Cole, 1/18/15:

 

Hola a todos!  Without fail, and as always, I hope that everyone is doing well.  The New Year is still so young and there are so many possibilities and things to look forward to, goals to be achieved and new things to learn, obstacles to overcome and other shit to conquer!

 

My year has kicked off pretty badass, I must say.  The first week or two seemed just mediocre to me, at best, but then I had a beer with a good friend of mine, took a step back, saw things from a different angle, had some things put into perspective, and the end result was that my pleasure with how my New Year has begun waxed immensely.  Aside from he and I setting an awesome new goal for each of us to achieve, mainly, getting some work of ours published by August 30’th of this year (an ambitious goal, to be sure, but there is no harm in trying, even if we don’t succeed), I also realized that at the core, though some aspects of my life of course are not quite 100% where I want them to be, I am truly, genuinely happy. 

 

I was looking at things all wrong before, and I was too concerned with what I didn’t have to realize what I did have.  To most people, my reasoning will probably sound insane, but I am me, I am different, and to people who truly know me, this will make perfect sense.  I am going to break it down like this:

Though eternally cynical, yes, I used to be one of the happiest people I knew, most likely the happiest, but then I had my access pulled from the nuke plant (not just for something I did not do, but something outrageous!) and I was, for the first time in my life (since the age of 12), without a job.  No matter how hard I tried to get re-hired, for one reason or another, finding another job proved near impossible.  I sank into a deep depression, something I had never before experienced, and it consumed me.  For close to two years the happiness I had once known eluded me.  True, from time to time I had happy moments, but for the most part all I really wanted to do was drink myself into a coma, to forget how miserable I was and to forget how dire my employment prospects were.  I woke up with incapacitating anxiety every morning.  Any time the slightest thing seemed off or wrong in my life, I sank back into the darkness that I could not escape no matter how hard I clawed at the walls to keep my head above the water.  It felt like living in six feet of freezing, filthy water at the bottom of a dank well, constantly treading in order not to drown, fifty feet under sea level, three-foot circumference around me, slimy lichen-covered stone encompassing me.  I would wake up dry heaving, my anxiety was so bad, and sometimes I would spontaneously vomit, a new form my anxiety took, as if panic attacks and feeling like I couldn’t breathe weren’t bad enough, though luckily the vomiting was mostly a morning occurrence that would disappear after an hour or two. 

I didn’t feel good enough; not for an employer and not as a girlfriend.  I always felt like I was somehow inferior, letting people down, was a failure, etc, ad nauseam.  There were peaks and valleys, but the valleys far outweighed the peaks, and I was beginning to wonder if I could ever again be the person I was before, the person that I longed to be again, the person who loved herself and knew she was strong, and intelligent, and not only good enough, but the crème de la crème that any employer or lover should want, because I don’t slack off and always try to be the best possible employee or lover a person could have.  For close to two years, when I didn’t have something distracting me, I would stare off into space, not really wanting to do anything but hide under a blanket and not have to deal with anyone, anything, the world, people in general, or debt collectors.  I can’t tell you how many times I almost had my car impounded, because I could not make my loan payments, but somehow, at the last moment, the money was made and I juggled my finances to somehow make things work.  I kept most of my troubles and feelings of inadequacy inside, because I don’t like pity and I don’t enjoy talking about my problems.  Throughout those two years, only one of my friends saw me cry, as I prefer to keep my emotions to myself, and would most often cry quietly in the shower to myself, so no one would hear me or know the deep slicing pain that I was experiencing.  I almost always laughed and smiled, but the smile was a mask.  The pain only visible if you searched deep into my eyes, but luckily, no one did. 

 

Some days I couldn’t even get out of bed without prescribed medication, Klonopin, an anti-anxiety pill.  I would wake up feeling completely nauseous and yet chained to the bed, gasping for breath, feeling like I was suffocating, dying.  It was all the courage and strength I could muster to roll out of bed, walk the five, ten, twenty-five feet to my purse, swallow the pill, crawl back into bed and try to go back to sleep until the calming effects of the pill washed over me and I could face the day.  But the thing about Klonopin is, it doesn’t make you happy, it just makes you Zen, or rather, numb.  I could take one, and once it kicked in, someone could tell me that I had ten minutes left to live, and I would blink at them slowly, through glazed over eyes and say something like, “far out.  You got any Jameson?”  I could not give a fuck about anything, which is really no way to live.  

