Listening

Listening to 405 by Death Cab for Cutie takes me back to nights lying on the floor of Landon's bedroom.  It's late and dark.  The night reflective of experiencing youth turning in to adulthood.  Everything mysterious and new, not sure what lies very far ahead, hidden in the dark.  Feeling an intensely easy connection to people still very foreign to other personal lives I've so far grown to know.

Familiarity still primarily grounded to my parents and by association my one brother.  Parents are your reality as a child.  Life defined by the people they are.  Now an entirely frightening idea.

And so here I lie, or there I laid, on the fairly barren floor of a newfound brother in arms, surrounded by four bodies of whom I am, or was, only slightly beginning to understand, and listening to music fresh and innovative to my soul.  My brain turns, or turned, these musical impressions in to very distinct memories and intertwined feelings.

Now I sit, or lie, listening to the same music, perfectly preserved by digital reproduction, and I am transported back in time some 7 odd years.

Adulthood no longer so dark and unknown.  Time has revealed some of its secrets, shed light on some of these mysteries.  The song 405 holds a little more personal meaning than it ever could have those 7 years before.  But the emotional relationship is the same.

It keeps me thrown askew.

Space

It is dark in my apartment.  There is precipitation outside.  That nasty looking strawberry at the bottom of the basket was the sweetest and most delicious.

I find inspiration through others and that leads me to believe I am extroverted.  Reading the blogs of Landon and Suzie (and Suzie) inspired me to write this post.

Last night at work I got to bar tend more so than bar back.  It was slow, and so nice.  I got to smile at people, and have conversations, and craft beverages and make recommendations.  People seemed happy.  It wasn't like Saturday night where I was pressed to get things done; fill waters, polish glasses, empty bus tubs, and have drunk people get angry about the price of the wine they ordered.  But I made forty-five more dollars on Saturday.  That's the trade off.

I really want to open some kind of hospitality place.  What exactly that will look like is ever changing in my mind.  Part of traveling in the future includes the ability to be witness to many different hospitable spots around the world.  What they look like, smell like, taste like, feel like.  Most importantly what they feel like.  I want people to feel welcome and taken care of in whatever space I open.  I want them to be greeted by smiling bar tenders.  Not because I told the bar tenders to smile, but because the guests are excited to be there and the bar tenders are excited to serve them—to play a part in offering them something they cannot get elsewhere.

For me these things come through in light, texture, music.  Through exceedingly high quality beverages of varying sorts.  Through food that surprises and comforts.

The vision of this place solidifies a little more each day and I am excited to someday walk the space and greet every person who fills it with their presence and helps bring it to life.

I kind of want to call it Friendship Committee Museum.

Ties

I've written about being tied to a place before.  I am starting to feel a little tied to Denver.  And I have been tying more ties around my neck than ever before.

I thought about leaving at the beginning of the year.  Figured I would venture up to ever so sunny Seattle and help tend a farm.  But then I got offered this job at a cool new restaurant that was opening in the Highlands neighborhood in downtown Denver town and figured I couldn't pass it up.

I feel like I am making the kind of connections that could begin to take me places.  Connections with various people, in various circles, with various important ties and connections to other important people, places and things of varying sorts.  Just to phrase it in the vaguest of ways.  This is both exciting and terrifying.

It's kind of like that serious relationship I am kind of glad I am not in.  That one that would keep me tied down.  Keep me from moving and shaking like any savvy, well, you know: twenty-something.

I had lunch with an old high school friend of mine today. Which is a funny thing to be able to say now that I am nearly six years out of that four year institution.  And what did it make me think of?  More than reminiscing about those four years, I reminisced about the four years after them, and the two following those four—thought about the two that will follow this one.  What I have done and what I will do.

Eva, the friend I had Pho' with today, has graduated with an art degree, has been working at an art museum and is about to start her masters degree.  I graduated with an art degree, in film to be specific, have completed a couple feature length docs and am working on a successful bar-tending resume...haha.  I think we are both more or less where we figured we would be six years ago.  Actually, fuck that shit, I don't think I am anywhere near where I thought I would be six years ago.

If you had asked me then I would probably tell you that by now I would be done with school (check), working with a production company or tending to my own (semi-check), married (ha!), working on Chinese Waters (yeah, no longer a Christian) and maybe thinking about having a kid soon (double ha!).

I am definitely not as far along as I thought I would be in this so called life.  But, that said, all these connections and possible opportunities that could take me to that further along place, well, they make me nervous.

Like that metaphorical relationship: while the closeness that comes with being tied down is nice, it can also be a little restricting.  I may want to disappear in a year.  You know, purchase a plane ticket and see where it takes me, but if I am building upon business relationships and opportunities here in Denver—will I want to?

I am left with this choice, this choice to work hard and make things happen.  To really make shit happen.  Part of me wants that.  Really wants that.  Then there is a part of me that wants to skate by, take the easy way; ride it out.  And then in a year—disappear.

Tonight as I drove home I wondered if I could have both.  If I could work hard, make lots of great connections, and then disappear.  Just return in a year or two and pick up where I left off.  But I don't believe it works that way.

We had a craft beer rep for a local brewery tell us during one of our days filming for our documentary that he can't stop distributing to a liquor store for a week without loosing the rapport that he has built with them.  He works for a small upstart brewery and they were having problems with supplying enough beer to fill the demand.  Arguably a good problem to have.  But that said, he couldn't just stop and then pick back up where he had left off with these guys who were counting on his product to fill their shelves.  He had to maintain that relationship.

I really want to build some good relationships.  Or do I?