Mildly Awful Writer

Encouragement by your betters or even by your pairs is often something that is lacked in every day life. Teams sometimes enjoy a union of people that inspires everyone to perform above and beyond their normal capabilities, resulting in a group that is greater than the sum of all its parts.

Sadly though team life and every day life are stark contrasts of how humanity as a whole have grown over the last few centuries. It was once a time where one had to work or develop beyond their normal capabilities to further the betterment of their own family, village, tribe or in some extreme cases, Nation.

But now in a world of physical convenience and social ineptitude we are becoming stagnant in our own personal growth and our ability to encourage those around us to heights they had only had dreams about. A person can never truly achieve flight unaided. To reach the beautiful expanse of sky above, first they must have the faith, trust, friendship and encouragement of the people around them. To take flight unaided is a true fantasy.

To develop the skills we all lack today, schools attempt to guide us all down the path by pushing school sport and group activities in class but children to not understand the importance of the bonds they form at that age.

I bring up the topic of social unity at school because in my experience and in watching, listening and asking questions of the current generations going through the public school systems, it does not exist. I doubt it ever really has. School is a place to, in later years, make connections and learn skills that will help you as you develop further as a young adult and take your from the classroom to an office but as an entity school is a gauntlet. It tempers and pressures a child and then the teenager they become into something that may or may not be socially acceptable.

I am glad of my time spent in school, at the time I may have felt it was hell but really it made the base of who I have become today. Even now as I sit here thinking of the words to type and how to express my feelings towards schooling and the experience around it I cant help but smile at the silly memories.

Things that had felt to mean the world, now are so trivial that it's comic I took it and in turn myself, so seriously.

To develop as I have as an individual I was not alone. In order to grow further as a person, an individual, you must first surround yourself with company. The irony that you must have the influence of others to develop your own personality that is unique to you is not lost on me.

The mind and heart of the mob are one.

It comes again to the formation of a team. They are a whole unit, a single entity devoted to a single purpose and goal, yet every member of the team is an individual. They go home at the end of the day and are a different person, no longer part of a team but themselves as a whole.

Sometimes I envy people with multiple personality disorders. For the most part they are misunderstood people but as a whole they are the sum of all their parts, sometimes greater, sometimes less but always, in some form, a team.

“Behind three feet of Mahogany” that is a quote from the movie 'Cocktail' starring Tom Cruise, and changed my life for the better almost 5 years ago.

 In the time since I have heard that I have developed from a young man, hardly out of my teens, who didn't even know what he wanted to be in the future, into a man of twenty five years who has seen and lived more loudly and with more courage than I was ever able to achieve.

 The saying itself refers to the normal service distance involved in a bar counter top, few of which are Mahogany anymore. It is in that area of the world that I found my comfort and came to enjoy life for the first time since leaving school a few years before.

 I found myself as a person and grew as a man in the years since. I have traveled to Australia and loved and lived as if it were my last day on this earth but through it all I have always stood behind 'Three feet of Mahogany', a safe and secure distance from the action but able to laugh along with everyone else as it unfolds before me.

 A guest recently said in passing that I was 'Born to Serve' and on many levels it is true. In my professional life I am a servant to the people, be it as a 5 minute friend as their bartender or in the future as an agent of law enforcement, one way or another I serve a purpose that is not of my own design and that lack of control is something I struggle with daily.

 I do not dislike my job, the profession of serving others is what I chose to do with my life and it is a decision I will never regret, I dislike however that people who receive my service do not notice it.

 How often have you thanked your server and been genuine in your thanks?

 How often do you forget your waiters or bartenders name the moment they walk away?

 Do you often consider the time and the effort that has gone into setting the table you are sitting at or the drink you are currently enjoying?

 I ask you these questions because unlike me you probably have not chosen the three feet of distance that I have. Instead you are at the core of the action in the 'real world'. Working at a desk or going door to door and always finishing at 5 or 6pm.

 You probably get thanks from the people you produce work from as often as I do, that is to say almost never, and yet you continue to do it. Why is that? Do you do it for the money perhaps? Or is it the security of something familiar?