 

And then the most spectacular thing happened.  My situation was so desperate, my mood so somber, I decided to turn my résumé into a temp agency and just have them find work for me.  I felt desolate.  I honestly didn’t know what else to do.  Once I did that, and work started coming in, everyone I worked for LOVED me!  True, it being a temp. agency, most of the jobs were only temporary, but soon, the agency was getting rave reviews about me, and they would send me out to more jobs, landscaping jobs, construction jobs, solar plant jobs, jobs where the foreman would say that he didn’t want a chick, and the ladies at the temp agency would just reply ‘trust me, you’re going to want this chick, and you’re not going to want to give her up, but at the end of this week, she’s promised elsewhere.’  But they were like my pimp, the temp agency, and I was their ho, their property.  It felt good being appreciated and wanted, but at the end of the day, they were making the majority of the money, and if a company wanted to keep me, they would have to buy me, for a TON of money before I could be legally theirs.  I met a lot of cool, and some really not cool, people, but at the end of the day I was caught in a web of making a fraction of what I was worth, but not really knowing what else to do.  The agency found me work, which was more than I had been able to do for myself, so I didn’t really feel like I had any way out.  It was either stay and put in three plus months of underpaid work to get hired on full time, or find something for myself. 

 

When I finally found a job and a company I could love, a company that was trying to bribe me away from the temp agency, the temp agency found me another job working harvest at a winery.  So though I loved being back into construction, installing solar panels, with a crew of badass dudes who respected me and made me laugh, I had another hard decision to make.  I left the solar job, and worked harvest, which was a blessing, and a curse, but long story short, it lead to me finding this new job that I am working now, without the help of the temp agency, doing something that I love, that I found on my own, was hired because of my diverse and kick ass background, and now I could not be happier with where I am at, as far as work is concerned.

 

 

This new job is so great and so perfect for me, I know that the reason nothing really worked out for me before was because I needed to go through what I went through in order to be where I am now.  They love me for who I am, encourage me to be myself and rock my own style, I don’t have to cover my tattoos, remove my facial piercing, dye my red and purple hair back to brown, they encourage me to use my own judgment in choosing my outfits, so long as I wear mostly black.  Some days I come in totally punk rock, leather skirt, fishnet tights, black combat boots, skulls, so long as I wear makeup and provide excellent customer service, know the wines like the back of my own damn eyelids, and keep customers well informed and entertained.  They did say they want us to be “edgy”, after all, and I think I fit the bill pretty well.  Hell, I’ve even rocked the faux hawk in the tasting room before, and they didn’t mind one bit, in fact, they thought it was hilarious, and very “on brand”.

 

As far as my co-workers are concerned, they are all pretty badass, and I like them all for different reasons, though there are only a handful that I kick it with outside of work.  Some people I just want to remain professional with, but I would have a beer with any damn one of them after work (this is how I gauge whether or not a person likes there co-worker or not, though in this case it would more likely be for a glass of wine, but if you ask someone if they would have a beer with their co-workers after work and their answer is “yes”, you know they like their co-workers.  If the answer is “no”, that spells trouble) because they are good people, every one of them.  There are four of us though that work together on a pretty consistent basis, and I would like to think of us as sort of the dream team.  Our bosses call the group of all of us that work behind the bar “the Breakfast Club”, because we are all so different and diverse, but when it’s the four of us within the Breakfast Club working together, and it’s slammed busy, I would like to think that we fucking kill it! 

 

You get the four of us behind the bar and it’s a fucking party!  We’re rocking out to the music, either live or on the stereo, I’m “Lola dancing”, we’re talking shit, encouraging each other, egging each other on, it’s high fives and fist bumps, lip-sinking lyrics, and our energy is infectious, and more often than not, the customer is just as stoked as we are to be there, drinking wine, but also experiencing something different, something special, unique, and “edgy”, and that is what we are paid to do, no matter how ludicrous it sometimes seems, to me, anyway, to actually get paid to do what I do, which is something I love more than an almost anything else in this world:  Drink wine, and have stimulating conversations.  I think I’ve found my dream job, after writing, of course, but I still want more cellar hours… 

 

Non-verbal communication is key.  We can understand what the other needs with a nod of the head, a hand gesture, or even just the look on a face, the glint in an eye.  I have to say that it’s pretty fucking fun, being behind the bar with these people, when it’s fucking slammed, and you don’t even have time to think when a new group of six rolls up, you’re pouring for three groups outside, four groups inside, and you just smile, open the tasting menu, set out glasses, and give your spiel, and just know that somehow, you will manage to juggle all the groups without a hiccup, and then sip on a delicious bit of wine when the shift is over, and you are closing together, laughing about the day, exhausted (though undeniably a different kind of exhausted than I am used to), but happy. 

 

These are the people I go out with on Tuesdays, when the tasting room is closed, if I’m not lucky enough to have cellar hours.  We taste for free everywhere we go, because we are industry, but of course we buy wine (at an industry discount) and at the very least leave a tip, because it is proper etiquette.  We do this to bond, to have fun, to get to know each other better, team-build, and get to know our neighboring wineries and staff, so we know who to send people to after they taste at our winery.  It is a very tight-knit industry, and everyone knows each other and everyone in every tasting room has their favorite other wineries they send people to.  I’ve met some of the most awesome people, in the industry, who come in to taste where I work, and I always send customers their way.  It’s our way of paying it forward.  It’s good business, and it’s just the way things work.

