Have you had an experience in your life and at the time you thought, “things cannot get worse?” A very long time ago, well around thirty years ago, I had an experience like that, and it was not at all the last. My first time dealing with “things cannot get worse” I was around twenty and had a job working in a restaurant. It was pretty good I made an ok amount of money, and my co-workers were pretty cool. I worked there about two years, I had no plan for my future but I was young and was living my life and was pretty care free.
Then there was a Christmas party. I went with a mind to have a great time, and back then (and not just back then unfortunately, far too many other stories on that) that meant alot of drinking with no thought of consequences. I am going to keep this short and omit details, but the next morning I woke up in the drunk tank, jail. I had no memory of how I got there or what happened past a certain point while I was at the party, something about somebody offering me something they got as a present, that you eat.
Going to work was never the same again. Despite blacking out that I humiliated myself was not a difficult thing to realize, how exactly I don’t know, nobody told me, and I was afraid to ask or even bring up that night. I do know I offended someone I really liked. A bizarre awkwardness, I guess I’ll call it, was what I experienced with everyone there after that, and it clearly went both ways. Also I kind of picked up on what seemed like alot of gossiping going on. Everyday I went to work was very stressful, my co-workers did not look at or treat me the same. I lasted there maybe three months after that. I was fired for being “too slow.” I took it very hard, I was on a break when I was given my notice, I went for a walk to a nearby lake, sat on a bench and cried. Then went back and finished my final two weeks there.
I thought my life was over, or at least I had no idea how to recover, I was anxious I would not get another job. Also there was the person I really liked, I was not capable of working out what that was. I was broken, (not at all really but I felt so) and brokenhearted.
And so, reality turned out to be my life was not at all over. There have been many stories, situations, processes, events, and certainly cycles from then to now, but here I am. I now look at that time in my life and it was a really tough situation, I regret my bad choices, ignorant and or juvenile way of dealing with it. Although from my point of view “people were mean to me” I certainly was the cause of the things that followed. But life went on. One thing does lead to another, but sometimes I (probably not just me) keep repeating mistakes, or have situations that seem to keep coming back up, this seems to be the way life goes. Lessons I learned, and not really very long ago, that if I could I would tell that younger me; maybe more often than not it’s about letting go not hanging on, you control your choices not others, and never give up on yourself.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/NpcEblt1ks0?si=Xq9aAd7G5Jk-ADp4