To the way things ARE!

"To the way things were."

"To the way things should be."

"To the way they shall be again!"

This was a toast that a close friend of mine and I would clink our glasses to when we started drinking.  It's meaning was both fun and serious and is something that we did for years together before our lives seperated.  It's something I still do to this day, although most people I clink glasses with don't ever understand it's deeper meaning. .

I'm sure you can gather what it means.  When we said "To the way things were" we were toasting all the good times that we had had before.  The good times we had in band (we both played the trombone in high school).  The good times we had playing games or watching sci-fi flicks.  The good times we had moving from a community college to four year universities.  The good times we had just jumping into one of our crappy cars, driving down the road and discussing philosophy and women.   We had a lot of good times together and instead of focusing on all the bad things that had happened in our lives, we looked at the past through rose colored glasses and saw only the good times.

When we said "To the way things should be" we were focusing in on the less than perfect present.  While I knew what I was going to be after college (an optometrist), he didn't know what he was going to do with his computer engineering degree.  While I had a few close friends, I lived hundreds of miles from them and was having trouble meeting new friends at my new college.  While we both had cars, neither were what we thought we should be driving.  While we were good in class and earning our respective degrees, neither of us were getting the same good grades we did in college.  While we had some cash, neither of us had what we felt was enough.  Even for struggling college students.

When we said "To the way they shall be again", we were talking about how our futures would end up being just fine.  We'd both end up as professionals in whatever career we chose.  We'd both find the love of our lives and have loving families of our own.  We'd remain close friends and make more everlasting relationships.

In short, the past was good, the present is rocky, the future would be good.  We started using this toast in 1994 and while I firmly believed it every time it spilled past my lips, I always seemed to be stuck in the rocky present.  It wasn't so much a declaration that things were getting better... it was a desperate hope that things WOULD get better.  Underlying that thought though, was the fact that the past always looked good.  The toast made us forget all the bad things that happened 'ago' and try our very best to look into the future.

I thought of that toast this morning as I'm getting ready to head out and visit a friend (a different one) for the weekend.  Over the past few year's I've often gone to visit this friend and his (ever growing) family.  While visiting with them is something I look forward to, it was often difficult to do so.  I couldn't really afford the gas.  I certainly couldn't afford to do 'anything' while I was there and was left to be thankful for them paying for things.  And as Lita started to go downhill, I started to dread the drive.   They live about an hour and a half drive away so if it was winter time, driving through the snow (or worse... a snow storm) was always a concern.  Worst was the summer... driving an hour and a half down the highway while the temps banged away at 90 degrees and the humidity climbed ever higher was just a pure pain.  I'd have to really plan out the trip... leave early in the morning and hope to miss the highest temps.  Leave either early Sunday morning or late Sunday evening to do the same.

And then there was the whole issue of working around my job.  My retail job for the past few years has been based on me working from 4am to 9am Sunday mornings.  So heading out on Saturday was useless... I'd have to just turn around in the early evening and return so that I could get enough sleep to wake up at 3am.  The other option was to just take the 'day' off... but that day of work constituted my entire work week, so it meant having even less money.

So each visit was going through a lot of problems all for the enjoyment of being with him and his family.  But now?  Now the temps can rise up over 100 degrees and I'll cruise comfortably down the highway.  Now paying for the gas is almost an afterthought, and I have plenty of cash to take my friends out.  Now I don't have to worry about work as I get every other weekend off.  With my schedule being 1:30pm to 10pm I can't leave Friday evening, but I can stay through Sunday night if I so wished and still make it back home in time to get showered and cleaned up for Monday's shift.

In short... I've moved from toasting "The way things should be" and am now living "The way things ARE".

This is just one of the many many ways that entering my career has changed my life for the good.  Now I need a new toast!