 

 

 

So things at work are basically great for me, but being the person that I am, I can’t just be content to enjoy what I do, I have to be the best!  I want the most hours, I want the highest sales, I want the best shifts.  I am always putting more pressure on myself than I need to, because simply floating along like a feather in the placid wind isn’t going to cut it for me.  If I have forty hours a week, I strive for fifty.  I never feel like I get enough cellar time, even though there really isn’t that much to do in the cellar right now, or really up until next harvest, and I have the best shifts, but I want longer hours on the best shifts, or else more responsibilities.  I am incapable of just kicking back and watching the grass grow, that sort of shit drives me crazy!

 

But… I am happy.  The epiphany that lead to my discovery of why I am truly, and sincerely happy, however, will have to wait.  Conclusions cannot be rushed, and it really is a complex happiness, in a sense, even if the clues that lead up to my discovery of happiness would, to the normal person, seem quite obvious…

 

I know that I put a lot of pressure on myself.  I know that I am the type of person who will never be content with mediocre.  I will always strive to learn more, know more, dream more, and never give up on my dreams, and even if I achieved them all, I would create new dreams, because living a life with nothing more to strive to achieve would greatly disappoint me, and leave me as uninspired and unpalatable as a glass of delicious champagne left out on the counter over night; tepid, and flat, something that could have been beautiful, but had gone to waste instead of being consumed.

 

I do not want to live a tepid and flat existence, and so I challenge myself.  I know a lot of people who are content with living tepid, flat existences.  I could name names, but I won’t.  All I know, is that my friends and I do not want to be tepid and flat.  We face challenges that the tepid and flat vast majority do not have to face.  My friends and I face mockery, ridicule, incredulousness, and even pity, from the vast majority of the tepid and flat existence.  I say, “fuck authority.  Fuck the majority!”  Middle finger out, honestly, go FUCK YOURSELVES! 

 

 

Anyone eager to mock myself or my posse is beneath me, beneath us.  Our paths are rocky, unstable, and dangerous, but at least we feel alive.  Through the pain, sorrow, tears, tribulations and triumphs, we are living a superior existence, in my opinion, but to each their own.  Some people think squeezing out spawn is all they have to offer to the world.  Congrats, and power on!  Other people want to change the world through other means of self expression, or even do both.  Each are valuable contributions to the world as a whole.  I applaud those willing to be tepid and flat.  Without the banality, mankind as we know it would cease to exist.  So lets just all simmer down, and appreciate the individual paths we all take, because we all are dealing with our own pains, sacrifices, struggles, dreams, and goals.  What kills me the most is that we can’t just learn to be supportive of our unique, individual paths, and we all seem to prefer to gravitate toward ripping each other to shreds.       

 

 

I know that I can, in all reality, just breathe and relax, now that I am content with my job situation, and I know I would be better off if I could just do that, but that is not me.  I want more.  I cannot, will not, and have never been able to just settle.  If I were capable of simply being content with life, I would still be married to my ex-husband.  I actually don’t even think it’s a matter of wanting more, it’s needing more.  Before, I was incredibly well off, owned my home, had a “nice”, “pleasant”, easy going, white picket fence sort of existence, but I was far from happy.  Now I’m pretty much broke, living with my best friend, but I feel alive, challenged, happy, and I am inspired to live up to the expectations I have always had for myself, only now I do not sit my ass upon a fluffy white pillow at night and know that if I do not succeed, I will still be taken care of (though Marge pretty much takes care of me, but that is not exactly what I mean).  Now is the time for me to step up to the plate and make some magic happen.  Now is the time to do something that could ultimately change my future, and only then can I re-pay Marge, and then some.  Some of my favorite successes, from artists I admire, sparked from pretty dire circumstances.  The point is to never give up, to never let the tepid, flat majority effect your future in any way.  Let them sit on their banal asses and judge, mock, and belittle you for trying, at the very least, to do something, while they strive to do nothing.  Now who should hold the gavel?  Huh?  When did sitting on one’s ass, eating Doritos and judging with no shame, but with crumbs on their lap become admirable?  That is actually quite disgusting and despicable to me, but I never pointed a finger at that sort of slovenly existence until a finger was pointed at me, in judgment, or at one of my friends. 

 

I have never picked on anyone for just being content with being average, or ordinary, until the average or ordinary decided to pick on my friends, or myself.  I don’t think I ever mocked people who just wanted to lead bland, stale, placid sort of lives, but when those people want to find their amusement in the lives of people who have the courage to put their egos aside and strive for something more out of life, it is then that I pick up my figurative machete and want to make heads roll!  It is easy to mock people for their attempted goals and dreams when a person has no goals or dreams of their own, but is it fair?  Is it just?  The type of person who mocks a revolutionary is someone too timid to step up to the plate, grab a bat, and look a fastball in the face, eyes narrowed, crooked brow, sweat dripping down one’s temple, pulse racing, heart thumping, everything to lose and next to nothing to gain.  It takes courage to pursue dreams, to face mockery, to stand up for what one believes in, but I suppose I’ve gotten a bit off track, and have gone off on a tangent, because I want to stand up to bullies who really have no right to judge. 

