Somehow I find myself listening to "Native American flute" music for a complete lack of better description. But's not necessarily by accident, I stumbled upon Wikipedia for some reason when I got home from Mom's house with Cara after work, reading first about Lakota tribes before wandering off into the other results pages on Google about marijuana's role in traditional Native American culture, and sure enough it seems that the stereotypes where all true about it. They didn't just sit around getting high all day. There where rituals and ceremonies for such an thing, and they used the plant for many things other than smoking. Apparently in some tribes there is a sacred position known as the "pipe bearer", sounds like the guy who is responsible for keeping track of the pipe. Seems legit.
Work was another day in shitty paradise. I have this extreme ability to want to talk to Cara about the most random shit right when she drops me off at work. It's like a flurry of stuff comes rushing into my mind the moment I get my apron tied up. The Minimalism book (which I finished yesterday morning!) has opened up my eyes very much. The book isn't about whatever it is that comes to mind when you think of minimalism. You think of an all white dining room with like a single thing in the middle of the table and nothing else in the room. You have nothing and own nothing, everything is neat and orderly but that's only because you don't have anything to fuck up. Not so much that as getting rid of all the stuff "your supposed to have (and want)" in favor of investing more time and energy on what is really important in life. Those things depend on who you are. The 5 Values of living a meaningful life are things I'm going to have to study up and learn to advance as time goes on.
1. Health
2. Relationships
3. Passions
4. Growth
5. Contribution
I don't want to sort of 'self-inflict' what the book suggests and just choose two of these values to be my top priority, but without a shadow of doubt Relationships needs to be my number one. Passions would be tempting as an easy second, but it's also equally tempting to choose Growth. I really am Jack's Step-Brother because I am also a thiry-year-old-boy. A thirty-year-old-boy who has been to "college", been married and divorced. So I need to grow I think in order to keep the erroneous behavior and choices of the past become a recurring timeline. History only repeats itself if your comfortable with it allowing to do so.
If cutting out negative relationships in my life is to become a reality, once the moment presents itself the reality is I'm going to have to jump ship from the restaurant. I remember when I was in the sit-down meeting with Krystal's lawyer, he said your marriage is either `insert FORGOTTEN LAWYER TALK here` that meant things could work out or your marriage is "irretrievably broken". Those words stuck with me and they apply in other arenas. There are problems at work, a couple of them, that make the restaurant irretrievably broken. I am powerless in making a change for that. I cannot help that situation whatsoever. I don't want to help that situation. The outcome and the payoff are too little and too late.
That is why passion is a deeply tempting choice for the other primary choice of the second value to focus on. I need to find my passion, or rather, figure out if it truly is food or not - or what part of food it is that I'm into and figure out a way to get paid for doing it. But I do not want to live for work. I don't want to be focused on going to work everyday like I am now. My entire 5 days at work are focused on work and I work today and then I get there and it's the same shit, I am always disappointed - it's like the same fucking shit every single day. There is absolutely NO FUCKING COMMUNICATION in our kitchen at all, and it is really starting to fucking piss me off. Everything is done on-the-fly and there is no fucking sense of teamwork or brotherhood within the core kitchen staff. I used to tell the people I worked second and third shift with back in the day that I loved them and I fucking meant that shit. We had each other's backs like fucking BROTHERS. Color and gender blind. That is just how the shit worked. TEAMWORK. There is no such thing at work. Not at all. Despite the food we put out, we are so far away from the actual culture of a kitchen that sometimes I wonder what the fuck we are all really doing. Fuck me.
Moving forward however, focusing on my relationship with Cara is top priority. When I used to look into her eyes I used to see this sort of shimmery glow that just gazed into my eyes and put me into sort of a hypnotic state. Having not participated in any sort of formal alcohol program of any sort, I can't give you a date when I "got sober". However, I like to call sort of my "waking up" era, that is, when I started to see the world around me, or rather the rubble and debris - what was left of the world around me from the destruction I have been causing for the last year, with an extreme focus on anything that happened between May and late October of 2015. So when I saw Cara all I saw in her eyes was hurt, and despair. So what do I do? What have I been doing? I have been avoiding the situation. Something one William Daniel Parker III is extremely fucking talented at. Avoidance. Running Away. Being in the Shadows of the Important Things and Always Around When He Should Not.
In Classical William Daniel Parker III form, first order of business was to cut the communication lines down. Easier that way. Silence. Nothing. Think About It. Cry About It.
I. Am. Going. To. Say. Nothing. To. You.
And so night turned to day, several times over. A fortnight passed. Then another.
I have so deeply embedded myself unto her life. Her children look up to me. The both told me they loved me. I told them both I loved them. Yet I allow myself to be comfortable and content with being an absolute stranger to the lady whom I am supposed to love most.
You fucking asshole.
You cunt, you mother fucking cunt!
So with clear eyes, I look at Cara and I still see pain. I still see suffering and despair. But I also see something else. She looks back when I look at her. It is as easy as that.
She has been there the entire time.
You stupid, fucking drunk cunt.
LOOK AROUND!
Classic William Daniel Parker III walks away when he makes a mess this big. Truth be told, when I first started coming out of my Whiskey Coma I really did consider it. I was fucking OVERWHELMED with what the fuck I saw around me once I started to know basic things like what day it was and where I was when I woke up, and where stuff like my phone, glasses (and grill) where located. But alas, basic principals of logic set in and then I realized that this fantastic lady whom I had been professing my love (and whatever else during that time) had stood there and watched this all go down - sober. With children.
Boys walk away from a problem like that. I'm not a boy any longer. Let the days pile to weeks. Watch the weeks stack upon each other and become Months upon Months. Let the Years start to pile up. Allow me the freedom to prove to you this is no longer the case. I enjoy influencing people, and I hope I'm not a bitch for saying I'm pretty good at it. Perhaps that's the passion. Influencing people. Kids. They always did stare at me. Let it be the height. Who cares if that gets the foot in the door. I have a message, and it has always been covered with a lot of vulgarities. Perhaps I should clean that shit up and start thinking about it. _**Contribute!**_