 Working from behind three feet of mahogany is not a secure life, it is one of transience and long hours. Often a person who works the job that I do will spend six months in one location before moving on to the next. Travel is the core of my industry and I love the change, the distance will never change but the view beyond it will.

With changes to a person’s position in life, comes introspection. It is at this point in my life, as I learn new things in my job and about myself, train hard to become a bigger part of the company I work for and extend my abilities into areas of my personal life that I have until recently been too shy or afraid, or embarrassed to even try and do.

I find myself looking back at the last 12 months and wondering where the change started and how it has accumulated into what I am currently experiencing. I think it all started when I was encouraged by a “Friend” to break up with my, then, girlfriend. A decision that ended up being taken out of my hands but at the end of the day was probably better for us both.

I know it was for me.

I spent several weeks following that, doing the normal introverted things a person does when they find themselves newly single after an extended relationship. Heading into and through Christmas and New Year’s Eve I found myself just plodding through the course of events, not really paying much attention to the people around me at the time. Instead I focused on myself and trying to get myself into a position where I could be happy with the person I was, or would become.

Jumping forward, through a few more months of self-pity and “what if’s”, I was starting to recover. A trip to my home town of Christchurch had helped immensely with helping me to take a step towards recovery. I started to become social with the people I work with and then changing of management in the Restaurant I work in had made the work environment significantly less hostile.

Then, around April, I discovered an album on the music streaming service Spotify.

Hamilton, the Broadway Musical, Original Cast Recording.

This album, though I didn’t know it at the time, would go on to change my life. I was hooked from the very first song. The beat, rhythm, lyrics, everything about it resonated with me in a way that few other songs ever could. I began to listen to it almost without pause for over a month. It became my go-to music choice when goofing off in WoW or Diablo 3. Interspersed with some Five Finger Death Punch, but the story of their music is a whole different beast.

The first song that really changed my life is titled “My Shot” and is done in most part by Lin-Manuel Miranda, the man who wrote it. The main theme of the song is about how he, Alexander Hamilton, will not give up their shot at making a mark on history and how he plans to go about it, with the aid of his friends, or alone if necessary. He goes into detail about how with his country, America, being so young and in the midst of throwing off the shackles placed upon it by England, he would do whatever it took to leave his mark on history.

Revolutions, especially successful ones like the American Revolution, are good ways to get your name in the history books to be sure.

And it is his attitude in this song that really pulls me forward. It reminds me and is a continuing theme through the whole musical that nothing is gained by waiting for it to appear before you. You need to step out of your comfort zone and seize whatever it is you want, with both hands.

The song has a counterpoint though, which is covered in the song “Wait for It”, sung by Leslie Odom Jr. The songs theme echoes Aaron Burr’s choice to wait for the opportunities that should be coming to him. The opinion of a man raised without the struggle that was experienced by Alexander Hamilton.

Often in the musical, Hamilton and Burr come to heads over their two different ideologies and it isn’t until the latter half that Burr changes from a passive to active role in the narrative. Often coming into conflict with Hamilton over it.

The difference between the two men is covered in some detail by both of these songs. Their approaches to life so very different and at the end of the show, Burr ends up jealous of Hamilton and what he has achieved. Conflict between the two men ends as the history books describe, a duel with pistol at dawn, leading to the death of Alexander Hamilton. Although in the musical Burr displays more regret for his actions than is widely recorded in public media.

The point that I suppose I have been approaching is that there are two different ways to live a life. If you want to paint it in a black and white picture. You can either wait for life to give you what you feel you deserve or have earnt. Or you can reach out and grasp every opportunity with both hands. Chase down your dreams and make them true rather than to sit back and watch them from a wistful distance.

For much of my life I had been reactionary. Often responding to opportunities only as they literally knock on my door. But now, with inspiration from this musical and several other aspect of my life, I am taking steps forward. They may lead me to disaster, or salvation, or nothing. I may need to start over a hundred times, or only this once. But I will not have any regrets for those “what ifs”. I will start to live my life and no longer will I throw away my shot.