 

 

Bullies bully because they are intimidated by ferocious, strong willed and strong minded people who have the balls and courage to take a chance and strive for something different, something better, for a life less placid and banal.  Bullies only bully because they are afraid that if they don’t bully, the spotlight will inevitably fall back upon them, their failures, their inadequesies, and they know they have nothing worthy of placing in the spot light to begin with.  Bullies are nothing more than cowards.

 

 

 

Again I digress, and I apologize.  I just get pretty heated when inferior people pick on my friends or other people who are eager to dream big because a life without dreams, to people like us, would not be a life worth living.  I will conclude my previous thought with this:

 

Since the beginning of the New Year, I thought that perhaps my year was starting off to a somewhat uninspired and mundane, hiccupping start with fits and jolts because I did not wake up every morning shouting with joy, throwing the covers off of me, dancing through the hallway on my way to the coffee machine.  Some mornings I felt like that, yes.  Some mornings, I woke up with an absolutely erotic sort of delicious, deviant excitement, a mischievousness, a wicked determination, a gratitude for nothing, really, aside from being alive and loving life and feeling great.  This was a good thing, and I recognized it as such, however, on days when I woke up just feeling “normal”, When I hit the snooze button a couple of times, when I did not want to get out of bed and face the frigid cold of winter, when I just wanted to stay warm and cuddle up with my puppy and not get out of bed, instead of accepting that that is how most people start their day, I thought of this as a bad sign, and not something normal at all.  I had been having so many delicious mornings, that when a morning was not positively gorgeous, and was just “fine”, I started wondering why I wasn’t dancing, and started wondering if I was slipping back into depression again.

 

This is why I think most people would think I was crazy for feeling the way I did, the past few weeks of the New Year.  Most people do not know me personally, and did not know me as the person I was before.  But even when I was working at the nuke plant, no, I did not enjoy waking up at fucking 4:30 in the morning, and more often than not hit snooze a couple of times, but once I was awake and at the plant, I was all laughs and smiles, because I was always happy.  Cynical, determined, hard working, serious in my work, but always happy, and quick to joke, laugh, and smile.  So these days, for some random reason, I think that I focus more on the fear of what may be wrong with me if I am not as I used to be, all jokes and smiles, as opposed to being incredibly appreciative of perhaps the most important occurrence in the past two years; the fact that I no longer wake up in the morning with incapacitating anxiety, and even better than that, I wake up with no anxiety at all.

 

 

 

My rare days off are no longer spent stressing out, wandering the house aimlessly, filled with anxiety, antsy butterflies in my stomach and a complete lack of focus, but are instead spent studying my world Atlas of Wine, in preparation for the sommelier two day course and exam I will be taking in San Francisco, either at the end of this year or some time next year, I have looked into taking some extended education classes at Cal Poly, in enology, winemaking, and wine appreciation, which my father has enthusiastically offered to help fund, or doing other creative, gratifying art projects, or else writing.  To think of all the time I wasted allowing anxiety to consume me really bums me out, but instead of focusing on the negative, and all the time I have lost, I enjoy the moment with a smile on my face, and reflect eagerly on all the time I have ahead of me, the new goals I have set for myself, and all that I am going to learn in the present, and near future.   

 

Anxiety is a tricky bastard, a mischievous motherfucker.  To those who have not experienced it, it is difficult to describe, much the way I did not understand depression until I myself had experienced it.  For me, if I knew what was causing my anxiety, I could usually talk myself out of it without having to take medication, and could carry on with my day as any normal person would.  But when you wake up gripping your bed sheets in terror, clammy, sweating, hyperventilating, gasping for breath, feeling like you are drowning and being suffocated with a pillow at the same time, you don’t know what is causing the sensation, all that you know is that you are feeling the way you do, for what appears to be no reason at all.  If nothing is causing your misery, you cannot approach it rationally and tackle it the ground and make it your bitch, and so you suffer, all too greatly.

