The following is my testimony of how I was called into God’s service.
I had just rolled down the highway 1200 miles in two days so I could reach Nashville by Friday, October 4, 2013. I could have spent time exploring Kansas City, St. Louis, or a number of places along the way, but I was ready for a fresh start in Tennessee, and wanted to be there that weekend. I pushed myself and my 1996 Ford F150 hard to make it. By 7:00 pm I had checked into my hotel, and after a quick shower I walked to the Bound’ry Restaurant near Vanderbilt University, set myself up at the bar, and ordered a pint of ale to relax and start celebrating.
As chance would have it, the man sitting at the bar to my right happened to be a traveling Professor from Canada. He was working at Vanderbilt researching why Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence that we have a right to the Pursuit of Happiness. John Locke, who influenced Jefferson, said we have a right to Life, Liberty, and Property, but according to historical sources Jefferson appeared to, at last minute, change Property to The Pursuit of Happiness. Why?
If I were to put myself in Jefferson’s shoes for a minute, I would imagine that the world he lived in was one where people were immigrating to America for the promise of liberty, and to escape the class system of Europe. Men were fleeing the religious discrimination of the Old World to be free to worship God, the only God, the God of the Bible, anyway they wanted to. America was a place with nothing but potential for a man who had enough will to succeed, and toughness to overcome the hardships of the journey. It was a place where the only limit to success, the only barrier to reaching one’s own goals, was in the heart.
In my own way, I was busy similarly Pursuing Happiness. I am a disabled Veteran. I have a 50% disability rating from the Veterans Administration for depression and an anxiety disorder. I dealt with a lot the last five years of my life. Between a divorce, a deployment, and a lot of disappointment, I was usually depressed, and at times, to the point of despair and numbness. There were a few times I wanted to just kill myself. I felt I had lived a decent life, and death would be a sweet relief from my troubles. I woke up every morning hoping for it, praying for it. I felt like Job from the bible.
Day to day, I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. I couldn’t quit. There were people that counted on me, and looked up to me. I couldn’t let them down.
I was honorably discharged after completing twelve months in Afghanistan and my three year enlistment. I decided to go home to Kennewick, WA to be around family, but after two years, I just wasn’t happy there. I felt ashamed around people I had known growing up, and felt like there was a wall between us that I didn’t care to scale. I decided I needed a change; I needed to move, and to Pursue Happiness. I applied for, and was awarded, Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment through the VA. I was going to be able to go back to school and have a fresh start. Since I wasn’t really tied down anywhere, I could choose any place in the country to go to use my Vocational Rehab. I chose to go to Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) in Murfreesboro, TN.
Why Middle Tennessee? I lot of people ask me that, and I might tell them “Well, I had a baby in Raleigh, but she decided to rock someone else……..,” or that “I wanted to be around a lot of co-eds in sundresses and southern drawls,” or “I just wanted to party in Nashville.” None of those are wrong answers, but when it comes down to it, it just felt right in my Thumos. Like God was guiding me there.
I cashed out a $5000 Roth IRA to pay for my journey, which was all I had, and help me get started. I decided that on my journey, I wasn’t going to worry about money, and I was just going to do what was needed to keep up morale, and to accomplish my mission: successfully settling in Middle Tennessee, and to learn to enjoy life again. If it were up to me, I would have just thrown everything I could fit in the back of my truck, and left as soon as I learned that I had money for school, but there was paper work with the VA to ensure my Vocational Rehab, and with the Army Reserve that kept delaying me. I waited around for about two weeks before I got to the point where I felt that if I didn’t leave, I would blow my top, so on Monday, September 30, 2013 I left. I was a ramblin man, see ya’ round.
Leaving everything I knew behind, and traveling into the unknown wasn’t easy. I couldn’t sleep at all the night before. I just laid in bed visualizing my journey. I hadn’t been so anxious or nervous since my senior year playing high school football. For the first two hours of my journey, it felt like someone had kicked me in the stomach. I felt light headed. I had to pee every thirty minutes or so. I stayed the course, and by the time I reached Idaho I was feeling a lot more comfortable with my ramblin fever.
I started out without a clear destination to go my first night. I could have stopped in Boise or some other place in Idaho, and explored the night life there, but I had been alone for the last four years or so and was tired of it. Due to my experiences in the Army, I had self-isolated myself for a long time. I had a friend from the Army in Salt Lake City named Beth who offered me a place to stay, so I drove 625 miles my first day out to Salt Lake City. I drove towards companionship.
