The Biker Bar

In central Connecticut, there’s this biker bar. 

My first apartment out of college sat one floor above it, and every Monday night during football season, the place would come alive. With Boston two hours north and New York two hours south, the rowdiest Mondays were when the Jets, Giants or Pats played.

The hardwood floor of my 500-square foot apartment would thump with every first down. Most nights, I could deal with it and continue working. But every once in a while, it got so bad, I said forget it. And I went downstairs and joined them.

During the winter, we’d get a couple snowstorms that would bury our cars in the parking lot.

These storms were an odd glimmer of hope. Maybe, just maybe, we’d have one quiet Monday evening.

But sure enough, come 8pm, middle-aged guys and gals in worn Testaverde or Manning or Brady jerseys would come rolling in. They were relentless.

At the time, I wanted nothing more than to leave this apartment. Truthfully, I wanted nothing more than to leave the state (which I regret, because I never soaked in the beauty of Connecticut).

But I look back now and miss it.

I miss the simplicity. I miss the grittiness. I miss the strange characters I’d see in the bar.

It was a place that shaped me.

It gave a California kid just enough Northeast edge.

If I could go back and tell that early-20s California kid something, it would be this:

Don’t rush through this place.

Be where your feet are. Look around. Explore. Go on adventures. Learn the local history. Visit historical sites. Build relationships. Live.

It took me years to understand how this place and season shaped me. Part of that is natural – wisdom, insight and perspective tend to grow with age. But part of it was because I was not present. I lived in a rush.

Since those years, I’ve thought a lot about this question: How do you recognize the ways you’re being shaped by the place you’re currently in?

I have three brief thoughts:

1. People

We are shaped by our relationships. Some will be deep, others may be surface-level, but they all play a role. The Lord will bring people into your life at different stages for different reasons. Assess the people around you and ask, what can I learn from them?

2. Learning

Every “season” of life teaches us something (if we are open to learning). It’s worth spending time pondering questions, such as: What am I learning right now? How am I growing and evolving? What old thoughts and ideas am I letting go of? What new perspectives am I gaining? 

3. Experiences

The things we’re actively doing are vehicles for relationships and learning. What are you building? What mission are you pursuing? What adventure are you enjoying? What challenges are you navigating? All of these experiences leave an imprint. 

Everyone’s journey through life is different. 

We all have these places that shape us. Recognize and appreciate them.

They’re the places that brought you to the place you are now.

A Few Good Things

1. My friend Sahil Bloom wrote a beautiful newsletter about Wade Lytal, a football coach in Texas whose daughter was one of the children who tragically died in the Camp Mystic flooding in Texas this summer. Wade’s perspective on life and how his family marches on is inspiring.

2. Jeremy Stern wrote an incredible profile of the founders behind Alpha School. If you haven’t heard of Alpha School, the piece describes it as “the teacherless, homeworkless, K-12 private school in Austin, Texas, where students have been testing in the top 0.1% nationally by self-directing coursework with AI tutoring apps for two hours a day.” Students are incentivized to complete their work to “mastery-level” (90+%) and then get to spend the rest of their day in workshops learning about business, how to build things or something else of their choosing. Education is being transformed before our eyes, and it’s incredible to watch. Read this story – long but worth it.

3. If y’all didn’t know, Matthew McConaughey has one of the best newsletters on the internet. This is not another “famous person does a newsletter for marketing” thing. It’s actually written by him and great. It comes out on Friday afternoons and is called Lyrics of Livin’ – check it out.

Thanks for reading.

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Have a great week, y’all.

Teddy is the author of The Process. Feel free to reach out on LinkedIn or X, or reply to this email.