 

So I suppose my point is that, until I met up with my dear friend and we had a couple of beers together, I thought the beginning of my New Year sort of sucked because though I woke up more often than not positively ecstatic, the days I felt just mediocre I thought maybe something wrong with me, and that is just an insane and ludicrous way to think!  I mean, honestly, I should have been focusing on the positive fact that I no longer woke up with anxiety, but that just goes to show the huge amount of pressure I put on myself, and though I know I need to tone it down a bit, I know that is just who I am as a person, and I will always strive to be the best I can possibly be.  I just need to learn to allow myself to hit the snooze and not feel guilty about it.  What is life without a few guilty pleasures, after all?  ;)

 

 

The contradiction that is me...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHYDFClkqHw

(Cole) 1/3/15:

 

Hola a todos!  I hope that everyone had a great New Year’s Eve, and that the New Year itself has kicked off to a great fresh start, with a clean slate, to pave the way for future happiness.  As for me, my New Year’s Eve was pretty mellow, but it was awesome.  I worked until about seven, got to take home eight pretty much full bottles of epic wine to drink, seeing as we were closed the next day, and could not hold on to them.  I came home, cracked a delicious bottle of champagne, then did a little tasting of some of the wines I did not gas (so as to hold them over for the following day), conversed with the lovely and always entertaining Marge for a bit, and then sat down behind my computer to write, with my adorable little puppy in my lap.  I watched the ball drop with Marge at midnight, and then went back to writing.  When I hit a stalemate with where I wanted to go, I turned my computer off and crawled into bed to read, and ultimately ended up falling asleep with the book in my hands, which is not uncommon for me, on any given day of the week, but it was mellow and peaceful, and thankfully, I was not out and about, freezing my ass off, surrounded by people I couldn’t stand or had nothing in common with, screaming to try and maintain a conversation over blasting music I do not enjoy, running around looking for someone to kiss at the stroke of midnight (getting mouth herpes from a stranger does not sound fun to me!).  That is not my style, and if that was what my night had turned into, I would not have been very happy, and I would hate to spend the very first second of the very first day of a brand new year unhappy.

 

New Year’s day, on the other hand, while still pretty mellow, was WAY more exciting and eventful, but what can I say?  I’m just more fun and into doing things and getting into trouble when I have the entire day off, get to sleep in, and just see where the day takes me, which leads me to a new idea that just occurred to me, one can even consider if a fresh “resolution” to add to my list, but I only just now thought of it, and the idea is so delicious and enticing that it has me positively giddy with joy! 

 

The series of events that have ultimately lead me up to this new, current, change of perspective were pretty random and inconsequential, and the thought really only just now occurred to me, at 10:42 on a Saturday night, having gotten home from work, showered, poured myself a glass of wine and began reflecting on how the beginning of my new year has been great in terms of work, but outside of work, pretty uninspiring and bland.  I started thinking of the person I used to be, the person I am slowly becoming again, at least in terms of happiness and loving myself, and then all of the sudden this idea popped into my head, and I decided that I should tackle it, and own it, and maybe then and only then can I truly be the whole person that I used to be, two years ago, when I had just moved to SLO, and was so happy to be starting my life over fresh, newly single, independent, confident, and loving every minute of life. 

 

But before I get to this new, gorgeous idea, a little background story.  After all, the reader should know where my head has been to get me to my current state of mind…

 

New Year’s day, I slept in.  I made myself a pot of coffee, and tried to finish my blog post, because I really wanted to post something upbeat for the New Year.  I had a lot of ideas and thoughts rolling around in my head, and I wanted to get them down.  Writing is pretty much the thing that makes me the most happy these days, apart from work, and nothing brings a bigger smile to my face or has me so excited and genuinely positive than when I am behind my computer, expressing myself, and hopefully penning some sentences or paragraphs that people can relate to, and benefit from, in some way.

 

I knew that Marge wanted to commandeer Mickey’s truck for the day and get a little joy riding in, so I was rushing to finish my post and get it up and running, in case some hungover blog followers wanted something to read.  I poured myself the last glass of champagne in the bottle from the previous night, which I had abandoned early to get more intimate with some reds that I pour at work, so as to better speak about them with people, but I would never let a delicious bottle of champagne go to waste, and it was a new year, I was feeling upbeat because I was writing, frisky because I knew we were going to get out of the house in a beefy, four wheel drive, diesel, and I just wanted my first fresh day to kick off epically. 

 

I finished my post, but I was in a slight rush, so afterward I just threw on whatever was lying on the floor and off we went!  After picking up the truck, we decided to go to the Kilt, in Paso, because Marge brought her dog, they had a patio, and I thought that a pint of IPA sounded like a delicious idea.  It wasn’t until we were about half way there that I realized that not only was I un-showered from the night before, but that I had also not had time to brush my teeth or run a comb through my hair.  I was wearing a pair of army pants with the top two buttons popped off, a tank top that said “sunshine and fuckin’ rainbows” with a skull and crossbones on the front of it, a pair of combat boots, unzipped, my skull ring on my right middle finger, and my brass knuckles necklace with the keys to my 12 gauge slung on them, and a black leather jacket.  At least I had remembered to spray on a squirt of perfume, but that was about the only thing I had going for me at the time.  But I didn’t care!  I felt good, I was with my best friend, we were cruising around in a big ass truck, I wasn’t too hungover, and was slightly buzzed off my glass of champagne on an empty stomach, and we were going to have a beer and enjoy the first day of a brand new year on the crisp, fallen leaf filled patio of a local bar, and it was beautiful in its simplicity. 