I spent a day in a half in Salt Lake resting, fixing my truck, and exploring the night life and restaurants. My friend Beth had just come back from a deployment to Afghanistan in January. She had a full time job, and was going to school full time as well. She spent most of her spare moments of freedom working out. She too had been isolating herself, and had few friends. I didn’t have the opportunity to spend much time with her because she was so busy. I probably explored more of Salt Lake City in twelve hours then she would have in twelve months.
Beth and I had lunch at The Robin’s Nest on Broadway which happens to be a great little sandwich shop in downtown Salt Lake; however, my lunch turned sour, when afterwards, I went to start my truck, and my clutch smacked the floor with no pressure. Broke. My friend Beth had already left to go back to work in her own car. I was stranded downtown.
I could tell my clutch was going out as I left Kennewick. The pressure on it felt off, and I had to give it a whole lot more pressure then usual in order to change gears, it became progressively worse as I traveled, but I wasn’t going to stick around Washington, any longer, for any reason. I decided that if I broke down on the road I would just figure out how to deal with it. A mechanic was actually the next stop on my list of places to go that day.
I called a tow truck. The Tow Truck driver was a great guy. I wish I could remember his name, but I left his card in a hotel in Kansas City. He drove me around to a couple different places as I searched for someone who could work on my truck today, and not tomorrow or sometime later in the week. He remembered a friend, and called up Transmission Man on West Temple who said he could look at my truck today. He was an older gentleman with a friendly countenance, and a hook replacing his left hand. I dropped my truck off, and he had an employee named Jose drive me back to Beth’s place. I asked Jose about work, and he told me that the Transmission Man was the best boss he had ever had, and he even held Jose’s job for nine months when he was sick. In an hour I received a call from Transmission Man, and learned that I just needed hydraulic fluid. My truck was fixed. He didn’t even charge me.
Salt Lake isn’t a bad place. It has some of the friendliest people I have met, amazing food, beautiful women, but soul crushing liquor laws. I cried a little inside every time they measured out an ounce of whiskey instead of an ounce in a half which is standard for a shot. The 3% limit alcohol limit on beer made it so I was basically drinking water.
Beth offered to let me stay with her. She was lonely, and she liked my company. It is difficult as a veteran to find friends and people we can relate to because we are separated by an ocean of experience from those that have never served. We have endured many tribulations. I was tempted to stay, but I had to move on. Destiny and better liquor laws awaited me.
I left Salt Lake City and headed for Cheyenne, WY. In 2011, when I was honorably discharged from active duty, I drove from Fayetteville, North Carolina to Kennewick, Washington. I stopped in Cheyenne, and wasn’t too impressed. Cheyenne may be the smallest, big city in the country. It is small enough that all the locals know each other, and look at you in an unwelcoming manner if you enter a random bar, and big enough that musicians will sing songs about the city, and big country music acts will travel through there from time to time. Despite past experiences, I decided Cheyenne was a worthy stop on my journey.
I ended up at the Holiday Inn which was right next to Outlaw’s Saloon. Outlaw’s Saloon is a big country dance club and concert venue. It was Wednesday night, and the band was good, but the place was empty. I guess the outlaws had better things to do then get drunk, and listen to country music. I asked the bartender about the situation, and she explained that the bad weather was coming, and it was keeping people away……. Great.
By the time I arrived at Outlaw’s something had snapped in me. I am not sure how to describe it except that the gravity of what I was doing, and being out on the open road with no cares helped me reach epic levels of not giving a damn. There was no one at Outlaws really worth talking to, and I was sitting at a big bar by myself. I decided I was just going to sit and drink. I drank many shots of Hornitos and bottles of Coors Light while enjoying the live music. Go big or go home.
Waking up after drinking a lot of tequila is always an interesting experience. Usually it feels like my blood is still on fire, and all the tequila is sitting on top of the pours in my face. Have to sweat it out.
I spent twenty minutes doing some high intensity calisthenics, mostly pushups, sit ups, and body weight squats until I had a good sweat. I cooled off, and took a shower before packing up and looking for breakfast in the hotel restaurant. A tequila hangover is always better with some coffee. The waitress looked at me funny when I ordered an IV full of coffee, but I guess that don’t do that in Cheyenne.
