Welcome Back

Welcome back Michael. It’s been way too long since our paths crossed. So much has changed since we last met. What are you doing now? I heard you’re still bartending at UC and recently became a lead bartender? Congratulations. I can tell your hard work is paying off. I also heard through the grapevine that you’re putting together a bar training program? What’s this about!? Only three years in the industry and you want to start training people!? I’m sure there are a lot of trainings out there already but if I know anything about you, you’ll find a way to set yourself apart and be successful. 

What else is new? What are these talks about starting your own business that creates videos for people? Is this like that project you started a few years ago? This Wisdom Project? I always liked that idea and wished you kept going with it. I’m glad you kept it in the back of your mind and want to make it into something more valuable. 

You know, the problem you always ran into was doing things yourself. It’s your strength and weakness. You can get further than most by doing things yourself, but you HAVE to work with other people if you want to get the furthest. And I know you...you want to go beyond what anyone thinks is possible. You’ll find a way. Hopefully by now you see what is possible from finding the right people for the job and working with them. Only then will you see lasting results. 

It was really nice catching up with you Michael. I’m really excited to see what else you do this year. Wait, you’re telling me you’re also going to try out modeling!? And you may try your hand at bar management!? How are you going to do all those things and remain sane??? You’re crazy Michael...but I know you. You’ll figure it out. You’ll drop the things that aren’t working and focus on the things that are. I guess that’s one of your secrets huh? Throw everything at life until something sticks, then grow that into something beautiful. 

I’m going to start writing regularly again. I need an outlet. Writing also keeps me accountable to myself. It seems as though saying something makes me more likely to do it. I need to figure out what I’m going to write about! Well...let’s go on a mental adventure from the last time I wrote. I believe it was in 2015. Damn... so much has happened since then. 

I am now working full time as a craft cocktail bartender in two of the city’s most popular bars. And I love what I do! In other words, I reached the goal I set out on after I came home from my bike trip! How cool is that!? It has been quite a journey getting to this point and the journey is quite the reminder of what it takes to reach a goal: nothing is straightforward and easy and everything takes time. What did it take to get to this point?

Worked at Olive Garden for a year as a server to get some service industry experience. Eventually I became a bartender at the OG (a milestone!) but I knew I didn’t want to bartend at a chain restaurant...I got hired at High West for a winter season as a barback to get some bar experience and see what craft cocktails are all about. At times, I felt in over my head and was desperately grasping for the fundamentals of being a good barback. Forget trying to learn the fundamentals of bartending! I was just trying to stay afloat as a barback, bussing tables, refilling juices, cleaning glassware, restocking beer. Looking back on my performance objectively, I’d give myself a C- as a barback for HW. Fortunately, the bartending bug didn’t leave me. I still knew I could be better and had a lot more to learn. I was intrigued by the speed at which the bartenders moved and the countless number of drinks they seemed to pull from thin air and artfully craft in a few minutes. How???

I eventually found my place at the bar which would eventually solidify my status as a craft cocktail bartender: Undercurrent. Now that I knew what a high functioning bar looked like, I could ask better questions to help me find a bar that I actually wanted to work at. This place was a gold mine. Employees who laughed and loved eachother, a menu with a plethora of carefully crafted cocktails, a manager who wanted to train barbacks to become bartenders...this place had it all. I put in my time and worked HARD. I wasn’t making as much barbacking at UC as I was at HW so I had to supplement my income. But it wasn’t a hard decision to make: Yeah the pay was pretty bad, but it made up for it with what I was learning. We would have weekly training on all of our spirits and were regularly given quizzes for the drink menus. We were encouraged to try new things and voice our opinions. 

As I continued drinking at new bars and acquired more barback experience at another bar called, The Rest, it cemented how special UC was from all ‘the rest’. Eventually a friend from the OG told me about an opportunity to work for a solar company that was paying good money ($18/hr plus commission). I still wasn’t making enough money as a barback so I got creative: I worked at UC for two shifts a week, quit The Rest (gladly I might add...the manager sucked to work for) and worked part time for Auric solar. It was an interesting time in my life....

At first I loved working for a solar company. The idea of helping people switch to cleaner renewable energy is noble, right? In practice, it was nothing more than another company ran by ex-phone salesman, who just so happened to start selling something that can be viewed as good for the planet. They were solely focused on numbers and had very little to show in the customer service department. The crazy part is that they were one of the best solar companies in Utah! Other companies didn’t even have 5 people to pose as the customer service department...

I was stuck though. At least momentarily. I needed to supplement my barback income until I started bartending. So I stuck it out at Auric solar and knocked on people’s doors like a Mormon missionary; in rain or shine, dark or light, I was out there, hating my job but focusing on my next step. Always having a next step so I didn’t feel stuck. Looking back on working for Auric, I can’t say that I’d want to do it again, but I am very very glad I tried it. It took me out of my comfort zone and it taught me something valuable: how to read people face to face and how to overcome verbal obstacles in a kind and considerate way. That’s what I chose to take away from that experience. It wasn’t a waste of time. Nothing you do is a waste of time. You just have to find the lesson your experience is teaching you.

Now that I have a couple years to look back on it, I laugh at what I used to do for Auric: go out in the dead of night during a blizzard, walking aimlessly through another new neighborhood, dressed like a burglar on the prowl, bruising my knuckles on ice cold doors, smiling rebelliously at the fate I have chosen. 