 

 

 

 

The sun was out, the patio was positively covered with fallen leaves, the light was gorgeous, and I felt good!  I left Marge on the patio with her dog and went inside to get us drinks.  The bar was packed, and the buzz inside was radiating warmth and happiness.  I sidled up and as I was waiting to put in my order, I started talking some shit about college football to the two men on either side of me.  We discussed the Raiders, other teams, the football season in general, and I ended up having my Lagunitas IPA, Corona (for Marge), and shot of Jameson purchased for me, by one of the gentleman I was conversing with.  I was dressed like a fucking hobo, un-showered, with un-brushed teeth and hair, and was already having drinks bought for me.  I was feeling pretty impressed with 2015, and had only been up for a handful of hours.  Not a bad way to kick off the New Year!

 

Marge and I drank our beers out on the patio and engaged in lively conversation.  For numerous reasons we haven’t really spent all that much time together, over the past few months, or really since I had began working harvest at Niner winery and she was in an outage at the nuke plant, so it was really lovely to just chat about life, the past year, our hopes for the new year, etc.  We finished our beers and went home, picking up fast food on the way back.  I mowed down a disgusting amount of cheeseburgers, fries, and chicken nuggets, and then took a nap, showered, and got ready to hear one of our favorite bands play at Frog and Peach, in SLO. 

 

We rolled up a little early, and as always, talked a little shit with the band, as they were setting up, passing flasks around, etc…  It’s always great to be on the bass player’s good side  ;)

 

The band played wonderfully, as always, and I had several interesting conversations with a handful of random strangers, got hit on a bit, but by no one I was interested in, and met some “industry” people that I could talk about wine and spirits with, exchanged a few business cards, etc.  It was a nice, chilly, mellow night in SLO, with not a whole lot of people out, which I love.  Frog and Peach can get so crowded and loud, so to me it was a perfect evening.  Pretty dead bar, best seats in the house, entertaining conversations.  I came home and passed the fuck out, only to wake up the next day for work slightly hungover, but not morbidly so.  My weakness for whiskey gets me every time.  Just a little fuzzy and sleep deprived.  Aside from that I was fine, and I was working the late shift anyway, one to ten, because we were offering a new special; a glass of cabernet sauvignon and an epic blue cheese burger for twenty bucks.  The interest and outcome was not bad, for a frigid, January evening, and some of the nicest industry people attended and kept us entertained and busy behind the bar.  It was a great night, but not part of the reasoning behind what sparked my latest, greatest idea for myself in the past two years…

 

Before burger and a glass of cab. kicked off, at five, it was business as usual, and we were busy.  Not slammed, but it was a pretty full house, and I was pouring for several people, in addition to a large group that just came in, to celebrate a birthday.  The large group that had just entered were well dressed, attractive, and seemed to be in their late thirties and early forties.  They were lively, pleasant, polite, not drunk, but I had to do a double take, once they all meandered in and gathered around a large table in the middle of the tasting room, because one of the guys looked almost exactly like the Rapist, only hotter, and he had all his hair (the Rapist’s hair is prematurely “thinning”, to put it politely).  I was instantly attracted to him, but tried my best to avoid eye contact, at first, because I didn’t want to come across as weird, but I was oddly drawn to him, even though he was someone I had never met before.  But it was fascinating, that I could be so attracted to a complete stranger, simply by association.  The further into their tasting, I could tell that he was intrigued as well, but I was busy, and we did not converse much. 

 

Later, once the bar thinned out and my time was freed, the majority of them came to the bar, and conversations ensued.  I spoke mainly with him, and learned that he was in town to meet up for the celebration of a birthday, but was from the bay area, visiting friends he attended college with at Cal Poly.  The more time went on the more he held me hostage and occupied the majority of my time.  I wanted to lean across the bar and lick his fucking face, but I remained professional and even slightly aloof.  He was a complete stranger, after all. 

 

The more time that passed, the more tempted I was to just write down my number and slide it to him across the bar.  He was only in town for a couple of days, anyway, and I had this insane desire to just meet up with him and hate fuck the shit out of him, because I didn’t necessarily like the guy all that much, or want anything more to do with him than just take some aggression out.  The group was large, and though he did not seem to have come in with a woman, I couldn’t be sure, and aside from that, I don’t even know how that sort of thing works.  I didn’t want to come across as forward, or desperate, or trashy.  I NEVER hit on people at work, and I never even call any of the dudes who give me their numbers!  I’m not loose, I’m not a whore, but I actually am pretty due for a good fucking, but I don’t really know how to delicately approach the situation.  I’ve been far too good for FAR too long, and I think it might just be time to change that, but I am getting slightly ahead of myself.