Soon I gassed up my truck, and went racing out of there, trying to beat the incoming storm. Everything that I owned was sitting in the back of my truck uncovered. I had forgotten to buy a tarp before I left, and figured I would just buy one when the need arose.
As I started into Nebraska, the clouds in the sky were dark grey and ominous. It started sprinkling rain a little bit as I hit the middle of the state, and I had to stop off at a trucker stop. I gassed up; bought a tarp and some rope. By the time I was back on the road, the rain started to pelt me like icepicks on your steel shores. Between the tarp and quick rate of travel, my belongings would stay dry this time.
Since being in the Army I had become used to going to bars alone a lot. I became good at making bar friends, and finding adventures, but I decided in Cheyenne that I really didn’t care to do that anymore. I was tired of being alone, so I pushed hard to Nashville where I could start my life anew. I stopped for a night in Kansas City, and had lunch the next day at Mclain BBQ and Pizza in Saint Louis, MO. It was a little local restaurant that gave me, not quite the best ribs I have ever had, but up there on my list. They came in a styrofoam container, and the ribs were sitting in a sea of BBQ sauce. Very rich and tangy.
I drove on. I missed a few exits around Southern Illinois, and after looking at my GPS on my IPhone decided that it would be easier to take some back roads then to back track from where I ended up. I traveled through rural Illinois and through a few towns with population under 1000 people. It was quiet and quaint. It was a good change after many hours on the highway. I came out of rural Southern Illinois around Metropolis.
I was almost to Nashville when I hit bumper to bumper traffic for the last hour or so of my trip. It was excruciating to be impeded this close to my destination after ten hours on the road that day by construction work, but nothing was going to keep me from Nashville. If a tornado had popped up I would have gave it the middle finger and raced on. I was a rock and roll train bound for Glory.
Eventually, I found myself at the Bound’ry Restaurant in Nashville talking with a professor from Canada who was researching the Pursuit of Happiness. I have a degree in Social Studies Education, and am a bit of an amateur historian, so the Professor and I had a good conversation for about an hour and a half about The Pursuit of Happiness, and other topics only history and political nerds would find interesting. Eventually, I decided that I needed to go find some live music and chase girls, so I bid the professor good-night. I walked out into a warm Nashville, Friday night with nothing but destiny in front of me.
I met a lot of women that night. It would have been nice to take one back to my hotel room, but I am above that anymore. I have been single more or less for four years, and I have become a pro at the single bar room game. I could throw some lies out, and deceive a woman into going home with me any night of the week if I really wanted to, but that’s not me. There is so much hurt out there in the dating game. I refuse to add to it. My principles lead to some lonely nights.
Being in Afghanistan for twelve months without any sex or any female affection made me really appreciate what a good woman can do for a man. Women have intrinsic worth regardless of age because it is in their nature to better everyone’s quality of life. It is too bad that there are so many bad boys who steal their innocence, and make a lot of women calloused towards men and dating. It is also too bad that so many young women would give up their innocence so easily. It is more traumatic for most girls to lose their cell phone than their virginity.
I found a few nice young ladies that night in Nashville, but I wasn’t ready to meet anyone. I just like knowing that I can get them. Catch and release. Some of them might have been happy to just spend the night with me, but that wasn’t what I was looking for. I walked back to my hotel room alone after I had explored up Broad Street as far as I cared to walk. As I walked by the bars, and saw their patrons watching me, I wore my loneliness like a dark cloak around me. Being lonely might hurt, but my soul was filled with purpose and promise for the future. I could afford to be patient.
When I woke up then next morning, I changed out of my cowboy boots and sweaty jeans I had been living in for five days, shaved my road beard, and put on some nice dress clothes. The first thing I was going to do as I came into Murfreesboro was find a job. I needed a job to have an apartment. I might have been able to find a job before I left Washington, but I was more motivated this way.
It was Saturday, October 5th and I started by going to the VA hospital in Murfreesboro. I figured there might be an employment service center there. I eventually found one, but I guess they are closed on the weekends. When I was in Afghanistan I worked twelve hours a day seven days a week. I guess the VA isn’t that dedicated.
The degree I was working towards at MTSU was Construction Management, so I wanted to find a job that helped me learn about construction a little bit, and maybe make some contacts. I went to Lowes, Home Depot, Northern Tools, Sears, and a few other random places that caught my interest as I roamed around town. At every business I entered, I would find an employee who looked like they might know something and would say “I am looking for a job. Do you know where I can find one?” What I found out is that it is impossible to be hired anymore without first applying over the internet, and there is no way to walk into a place, get an interview, and be hired on the spot regardless of how many arms you twist.
