Meanwhile at Olive Garden

Then

When I visited my Dad in January of 2019, we took him on day trips to get him out of his nursing facility. He hated being cooped up. He wanted to be anywhere but there. He wanted to show me Lubbock. He wanted to eat real food.

On one of these days trips, we decided to stop at Olive Garden and get something to eat.

It was busy. Dad didn’t want to wait in the crowd, so I placed the order to go.

Salads. Breadsticks. Pasta. Boxed up in plastic and put in a plastic bag with plastic silverware.

We left the parking lot and went to our hotel parking lot to eat.

It was a silent lunch. A lunch where we didn’t know what to say.

We couldn’t agree on how to manage his health, or from where, so here we were an awkward family of 3 eating pasta out of boxes in a Comfort Suites parking lot.

…

Recently

I’m sitting in an Olive Garden in Texarkana, TX. It’s day one of my journey to visit friends in the Austin area. I haven’t been in an Olive Garden since that day in Lubbock.

My waitress’ name is Angel and she is very kind. She asks what I would like to drink, then brings me water and sets it atop a Blue Moon paper coaster on my table.

I hate Blue Moon. The logo. The beer. The bottles that used to clutter my home. The bottle caps I found in drawers and under furniture. It’s a trigger for me. I turn away from it and set my water cup back down to cover it up.

The restaurant is largely empty and I am relieved. After a long day of driving, I just want to eat and go back to the hotel to get some rest.

She takes my order and brings me breadsticks.

At this point, all I can think about is the scene in Cobra Kai when Johnny tells Miguel and Robby that the Garden’s breadsticks can fix anything.

It’s a nice idea, but I know those damn breadsticks aren’t going to fix anything.

As much time has passed, there is still pain in my heart. You never get over losing a parent, and I don’t expect myself to, but I can’t figure out why it all still weighs on my heart so heavily. Perhaps, it is because my Dad’s death and my failed marriage are so closely intertwined? Was it just Texas? Being in the place where he died again? Or is there something else buried? Something which hasn’t shown itself yet.

I made a lot of choices because of my Dad throughout the years, like what college I did (and didn’t go to), jobs I applied for, and marrying someone because I didn’t want to end up alone.

I wanted nothing more than to make that man proud of me.

Being an only child, and an only daughter, has an odd pressure to it. The pressure to succeed, the pressure to be a caretaker, and the pressure to keep it all together for everyone else. To quote Nancy Wheeler, “it’s bullshit.”

As I’m writing this, I can’t help but find the irony that all the pressure I have put on myself for the last decade has literally caused a condition where I have high blood pressure in my heart.

God doesn’t mess around with trying to get our attention y’all.

I wait for my food to come and wonder if anyone else has ever had such powerful revelation while sitting in an Olive Garden.

I listen to the few conversations going on around me.

There’s a couple here that’s talking to Angel. She asks where they are headed and they say the beach. This is their first time in Texas.

It’s not mine. That’s for sure.

Major milestones of my life can be counted along I-27 south of Amarillo into Lubbock.

Somewhere near Dumas, I fell asleep at the wheel after driving north all night from San Antonio.

I found a piece of my heart I didn’t even know I was missing off a sunflower-lined I-35 near Waco, headed toward Austin.

This place is completely new to this couple, meanwhile Texas heat and humidity is in my blood.

Angel brings my dinner out. About 5 minutes into my meal, a woman and her friend walk in and choose a table across from mine. The older woman is clearly drunk and begins to ask Angel about what kind of liquor they have. Angel is polite and handles herself well, but I can tell this is the last thing she wants to deal with 40 minutes before closing.

The drunk woman thinks she’s funny, when in reality she is abrasive and rude. She tells Angel how to do her job and it’s another trigger.

I finish my food quickly, leave Angel a big tip, and hope that the rest of her shift goes quickly.

As for me, the last thing I need is to listen to the ranting of another drunk.

…

Now

As a writer, I never know when inspiration is going to strike. It’s not something I plan.

I simply pay attention to the signs God gives me.

I give myself time in nature.

I observe people.

I listen to the wind.

And it comes. Without fail.

It’s my unique way of expressing my faith. Put yourself out in the world and the writing will come.

For many years, the writing never came, because I wouldn’t let it.

I spent a decade in a toxic relationship with an alcoholic, and fast food, and cigarettes, and the hole I was digging for myself that I learned to call home.

Once I removed all that noise from my life, the writing came. I took a leap of faith and what was always meant for me was still there waiting.

It never left.

Everything in my life (and in all our lives) is a direct correlation to the choices we make. The people we say yes to. The people we walk away from. The words we say, or don’t, and every thing lost in translation in between.

I know my choices are what got me here, but they are also the things that are going to save me.

I made bad choices in my relationships, including the one with myself, but even with all those bad choices, I made some good ones that got me HERE and here has become a place of hope. Yes, I mean Tennessee in the here, but I also mean where I sit within myself.

I’m divorced.

I’m a work in progress.

I have weight to lose.

I have people to forgive.

I have confidence to build.

I’m going to reverse my autoimmune disease and PAH.

I have so much damn love left in my heart and I’m still here because of it.

I give all the glory to God for the things I have accomplished and still have yet to.

Impossible is God’s starting place, so pray the big prayers and dream the big dreams folks.

I always thought getting divorced or getting an unpleasant health diagnosis would be the end of the story, but God is a better storyteller than that y’all. He is in fact the best storyteller and my grievances have become the plot twists He knew I needed.

I can’t tell you how it’s going to work out in the end, for you, or for myself, but I can tell you that the journey is so amazingly beautiful that I’m not worried.

…

One Day

Olive Garden has a place in my story and I imagine some day I will enter one again and remember all the uncertainty and wisdom and truth that has come from these moments.

I imagine on that day I will be surrounded by people I love and we will be marking some milestone with breadsticks and maybe by then, I won’t need them to fix anything.