 

Before the hotter, Rapist-look-alike left, he bought two bottles of wine, confessing while he purchased them that he didn’t even really drink wine, and chatting me up, keeping my attention fully engaged.  I pussed out, did not write my number on his receipt, and watched him leave, while confessing to one of my co-workers the dilemma I was faced with.  He laughed at me and called me out for being a pussy.  He said the guy would have been fucking stoked to have an all night fuck fest with me, and told me to step up my game, but there in case, lies the problem, and the new turn of events that has lead me into me thinking I might just need to revert back to the person I used to be, in order to be happy…

 

I’m too good, as of late, and I should just be bad.  I’ve been too good, for the past two years, because of the Rapist, even when he and I have not been together, because I guess on some level, I always wanted to believe that he and I would get back together, so I allow myself no naughty, guilty pleasures.  But why be good?  What has being good the past two years gotten me?  Nothing.  Aside from being fucked over, mistreated, fucked out of an epic job, or verbally abused by scorned, potential suitors.  (Seriously though.  I’ve had some dudes freak the fuck out on me!).  So if being good has brought me nothing but bad news, yet being bad had previously delivered to me everything I could have possibly asked for, why am I still riding this fucked up, shoddy “nice” train?  The newer, sleeker, naughty train is looking pretty state of the art, right about now.   

 

 

 

When the Rapist and I split for about a month, in April, I remember one of my previous bosses from the nuke plant trying to cheer me up.  He said, “you’re young, you’re hot, and you’re smart.  Probably too damn smart for your own good”.  (To this day, probably the best compliment I have ever received, though looks and age are fleeting.  It tops being told I was “creepy, yet attractive, at McCarthy’s, which previously held the record, out of sheer hilarity.)  He was trying to cheer me up, because I was in a really bad place.  I know most of the people in my life have always felt like the Rapist was/is unworthy of me, and have tried to shine actual, physical light on the situation, but when your head is stuck in the sand, you tend to overlook certain aspects of reality.  I feel like I am now ready to pull my head out of the sand, and look reality in the face.  I am ready to start dating.  I am ready to be naughty, spontaneous, get into trouble, have adventures, and be open to the possibility of meeting someone who is actually somewhat cultured, open, traveled, literate, and adventurous.  I don’t want to be good for the sake of being good, for the reason of actually, genuinely wanting to be good for someone dirty, disrespectful, and unworthy, just to absolve myself of past sins.  I have been good for far too long, for someone far too beneath me.  I am still willing to be good, but now I would like to be good for someone who deserves my devotion, and until then, fuck the world!  I’ll do what I want!  I want to be good for someone who appreciates my voracious sexual appetite and meets my physical demands and desires, not someone who says I am only to be granted two boners a day, and cannot ask for more.  I want to be good for someone who is fucking stoked on the person I am, what I have accomplished in life, continue to try and achieve, and who is proud to be with me, not ashamed of me because he cares too much about incoherent lies and rumors.  And also, someone who doesn’t put a limit on the amount of erections he can provide me in a day.  For a guy claiming to be going through a mid-life crisis, I would think he would be a little more generous in the boner department, but I’m not a dude, and certainly not a dude on the cusp of 40, so I guess I don’t really know how dude “junk” works at that age. 

 

 

For a long time I thought that perhaps the Rapist thought he was better than me, but at the same time I knew it could only be because he made more money than me, and even at that, when I was working at the nuke plant, not that much more at all.  But surely he could not think that he was better than me for any other reason.  He was certainly older, less educated, less literate in his own native language, less traveled, less cultured, and knew far less about food, wine, literature, and most other things that mattered to me in life.  Why he thought he was better than me always baffled me, unless of course he thought his past was less shady and cloudy than mine, and even then I would never give him the upper hand in any way, shape, or form.  The past is nothing more than the culmination of events that shapes the person you become in the future.  The past is not really significant.  The only thing that really matters is who and what the present person chooses to leave in the past, and who the present person is in the present moment, and strives to be in the future.  The past belongs nowhere but in the past…   

 

So, for a lot of reasons, I have decided to change my outlook and manner of living.  I will be more spontaneous, more ambitious, more open to the different options life offers up.  I will not shy away from enticing options, nor will I throw myself at anything shady, just for the sake of being more outgoing.

 

When I came to work a couple of days later, my co-worker who I had confessed my desire to hate fuck that one guy to, we’ll call him Chef (because he is one and went to culinary school), could not stop laughing about it.  I thought what he said to me when I walked in was that I just refused to get over not giving that guy my number that night, and I when I agreed that he was right and it was stupid, and that I just should have, he corrected me and said he meant that he couldn’t get over it, and that it was his new mission to find me someone to hate fuck.  I laughed and happily agreed.  Makes my job a hell of a lot easier!  I don’t even have to put any work into it aside from judging a potential victim and either accepting or denying the candidates he brings to me.  Pretty simple! :D

 

And until then, I have taken the blinders off, now that I feel I am finally physically and emotionally capable of getting back into the “game”, and dating again, and not feeling weird about it, or like I am betraying the Rapist in some way, who now no longer factors into my decision making process.  Just in the past couple of days alone I have noticed how many really attractive, single men in the industry there actually are out there, and even seem eager to converse with me, as I pour them wine, and hand me their business cards and tell me that I should most certainly come in and taste when they are pouring at their winery, or barrel sample in their cellar, should they be cellar masters, winemakers, or assistant winemakers.  I feel sort of silly for being so anti all this time, for not taking these attractive men up on their offers, especially since we have at least one or two things deeply in common. Which is food and wine, in addition to several varying others, depending on which person and the subjects we discuss while enjoying the “art” and etiquette of pouring and tasting wine. 