One of the biggest issues I have with working for large corporate entities is that there is a lot less dignity in it than say, working for a family owned business. I picture soldiers coming back from World War II, and going back to work in the family corner grocery store, but today returning veterans might end up at Walmart. Most of the places I walked into looking for a job felt like empty, soulless, corporate entities except for Sears. The employees and the managers I talked to were friendly, and the place kind of felt like home. Sears is a real Man’s Man store. I decided that this was going to be the place I was going to work.
At about 7:00 pm I was tired of looking for work and needed a drink. I used Yelp to find a bar that felt right to me, and ended up at Gentleman Jim’s. I changed in the parking lot out of my dress clothes and back into my jeans and cowboy boots. I walked into the bar, and was greeted by the smiling faces of bar patrons that must have been admiring me as they were parking. In the bathroom I saw an advertisement that said “Drink the Tequila Worm, Get a T-shirt.” The very next thing I did was win a t-shirt.
I relaxed at Gentlemen Jim’s for a while and decided that I had made the right choice to come to Murfreesboro. The ladies dressed up in nice dresses to go to the bar, and when I put some Allman Brothers and Merle Haggard into the juke box random bar patrons started singing along. The people were friendly and liked to drink. The drinks were college kid affordable. I think I found home. That night I wandered around downtown Murfreesboro, had a cigar at Liquid Smoke, and went around meeting people. I ended my night at Waffle House for some coffee and an All Star Breakfast. I ended up passing out in my truck in the Waffle House parking lot.
When I woke up, I hit up Craigslist on my phone for a place to stay. I had already done a little research, but it is hard to be certain on a place without being able to see it or without having a job. I found an apartment that looked good to me, and drove over to check it out. It was on Main Street within walking distance from the University, downtown, and a number of other restaurants and bars for $525 a month. It was perfect. I really didn’t need to see the inside. I wanted this apartment.
It was early morning Sunday, and I wasn’t going to be able to accomplish anything on this holy day. I had just successful finished an epic journey, so I decided to go to church to give thanks, and ask forgiveness for my sins. I drove down Main Street, and the first church I saw I decided I was going to. I ended up at a black Primitive Baptist Church. I must have looked terrible; a 6’4’’ hung over white cowboy, smelling like a bar, and in my traveled in clothes. My jeans felt disgusting after all the sweat it had absorbed over the last six days. They invited me in anyway.
During the bible study the pastor started talking about my favorite bible verse. I knew I was in the right place. James 1:2-4 states that we should be thankful when we go through trials in our lives because hardships and trials produce patience and help us grow in faith so we may grow to be perfect, lacking in nothing. What a lot of people today do not understand about God is that he has a character. If you read through the bible, the same God that created the earth, sent a flood to wipe out the wicked, destroyed Saddam and Gomorrah, led the Israelites to victory against their enemies, also gave us Jesus. The Lord is a Man of War. He is a winner. God is a father, and like any good father he will make you do chores, get a job, and suffer when you challenge his will. He does so out of love. He wants you to deal with some hardships in your life so you can learn from them and develop character. On a side note, Monday I ended up with about an inch and a half of rain water in the back of my truck. A tarp only helps so much.
The congregation was very friendly at this church, and I think nearly everyone came up and introduced themselves to me and shook my hand. I spent most of the service in the back row talking with Mama, the old widowed matriarch of the church, and dreaming. I liked this church. I decided to coin the preacher.
In the Army we have a tradition where anyone of high rank may have a coin with their name and rank or unit insignia on it. When a leader in the Army sees a soldier give an outstanding performance in his duties, a leader might give that soldier a coin as a reward, to show appreciation. Most soldiers that put in their twenty years and retire have a coin collection.
I had a coin that said I was a Second Lieutenant. I had originally joined the Army to be an Officer, but after twelve weeks of Officer Candidate School (OCS) I was dropped from the course on graduation day because I was young and naive and made some mistakes. That whole incident set my life into a tail spin, and destroyed me for a while. I’ve spent the last five years working on rebuilding myself. Being dropped from OCS wasn’t all bad; though, I wouldn’t be in Murfreesboro today if it hadn’t happened. I managed to make it through the enlisted ranks to Staff Sergeant, and I like being a Non-Commissioned Officer; however, this coin from OCS was burning a hole in my pocket, and was a reminder of a past life.
