Endurance

We stood on a turnout of the canyon highway surrounded by pines and melting snow, a dozen Baton Rouge bar employees and friends in the mountains near Rociada, New Mexico, Spring Break 1995. The creek by the road, stunningly cold in the late March sunshine, jolted me as I squatted down and dipped my hands in it. The water in Louisiana did not feel like this, nor look like this. I stood and gazed over the ridge in the distance and could see the summits of snowy peaks to the north.

“That’s Colorado,” said Bennett, our leader, employer, and host. “Those are fourteeners, peaks over 14,000 feet high.”

Awestruck yet again in a week that had provided a wealth of such moments, I wanted to go north. I wanted to see those mountains from base to peak. I had never been to Colorado. But on this morning, we were heading down to Santa Fe to walk around and grab lunch and beers. And, a few of us wanted to meet “Rosalia,” the owner of the Pink Adobe restaurant who inspired the Better than Ezra song of the same name.

Northern New Mexico would change everything.

***

After a week of rejuvenation and celebration in those mountains, I arrived back in Baton Rouge transformed, still awash in the glow of near-zero humidity, crisp air, and limitless southwestern sunshine. Then, after precious little actual thought or consideration, I decided I would back out of my post-graduation (and purely theoretical) plan to move to New York City and instead move to Denver. Denver was in Colorado. Those mountains were in Colorado.  

It all happened quickly. I knew one person in Denver—a Louisiana buddy who had moved there the previous year. After a few phone calls, we agreed that I would arrive in June, after I wrapped everything up at LSU, and we would get an apartment.

The idea crystallized perfectly. I told my family and friends that I was moving to Denver. The news was universally met with shock, quickly followed by enthusiastic well-wishes. I got a line on a possible job, even. But as time progressed through April and into May, the mountain glow subsided. My enthusiasm waned, replaced by fear. I grew comfortable again in Baton Rouge and found that did not want to go anywhere, ever.

I tried fruitlessly to bait friends into telling me not to go. My brother in Baton Rouge offered no resistance, only support for the decision. The going away crawfish boil was a truly appreciated surprise, even if I did take a hot sauce-and-whipped cream pie to the side of my head and ended up with an ear infection.

But a going away party? I was trapped.

With no easy way out of my decision, I tearfully packed my stuff and drove to Shreveport to spend a few days with my parents before exiting Louisiana. Surely, my mom would talk me out of it. I was her baby boy, for God’s sake. I walked into the late afternoon kitchen after driving from Baton Rouge and found her on the phone with a friend.

“Joe just walked in. We are so proud of him. He just finished LSU and is moving to Denver.”

Shit.

Now I truly had no way out. What was wrong with these people? I had no rescuer, nobody to step up and say, “don’t do it. Stay in Louisiana. Nobody will think any differently of you if you just scrap the whole thing.”

I left Shreveport a week later, my little VW Golf packed to the roof with only the essentials—my CD collection and what little warm clothes I owned. In the end, it all worked out–I started a new life in Colorado and have absolutely no regrets about the decision to move to the place that has given me my family, friends, career, and countless incredible experiences.

I only bring this memory up because nearly twenty-eight years later, another momentous decision is haunting me. It feels eerily similar to that one.

***

I wrote a book, a deeply personal memoir to be exact. I thought the writing was the hard part, but in collaborating with my editor I’ve gained a mountain of knowledge about what it truly takes to do something like this. I’ve grinded through to this point with help from a quote from James Baldwin which is taped to the top of my monitor:

“Talent is insignificant. I know a lot of talented ruins. Beyond talent lie all of the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but, most of all, endurance.”

Endurance. That’s the word. Sticking with it. I’ve been accused of occasionally being something of a half-ass in the past. And I’ve used those judgements as fuel to get this thing done.

However, the day is rapidly approaching when any friend, family member, or complete stranger who wishes to read this book will be able to get their hands on a copy. It’s out of my control. Maybe nobody will read it. Maybe they’ll read it and hate it, or worse, they’ll read it and have no reaction at all.

Last December, I asked several friends to read the early finished draft, to get more eyes on it to see if there were any glaring problems we’d missed. After at least three rewrites and four months of editing, I could no longer see the forest for the trees. (I cannot thank those folks enough for their valuable feedback.) But in an apprehensive little corner of my mind, the one piece of feedback that I subconsciously hoped to receive never materialized:

Don’t do it. Don’t publish it. Nobody will think any differently of you if you just scrap the whole thing.

Much like my move to Denver, it’s too late to turn back. Nobody is rushing in to stop me. I’m painted into another corner. And in the end, pushing this thing out into the world simply requires faith that it will all work out. And just a little more endurance.