Nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion?
Yeah?
I have two words for society that we throw around like rice at a wedding... hope and passion. Cheapened by repetition and worn down to smooth stones that don’t skip when you chuck them across a pond.
Hope?
That got hijacked by politicians with nothing in the tank but a catchphrase. Hope mattered when you were eight, wishing on Santa for a new Schwinn. After that, it belongs in a drawer with unicorn stickers, whoopie cushions, and that old leather wallet you carried through high school. The one with a ring in the leather from a condom you never used.
And passion? Christ!
That word gets tossed around like it belongs in everybody’s story. It's good for a centerfielder in October or a Broadway diva belting to the mezzanine...
...but for the rest of us, the Grawbowskis, it doesn’t belong on the menu.
I'm a Grawbowski and we don’t do passion. We do early shifts, burnt coffee, busted knuckles, and second helpings. My people came from bakeries, from quarries and from railyards. We don’t sip mimosas, we drink out of chipped mugs at diners with eggs that still jiggle. My couch has a slipcover and the last car I drove was born in the 1900s.
I do some damn fine things. I cook a mean steak, I bake a mean peach cobbler and I write words that land. I read a shit ton because my brain is a battlefield and books are how I keep the foxholes from caving in. That ain’t passion, that is survival and only the strong can survive.
Fatherhood?
It ain’t fairy dust and slaying dragons. It’s dilemmas, dedication, discipline, and showing up on the days that wear you down to a nub. Not because you're passionate, but because you're responsible. You plant seeds and pray they grow into humans that you will be proud of.
My job?
I don’t love it like some romantic fool, I respect it. I bring work ethic, show up clean and leave a trail of grit. I thank God every morning for a five-decade career that still pays the bills and lets me sleep at night. Passion? No. Integrity? Every damn ounce.
I don’t have hope, I have awareness.
I don’t have passion, I have follow-through.
I don’t sit around waiting for a genie in a bottle. I mop the floor, make the grocery list, stand at a trading desk, pack my lunchbox, pray to heaven and I get it all done without passion.
Joy?
That is seeing a sunrise and knowing three people in the world love me. I swear and pray in the same breath. I talk to heaven and cuss out hell before brushing my teeth. I listen for the roar of a lion and the coo of the Mourning dove.
That is joy for me.
Then I go do what needs doing. Not because I’m chasing a passionate dream full of hope. Because I’m a Grawbowski and Grawbowskis don’t have butlers or gardeners. We get morning light, stiff knees, and the blessing of one more go-round.
God willing.
You wanna throw some zeal or gusto into your Sunday Funday? Be my guest. I’ll be on the couch with a coffee watching golf in the Northern Irish wind. The British Open, now that’s a holy day. Passion? You keep it.
I’ve got chores to finish and JumboLove to spread.