 

Just today two very attractive industry gentlemen came in.  One worked at a winery in Santa Maria, pouring wine, but also assisting in making wine as well, and the other, one of the chefs at The Madonna Inn.  They were slightly shy at first, but I was in a great mood, and quickly put them at ease with my casual manner of speaking and odd humor.  When I asked the chef what he did, he said he dealt with cows and steak.  I replied, “like butchering them?”  He laughed, and said that he used to.  I said that I had always wanted to learn how to butcher animals, and that I thought I would make a great butcher.  They both responded that they would love to have a girlfriend who could butcher a cow, proper.  Since they were both attractive to me, the chef more than the wine guy, I had to wonder; did this mean that they both had girlfriends incapable of butchering cows, or that they were single, but thought it would be cool to date a hot butcher chick?

 

Had I been on my “game”, I would have quickly replied that while I may not be able to proper butcher a cow, I could certainly proper re-tile their bathroom or kitchen floor, which I’m sure would have intrigued them, but as I said, I am a bit rusty at this being available and single thing.  I know it’ll start to come quite naturally, I just need to remember that I am single and open to options now, whereas before, I may have been single, but I was not available.  There is quite a difference!    

 

Wishing they had been more specific but not knowing how to politely inquire, I continued to pour for them the way I typically do for any industry people who are not lame and are super cool.  I don’t make them choose a tasting flight (as we have four different flights, because we make a lot of wine), but I picked and chose my favorite wines to pour for them, explaining to them why I chose the wines I did, why I thought they were special, unique, delicious, etc.  They lightened up and became much more relaxed and friendly, and asked me if I would mind giving them a tour of the facility.  I told them I would love to, as I was not very busy, passed the other group I was pouring for at the time to a co-worker, replenished their glasses, poured myself a taste of one of our reserve Chardonnays we very rarely open to pour tastings of, because so few barrels of it were actually made, and I took them around the building, to our reserve tasting room, the banquet room, and the two upper terraces, to show them the view and explain our future plans for the copious amounts of space we have at our disposal. 

 

We discussed other local wineries in the area, while on the terrace, overlooking the rolling hills of Paso Robles.  I had told them that my co-workers and I were all going out tasting together on Tuesday, the day the tasting room is closed, after a work meeting, and they told me about their favorite places, places we should go to and places we should avoid.  The one guy who worked at a winery was telling me about all the places he had worked harvests, both domestically and abroad, giving me tips on how to get more cellar hours, how to go about landing another cellar job by next harvest, should it for some reason not work out at the winery I am currently working for.  They were just really great, easy going dudes, who came in shy and aloof and left completely transformed.  I like that I more often than not have that effect on people in the tasting room.  It tells me that I am doing my job right.  By the time we descended the stairs and they were paying out, they were all smiles, grateful for my time and hospitality, business cards were exchanged, and off they went.

 

I think that what I have learned over the past month or so, but really more over the past couple of weeks, is that no matter what you do, for a living, or just in general, life is what you make of it.  You can choose to focus on the positive, you can choose to focus on the negative, or you can choose to just get out there, enjoy life, smile, do what you love, love what you do, meet awesome new people, and be grateful for the things you do have as opposed to focusing on the things you don’t.  Revel in the good, don’t dwell on the bad, and don’t let anyone unworthy of your time or love bring you down, because you’d really be surprised how much you can miss out on, when you are holding onto something that truly does not belong in your life.  Live, love, grow.  Let the toxic, negative, oppressive influences in your life go, in fact, kick them to the curb, because they can bring you down in ways you aren’t even aware of.  Appreciate and embrace the little beauties in life, and before you know it, you’ll be the happiest you’ve ever been! 

 

I’m looking forward to 2015 being a year full of new and exciting experiences and challenges, new opportunities, filled with learning, growing, meeting new people and discovering new things.  I’m looking forward to advancing with my new current company, and certainly to helping them to succeed and advance in the community as well.  I truly believe that if I keep smiling, keep with my current state of mind, stay positive and upbeat, continue down this new, great and exciting path I’ve decided to take, 2015 will be the best year I’ve had in a long time, and I cannot wait to see where the road takes me! 

 

Cheers, everyone, to a bountiful and euphoric 2015!!!

 

MUAK!!!          

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJT3dYIDPjY&feature=share