When the Church asked for tithe I walked up to the front of the congregation, ignored the worried looks of some of the church goers, and coined the preacher. I had the coin in my hand, and passed it to him with a handshake. I told the preacher, “because nothing worth doing is easy,” and “I’m just planting seeds.” Coining the preacher represented me letting go of the past and embracing the future. On the other side of things, maybe that coin might inspire someone within the congregation to do something great. It felt like the right thing to do.
I had an interview at Sears Tuesday, but I was almost out of clean shirts, and most of my clothes were wet from the rain Monday. I ended up dressing in black shoes, black slacks, black button up shirt, black belt. I pumped myself up for my interview by listening to some “Man in Black” by Johnny Cash. As I walked into Sears for the Interview, an older female customer says “Oh look at you, a man in black.” I replied with “Yeah, I guess I am representing the poor and beaten down, and the sick and lonely old today.” “But you are not Johnny Cash” she retorted. “No” I said, “I am just a ramblin man.” She smiled.
I nailed the interview. I think the manager really liked it when he asked “Do you have any questions?” and I replied with “When do I start?” I received a job at Sears selling tools. I tried to persuade the manager of Sears to sign a letter from my apartment manager for proof of employment so I could move into my apartment. I wasn’t officially employed until all the paper work, and background checks were done. That was going to take a few days, so all I could do was wait.
I terrorized Sears a couple times a day about my background check, and having my proof of employment signed, but they had just switched to a new all-digital system for processing new employees, and everything was going slow. I had been staying in hotels all week, and was tired of paying for them. Thursday night I parked in a large, mostly empty parking lot, and backed my truck up near some tall bushes. I planned to drink and socialize at Gentleman Jim’s again, and sleep in the bed of my truck that night under the stars.
So there I was, Pursuing Happiness, sleeping in the back of my truck on a cool Middle Tennessee night on top of my tarp, with my Army pillow an aunt had made for me, and a cozy comforter I had stored in a tuff box, when three campus police officers surround me, and start shinning flashlights in my eyes. They rifle through all my belongings, and rudely jostled them around. I was treated like a criminal. Asking me questions in a rough, authoritative way in order to try and inspire fear in me. I was calm, compliant, and unafraid.
I agreed that I could pay for a hotel even though I was running out of money; however, I wasn’t going to pay for a cab as well. I would rather walk. The police called me a cab and told me I could pay for the cab and the hotel or go to jail. Either way, my truck with all my belongings was about to be impounded. I told the cops, “Let’s go to jail,” and volunteered my wrists. They let me pack my belongings back into my truck before they handcuffed me. I longingly give my comforter one last hug as I packed it up, knowing that was the last bit of comfort I was going to have for a few days.
I ended up making some new friends that night in jail, and thought about sitting in there for the whole thirty days just so they could see how much it didn’t bother me. Every time the guards would come in they would ask when I was going to pay my bail and threaten me with the thirty days. I would reply with “Don’t threaten me with a good time.” The longer I stayed in the jail cell the more I became righteously angry at the injustice of the situation. I ended up chewing out a few of the guards in a way only a Sergeant in the Army knows how to do. They seemed worried by me.
I decided there were things that needed to be done. It was Friday around noon, and I posted my $258 bail on my credit card. I asked about where my truck was, but the Murfreesboro Police Officer didn’t know. He looked on his computer for a minute and said it was at A1 Towing, but he didn’t know where A1 Towing was. He said I should Google it………….. Really?
I walked out of the jail house, and whipped out my smart phone. It had 13% power left. I couldn’t find the A1 towing on the internet, so I started walking back to the parking lot I left my truck at in my cowboy boots and blue jeans in hopes that it wasn’t towed after all. The Murfreesboro Police Officer didn’t inspire much confidence that he knew what he was talking about.
I walked about 2 miles, and was almost to the parking lot where I was arrested, when I saw the campus police station. I walked past it a block or two before it occurred to me that they must know where my truck is since they arrested me, so I back tracked and confidently strode into the campus police station. I group of policemen walked in while I was talking with the secretary. I didn’t remember any of the faces from last night, but the policemen looked kind of nervous, and they became quiet when they passed by me. It turns out my Truck was at ATC towing, so I Yelped its location on my phone and started walking. It was about 3 miles away.
