Monday, February 25, 2013

Bad Deck of Cards






There is a show that my wife and I tend to frequently watch called "Kitchen Nightmares". 

The plot of the show is this: there are a lot of restaurants that are quickly destroying themselves and a man named Gordan Ramsay [infamous picture posted above] goes in and tries to fix them. 

What is interesting is that almost every single episode is the same. Because what is typically wrong with restaurants may change shape and size and appearance, but it always comes back one recurring issue:

Friday, February 22, 2013

Before You Do That...








One of the most nerve-wracking nights of my life was Christmas Eve of 2009.

My family had done some celebrating and reflecting and gift opening and meal sharing throughout the evening, all that stuff you are supposed to do on Christmas Eve, but by about ten o'clock all had gone to bed in preparation for the next morning. 

Because we had to get up early. 

It was going to be my nephew's first Christmas and we wanted to make sure everyone got to thoroughly enjoy that experience before we left. So instead of the ideal 8:00 or 9:00 beginning of the morning on Christmas day, it had to be more like 6:00 or 7:00 in the morning. 

I, however, wasn't going to be able to fall asleep like the rest of my family. 

Midnight had crept on me and I had been sitting in the old and worn rocking chair my grandma had given me and that now had its home in the corner of my small bedroom in my parent's house. At some point that evening I had angled the chair to face out the window and roughly two hours of staring and thinking and pondering had since passed. My body felt light and my breaths were quick and shallow as my mind continuously turned over everything that was soon going to happen. Tears were even on the brink as that small swell that moves in your throat without your approval was making its presence felt more and more. It was like this octane of emotion moving inside of me in conjunction with that nervous energy that leaves your mind racing while the world moves slowly around you. 

By 1:00 in the morning I had continuously been in and out of that chair and was now pacing around the little available space in the room rehearsing, practicing, and envisioning what the next day was going to bring. The moment was spinning in my head over and over again and the anxiety of wishing it would just happen already was heavy. But no amount of thinking or preparing could change the intensity of my emotional state of being. There was only waiting to be done while every single atom of my body knew that something was soon going to happen that would change everything. 

Until a blurry 3:00 in the morning I sat in my room facing this approaching experience that hung in the Christmas air, but finally, my eyes were able to shut and my body rest. Because I knew I had to sleep even in the midst of the constant pounding of my heart.

Because we had to get up early.