The month I quit Auric Solar and started bartending full time was incredible. I had finally done it. I reached the goal I set out on two years ago! The best part is that I was making more money than I had been at any point during this service industry journey; and working less hours. I no longer had to knock on doors in the freezing cold, I no longer had to barback until 2am every night...I could finally focus on honing my craft. 

Becoming a bartender at Under Current opened up many doors for me. I finally had a resume that could virtually guarantee me a job at any other bar in the city. I leveraged this experience to get a job working one night a week at another popular bar: Lake Effect. The money I make there on a Saturday night sometimes takes care of half of the money I need to make for the week. My bartending experience has also allowed me to bartend multiple private events and create a how-to cocktail video for a local outdoor clothing company. 

I have also been fortunate enough to make a lot of new and valuable connections through the bar. These connections have opened up so many new possibilities for me that I never would have considered: training people to bartend, modeling for various products and companies, and making new friends. And these new connections and friends have led me to my next big adventure...

I think I’ve figured out what I want to be when I grow up: a visual storyteller. I’ve always been intrigued by the human experience. It’s so vastly different from person to person and yet we all share so many commonalities that bridge the gap of understanding one another. A few years ago I started This Wisdom Project to compare and contrast the human experience. I loved it. I interviewed people from various backgrounds and asked them all similar questions. It was fascinating to uncover so many similarities in people with seemingly disparate backgrounds and also to see stark differences in those who you’d think were related at first glance. I was passionate about the work I was doing but I hit a ceiling with it. I couldn’t justify the time I was investing in the project given the revenue I was generating with it. Simply put, I couldn’t afford to maintain a website and interview people for free! It was a painful retirement I must say...but the idea always lingered in the back of my mind until last year when two of my grandparents died: my father’s mother and my mother’s father. Two figureheads from two very different families were gone just like that. They say a library is burned when someone dies and I definitely felt the heat from each of those fires. Within a few months of my grandfather’s death, my friend’s father also died. With grief on both of our minds, I started to put the pieces together of how we could fix the problem we all face when a loved one passes on. And I realized something...what if we created visual mementos of people so that their loved ones have something to remember them by? Eureka!

I presented the idea to my friend and he loved it...we started spitballing ideas trying to figure out what the final product would look like. We came up with a framework and then started searching for the right team. We both shared a similar creative vision but we had a difficult time finding the right videographer for the task. Months went on...I got discouraged. Another dream flushed down the proverbial toilet. And then chance threw us another curveball. 

A coworker from Undercurrent is a brand ambassador for a local outdoor clothing company and he hired me to take part in a video shoot. They needed to film two bartenders making two unique cocktails for their winter catalog. I was elated! I got to showcase my craft to a large audience and make some new connections. I started talking to the videographer and let him know I do some part time modeling and he asked me if I would be interested in being part of a last minute photo shoot. I said yes and was fortunate enough to be involved in a very creative photo shoot full of flowers, frolicking, and full frontal nudity. 

Okay partial frontal nudity. It was unlike anything I had done before and I quite enjoyed it. Throughout the shoot, Everett told me what emotions to harness and what thoughts to exude so I was constantly shifting character. After the shoot, the crew and I went out to lunch and I started getting to know Everett a little more. I realized we shared a lot of the same values and ambitions and he was just a genuinely cool and down to earth guy. The next day as I was sending him a thank you text for including me in such a unique project, I realized something profound...he was our guy! He was our videographer for Memento! I gave him a call and pitched the idea and he was intrigued. We set up a date for the three of us to meet and discuss the project more. 

Fast forward to today...we are in the process of editing the video footage for my grandmother’s memento. Her video is going to be our prototype and she will be our poster child!

I’ve got to be honest...the last few weeks have been daunting, frustrating and exciting. I would be lying if I said I knew exactly what I needed to do and if I said I wasn’t intimidated by the amount of editing ahead of us. I’ve never made a video that was this high quality so I’m practicing editing techniques on the side and planning to take a few editing tutorials all while messing around with the content. I’m having fun though. It’s been motivating sharing this project with people and getting their thoughts on it. I know it SOUNDS cool but I’m getting very antsy to show people how cool it really IS. We should have a few edits available for the viewing public by the end of March. Until then, enjoy my shot for shot remake of a commercial. 

In other news, Anna/Sophie is pregnant. And by pregnant I mean filled with a bundle of joy. And by bundle of joy I mean a newfound fire in her belly. Can I be any more clear? She has decided with renewed vigor to take the LSAT and pursue law school and get back into shape! Go her! Seriously though, I’m really proud of her for going for what she wants and not taking the easy way out. Currently she’s been a project manager for a local bank for the last year and has already made a name for herself and shaken things up. But even with her excellence, she knows she wants to do bigger things with her career and law school looks like the next big step. I’m happy for her to pursue this next big adventure. 

Speaking of next big adventures...Anna/Sophie and I have talked pragmatically about creating and squeezing out a baby of our own soon. Depending on her law school application and acceptance, wethinks we could start trying as early as this fall! So...we are expecting! Circa 2020/21! If our pregnancy plans are anything like our engagement, it’s going to be drawn out, deliberate, and worth it. 

I’m going to get back on that writing wagon this year. My future entries will be more succinct and focus on 1-2 topics in depth. Or not. I haven’t written any future entries yet so how can you expect me to know the format of them!? Get off my back a lil’! Let me know if there’s anything else you’d like me to report on. 

Hugs and kisses to you all, and to all a good night.