad real quick. You’re a spec of fly shit on a window sill when it comes to your relevance and relationship to Mother Nature. If you don’t respect that you’ll learn it the hard way. She’s not really your mother.

11ish pm

I finally got that grass plains breeze I was hoping for. It was just enough to whip up a little but pleasant enough to almost hum through my tent. I love a good summer breeze (no jokes y’all).

1:15am

That pleasant summer breeze picked up a little bit. My unzipped tent flaps stared making flag on a tent pole sounds. The zipper latches flapping around my fiberglass tent shell sounded like someone whipping my tent with a electric extension cord. I could hear thunder in the distance but I wasn’t concerned. I was in South Dakota that storm could be 100 miles away and heading south of me.

1:30

Ok I was wrong, I could smell rain. Rain is easier to smell in dry climates. In the south it always smells moist in the summer. You’ll smell the rain up there well before you see or hear it. I smelled it. And then I could see the horizon darken even at this time. I thought oh well, the rain will cool the ground off and I might even get a little chill. I’ll be fine.

1:35

“Was that lightning?” That’s what I said out loud. I thought someone had turned a spotlight on in my tent. I sat up and watched the horizon and did that little thunder to lightning count down. Was it coming towards me? Parallel to me or teasing me. It seemed to run parallel. Then I saw the lightning. I call this type of lightning Jerry Bruckheimer lightning. If you ever watch the beginning of his movies the intro to his brand is this ridiculous lightning strike that goes sideways into a tree. That’s what I saw. Sans tree. There weren’t any. I was the only tree like thing out there. I have a healthy respect for lightning. I’ve been close enough to a lightning strike that it set afire a book of matches sitting on a table next to me. If your hair begins to stand up, get the living fuck out of there.

I saw sideways lighting. Sideways is scarier than poke lightning. If someone comes up to you and starts poking you it’s mildly agitating. If that same person comes towards you and starts swinging their arms side to side then shit steps up to a new level. Same with lightning. Broad swath of fused energy sufficient enough to vaporize your favorite wrist watch and the arm it’s attached to. Coming at you like a colossal whip ready to give a permanent perm.

Once I saw the sideways lightning I decided to relocate into my truck bed. I didn’t drive 16 hours that day to be air fried like a bad chicken wing drum. I pulled my sleeping bag and pillow down from my RTT and pulled my camper tail gate window closed and braced for the ride.

1:45am

Well it started raining. Only slight at first. The wind was drowning out the sound of the rain for a bit but it was no longer a odor it was a reality. Rain is fine, I camp in the rain all the time. It can be a buzzkill at times but in the summer it’s organic air conditioning.

1:47am

Rain decided to get a hard on. It started hailing. Hard, hard hail and it was hitting my truck sideways. Like thousands of air soft BBs pelting the side of my aluminum camper shell. Those plains can push some winds too. Wind can pick up quite the momentum when there is nothing to shield it. It almost rolls downhill in these plains. It was blowing from the west. On the east side of my truck was a cliff 15 feet away that dropped enough for me to think that this might’ve been a bad idea Your sense of just about anything and everything is dulled or exaggerated in the middle of the night. Mine was no exception. Your sense of danger is always elevated when you’re camping in the wild. If it’s not chances are you won’t do it for too long. Mine was spiked. I wasn’t worried about being struck by lightning or flash floods they were physically impossible where I was parked. The wind on the other hand and the fact I had 180lbs of parasail like fiberglass set up to sail on my truck roof makes my truck a little top heavy. Like a sailboat in the ocean during a storm. And she was a rockin.

It would’ve taken a gust of wind the girth of the Wizard of Oz ‘nados to roll my truck but it was coming up 2am, I was half delirious from 16 hours of traveling and was probably at 50% battery life on a gummy edible I had taken before bed to help me sleep. I was present but no one short of a navy seal is present and ready to roll at 2am on a stormy hillside. This was not quite on my agenda of planning. The truck she was a rocking and swaying. I had just enough internet connection on my phone to google static weight equations for RTTs , Tacomas and the needed thickness of welded aluminum steel to survive a cliff roll. Also, I had enough propane, butane and gasol “ane” to blow up half the hillside. Just like what you see cars do when they roll off a cliff in Bruckheimer movies. My anxiety was at a healthy 9.5 out of 10. Close your eyes Chad you’ll be fine. It’s all in your head

1:55am

Did I just hear a moo? I guess the local free range cows all over the hills were still exposed to this hail and thunderstorm. I laid there wondering what cows do during these shitty times of inclement weather. I was about to find out.

