FEATURED POST

I’m a survivor, like you. Hopefully this pandemic is winding down and coming to a well-deserved close. Please roll the credits. Please.

We all got through it and we all have our stories about how we got through it. How we survived.

The pandemic hit me like a big, rough ocean wave. A wave I wasn’t expecting. A wave that crept up behind me, silently and unexpectedly, as I tried to get my legs back underneath me from a previous, much bigger wave. That wave was divorce. That wave knocked the bloody hell out of me and sent me tumbling into a spectacular faceplant into the ocean’s sandy, shell-sharp floor.

As a career waiter in fine dining restaurants, the sneaky wave that had crept up behind me, that stinkin’ pandemic with its restaurant shutdowns, was aiming to fuck me up royally. It smacked me down into the shell-sharp floor again, but this time a body-blow not a faceplant. The wave forced me down and held me there for seven weeks, rolling and tumbling. It left me holding my breath and reaching for the sky, or what I thought was the sky, for redemption. It left me somersaulting at a dizzying pace under an unforgiving, unrelenting, green, brownish, salty, disgusting foam of pandemic uncertainty. I did what we all had to do. I hoped for the best.

It was the first time I used Unemployment benefits. They were a godsend. Those unemployment monies were unbelievable, in that, I couldn’t believe I was receiving money like that without working. I cherished and treasured that dough. I was beyond frugal with it. I knew the world was getting turned inside-out and that uncertainty forced me to buckle down and hold on tight to everything, especially money. Especially hope. Especially determination.

That sneaky wave of the worldwide pandemic bashed me down. It bashed me down. It bashed me sideways, down again, sideways, up, down, under, over, and round-n-round like a wild ride in a gigantic washing machine. It knocked my swim shorts off and started dragging me out to sea with its menacing undertow of darkness, despair, and depression. Out of work for the first time in my life, at the worst time in my life, I felt adrift and doomed to sink and drown. The restaurant industry wouldn’t be able to keep me afloat and the divorce with all of its trappings were weighing me down even more. How about it? 2020, what a year, right?

I did hold on to everything that I possibly could. Especially hope. Especially determination.

I landed an essential job in the food and beverage industry. It seemed a little whacky taking a job as a dining room supervisor in a Continuing Care Community with all of the news reports on how the Covid pandemic was devasting this industry, this demographic. Uncertainty was everywhere. Everywhere! I was uncertain how much I could rely on Unemployment. I was uncertain about the divorce proceedings, uncertain about where I would be living. Hell, I was uncertain where my life was heading. I clung to hope and determination like a life preserver. I held on tight. I was asked by my new boss if I wanted to wait a few weeks before I started to see what the pandemic looked like within the industry, within the specific community. I told him that there would still be uncertainty then too. I told him I wanted to jump in right away. I wanted to jump in, feet first, hit the ground running and not look back. I was more afraid of uncertainty than Covid itself.

Hope. Determination. Money.

I’m a survivor, like you.

I changed my lifestyle in terms of being healthier. I lost forty pounds and have sustained it by exercising regularly and eating properly. The treadmill in the basement and my five disc CD player are pivotal to the sea-change in my lifestyle. There is nothing like blowing off steam or blasting through depression on a treadmill with the backing of Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All, Janes Addiction’s Nothings Shocking, Witch’s self-titled debut, Black Sabbath’s Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, and Red Hot Chili Pepper’s Californication playing at max volume.

I hold on to hope, continuously. I seek help in this endeavor, continuously through music. The Thievery Corporation…huge. Leonard Cohen(?), yes. Youtube Music, o my god yes. Most recently, the 45min Daniel Norgren performance at KEXP! Wow. Robin Trower. Janelle Monae’s Turntables, f@#$YEAH. I think my love of music is an addiction. I always want it. My brain tells me that I need it. It pumps me up. It picks me up. And when I combine it with the treadmill it must do something with endorphins or some shit like that. Music gives me hope, I guess.

I hold on to determination. I get inspired in this endeavor by writers who encourage. Steven Pressfield, The War of Art. Maggie Smith, Keep Moving. By chance I read reviews on these two books and had to get them in my hands, their words into my mind. Both were available through the county library system, online ordering and curbside pickup, of course. Ironically, Keep Moving was on a waitlist. It was worth the wait. Pressfield’s writing brings to mind something a friend had said to me recently. She asked, Are you going to take pictures of anything other than your little figurines? She’d have to read Pressfield’s take on Hierarchy versus Territory to understand. Wait until my friend sees my latest picture of two nickels, LOL.

I’m a survivor. I’m geared to following this mantra: Choose to Be Happy. I saw that little mantra on one of the high school server’s phone at work. I thought it was great. Inspiration can come from anywhere, from anyone. Surely enough, she seems like one of the happiest servers at work. Some are downright gloomy.

For some reason I’m delving into my dodgy past. It’s something I have to do. I must do. I’m discovering, now, with hindsight, who I was. How bad I was. I’m determined to shine a light on all of it, the drinking, the drug use, the womanizing, any foolishness that led me to here. Led me to who I am.

I’m in a process of self-discovery. I was a good boy. I went bad. I was a bad boy. Real bad. I leveled off and teetered that fine line of uncertainty. Good or not-so-good (maybe a downright scoundrel), respectable or the outlier (looks respectable, but far from it). Now that my son’s nearing the age I started rebelling, I’m looking for the signs. I want to guide him correctly. I don’t want to lose him. I feel like that is the breaking point for the freefall of rebellion. My parents don’t care. The bond is broken, the child lost. I need to face why I started rebelling. I need to face why I didn’t stop rebelling. Why my rebellion flowed like a domino effect of self-destruction. I need to face the reality that it started when my family uprooted from Philly to New Hampshire when I was in seventh grade. I couldn’t stop the dominos. I was a good boy. I went bad.

My future is a clean slate. It’s a new chapter and I don’t know what’s going to happen. I do truly believe good things are heading my way. I stay positive. I think in part to the mantra. Maybe in part to karma too, who really knows. I think we’re all in the same boat; good days, bad days. Think positively. Choose to be happy. I think everyone can relate to that, especially after the year we just faced. I’ve come to the realization that everyone fights with depression one way or the other. Do you think anyone escapes its tentacles unscathed? No. I’ll bet even Bruno Mars gets depressed occasionally. I see it all around, friends, family, coworkers. Personally, I have to move past it from time to time. Conquer it, if you will. Remember the mantra I’m geared to, Choose to Be Happy.

Immabee true to myself. I’m taking pictures of little figurines and nickels. I’m diving into my shady past. Immabee happy.

And the same applies to you.

You’re a survivor too. Like me.