When I reached the place my phone said the towing company was supposed to be I couldn’t find it. I walked up and down a portion of the Old Nashville Highway looking for it, and went into a couple businesses and asked about it. No one knew where ATC towing was. I whipped my phone back out. 1% power. I called ATC Towing. I was in the wrong place. Yelp had lied to me.
I was dehydrated and tired. I didn’t sleep much in jail. I gave my breakfast and lunch away. My feet hurt. Cowboy boots aren’t meant for this much walking. I bent over, and put my hands on my knees for a second to just embrace the suck. I go to my Yellowpages app on my phone to look up ATC Towing. It was another three miles in the other direction. I put my hands on my knees again and embrace some more suck. Stone the Crow. I had reached my mental limit for disappointment and hardship that day, but I had no other choice but to go on.
As I was preparing myself for more walking, a truck pulls up beside me, and a guy named Ron asks me if I wanted a ride. He was working in one the businesses I had walked into, and decided to help me. I accepted. Southern hospitality.
I ended up paying $235 to get my truck out of impound. It would have been $230 if I had cash. I was too tired to even question it. I just gave them my card. All my belongings were still in my truck even if they were thrown about in disarray. At least they left me my unopened bottle of Jim Beam Rye.
That night, with no other place to go, I drove to the Veteran of Foreign Wars (VFW) bar in Smyrna. Going to the VFW is like visiting grandpa. As long as you behave yourself he just wants to spoil you and tell you cool stories. It was the closest thing I was going to find for a home that night. I told the commander of the post my story, and he gave me permission to drive my truck out back and sleep there. He said I wouldn’t be disturbed. I spent most of the night drinking Tennessee Teas and talking with a gentleman who was originally from Wales. He had moved into Nashville some years back with not much but a shirt on his back, found a job, a wife, and decided to stay and sing country music. A kindred spirit maybe?
In the morning, when I woke up, my tarp, blanket, and bags were all slightly wet and covered in dew from the cool fall morning. I hopped in my truck, and started driving down the Old Nashville Highway towards Murfreesboro. I went to JoZoara Coffee Shop, ordered a big mug of coffee, sat in a cozy couch and read a book about Marcus Aurelius for four hours or so until businesses started opening. It was Saturday, and I had been in Murfreesboro for a week. I had arrived last Saturday, received a job and paid the deposit on an apartment by Tuesday, but was forced into homelessness by the paper pushing process. I called Sears again around 10:00 am. Background check still not done. I waited and hour to let my temper cool off before I mozied on over to Sears.
Along the way I saw Stones River National Battlefield and decided to stop. It was closed due to the government shutdown, but I walked in anyway. There was a low fog hanging over the battlefield as the sun rose which gave the place a beautiful but eerie feel. I was in awe as I stood where on a day in 1863 so many Americans had killed Americans. To honor their memory, of the young lives shot short, I had to play my part as a veteran and succeed and live.
I persuaded the manager into signing my employment verification letter, but they signed it as “employment on condition of successful background check.” I could work with that. The apartment manager accepted my employment verification letter. He said he normally wouldn’t have, but he was a veteran as well. I finally had my apartment. Victory!
I moved all my belongings from my truck to my second floor apartment. Opened my bottle of Jim Beam Rye, and poured some into a red solo cup that my mom had packed for me in a goody bag before I left. I had made it. I wasn’t going to accomplish anything else that day, so I just celebrated, sitting on my Army tuff box, drinking whiskey and rye and reflecting.
When I was going through my real hard times in the Army I started to see life like a Marathon. A constant struggle, but for a time I felt like I was faltering. I felt like I wasn’t going to make it. I kept racing for a finish line that I had created for myself, and I believed that once I crossed that line I would start to be happy again. It seemed like every time I was close to finishing, someone would move the finish line on me, and I would just have to embrace the suck and drive on. God is hard. I still love him though.
A few months ago I came to realize that there was no finish line. Life is a constant marathon that I was not prepared well for growing up. I grew up on milk and honey, but took what I had for granted because I had done nothing to earn it. Life is a constant marathon, and some days you are going up hill, some days you are running through sand, some days you may run through a big pile of dogs shit, and some days when you are happily striding downhill. You have to learn to cherish the downhill to mentally prepare yourself for the difficulties ahead, and it is always easier to run with good people to help support you along the way. Most importantly, you have to learn to lean of God, and you will walk and not grow weary, run and not faint.