1:56am

MOOOOOOOOOO

in all it’s loud clarity and bass erupted right next to my camper window. The last time I had a cow that close to me was in at a Whattaburger drive thru. At first I thought it was a nearby camper fucking with me. It sounded almost too articulated to be real. I grew up surrounded by cows growing up in Piedmont. On 86 I had them across the street for years and on the left hand side of our property. I’m not a city boy. I’m very comfortable around the cows y’all. When they would call out to each other it was usually a uuroooooOoooO! Never heard the m that much but maybe it was because I never had one crooning 8 inches from my head at 2am. This moo was perfect, unadulterated and smooth. It was like the cow was appearing on America’s Got Talent and had been practicing this moo in the mirror for just the right time. It was also piercing. This cow didn’t like the storm about as much as I. And then she brought all of her friends.

2:15

By this time I’m surrounded by cattle. My little abrupt aluminum parasail setting must’ve been ideal for the cattle to weather out the storm. I could still hear my leather friend with her perfect moos but soon she’d be drowned out by the uurooooOOs I so enjoyed as a child living in amongst the cow patty farms of Piedmont. I could also smell the mounds of shit that were amassing outside of my camp. I recorded several minutes of my conversations with these bovines to share with my wife the next day. You can hear me almost laughing at all the absurdity around me but in the back of my voice you can also hear my misery. I was fucking tired. As per the norm exhaustion can get the best of you and your imagination starts to elevate stories in your head. I had thought of setting off my car alarm to chase off the cows. Just a couple of harmless clicks to send them on their way. I wasn’t concerned about my neighbors. No one was asleep in this shit. The wind was blowing my truck off it’s axles. My immediate thought as I clutched my keys were “what if they stampede?” Also did any of those walking hamburger steaks have horns? What if they see my truck as something dangerous as opposed to shelter and turn my camper into Swiss cheese? Or better yet ram my ass into the ravine? Imagination is a hell of a thing y’all. I could hear them pushing up against my truck all stirred up from the storm. My hope for any sleep was done. The only option I had was to wait it out with my new found hooved roommates.

2:30am

I mentioned that Indian taco for a reason. You might’ve forgotten about it, actually I had too until it was ready to make its second appearance. My stomach at this time decided that taco was a terrible idea. Unfortunately for me the front gate had been closed for a while and the only exit available was the back gate. It wasn’t asking permission to leave either. It had already made up its mind the storm, cows, cliff hanging be damned. I literally sat up thinking “oh shit” (no pun intended), grabbed my phone to use its flashlight to find an appropriate receptacle to address the situation. I was loaded for bear not for using my truck camper as an outhouse. Also there is zero ventilation in my truck bed. The allure of sleeping next to a repurposed Indian taco drop off didn’t appeal to me. My only other option was to let it go outside into the growing chaos of the surrounding bovines, hail, Bruckheimer lightning and high winds. Couldn’t be that bad. The fucking cows already had the poop party started. There was no waiting for the storm to dissipate it was go time. Like the soldiers storming the beach of Normandy vessels I burst out of my truck tailgate, pants already down between my ankles and grabbed the same bungee cord I used to hold my back window down to hold onto as left a full moon hanging over my truck bed. I deposited my Indian taco back to the earth it came from faster than you could say Top Gun. The sideways lightning lit up the sky like a flash just in time for me to see the dozens of cows, surrounding my truck bellowing in the storm. It was like a scene from a bad horror movie where maybe the cows all team up turn people into zombie hamburgers. I hopped back into my truck soak and wet and 10lbs lighter. The storm stopped about 4 minutes later.

The cows decided to leave. Not sure if it was the weather or my own impression of a cow patty to mark my territory.

I got about an hour of sleep after that. I didn’t die obviously, my truck didn’t sail into the mystic and I didn’t shit all over myself or become the victim of a stampede. A nice little sunrise greeted me once I got packed up while the cows meandered across the dirt road, staring at the foul idiot that desecrated their abrupt shelter for the evening. Almost mockingly might I add like they were going to post about me and my shitting adventures in their Cowbook pages

Later that day I had some beef jerky and a cheeseburger for lunch. Probably won’t try an Indian taco ever again.