Fog on the Island

Today — April 8, 2026 — I finished reading Joseph Nguyen’s The Overthinker’s Guide to Making Decisions.

I wasn’t surprised by a single word in it.

Not because I’d read it before. Because I’d lived it first. Every page felt like finding a photograph of a place you’d already been — someone else’s camera, your own footprints. The fog, the promises, the strings of trials with no visible fruit, the moment clarity arrived without warning, the voice you learn to trust again — all of it already happened. The book just arrived today to name what the last several years had been teaching me one lesson at a time.

I started writing this piece back in December 2025 during the first thick stretch of Galveston fog — the kind that doesn’t lift for days. Every time it rolled back in through the weeks and months that followed, it added another layer. Another reflection. Another string pulled tight that I hadn’t seen connected before. By the time I picked up Nguyen’s book this morning, it was the last piece landing. Not the first.

This is that story.

These last few nights the fog’s been so thick you could step outside at 1:44 a.m. with a clean glass and bring it back coated in water. Left Chachynga Misufio out because he wanted to stay — he’s over sixteen years old and knows his own mind — then checked him this morning and he was sopping wet, just like the porch chair and drinking container, merely from the air. Dried him off and he crawled in bed with me till I got up. That’s Galveston sometimes. Fog doesn’t always come with rain, neither does heavy lightning.

Feels like that’s how a lot of things got here too.

To understand how I got here, you have to know where my palate came from. And I mean that literally.

I had many medical issues as a child — this thing they call acidosis. Always sick, in the hospital for many months at a time. My doctor said to have me self-medicate while I was still in diapers. I grew up with a bottle, self-pouring whatever limit I felt I needed. People claim alcohol is bad, but it’s in the fruit we eat and our bodies can make it too. That was my first introduction to it from the outside. Years later I discovered that beer and ale help — some better than others — and it turns out the best ones that keep me out of the hospital are usually full-flavor, strong, dark brews. A long life set of lessons born with things that almost no one understands. Only a handful of people ever realized this pain.

Growing up in Houston, my cousin’s Greek ex-husband made pizza by the Washburn Tunnel near I-10. So thick and full of foods it was amazing, worth every drive. That was my standard — the best pizza I’d ever had — until Italy reset everything, and then Galveston matched it. But that comes later.

The island waters were always part of it too. Swimming with my grandmother almost daily when young. Visits through the years that eased my pain, both body and spirit. The coastline has a way of doing that. I kept finding reasons to come back, even broke, even locking my keys in the car, waiting hours on Triple A with a six-pack just to get in the water. Fixes everything for me — skin, sleep, mood.

Then came the strings.

String after string of business attempts, each one for my edification and learning. It was almost comical — not in a cruel way, but in the way that only makes sense looking back. Each string prepared me. I promised God and myself I would dedicate myself fully, even a year solid if necessary, to each attempt — to learn what He had me to learn about myself, my methods, my thoughts, my actions. No payday guaranteed. No guarantees at all. Just: sit through the trials of growth. And I did. Businesses around me went under, strings snapped, visible fruit was nowhere for years at a time, and I learned a little here and a little there and kept asking for a way to get to the island waters more often.

After an eleven-year stint where I built contacts, harvested what companies and people were due, I took those tools and applied them — chasing government money for large companies, then flipping to electricity sales, going after corporate and franchise players and the tiny one-shop guys too. Learned along the way I needed the list of folks coming due instead of shooting in the dark. All the while laser-focused on Galveston and how to somehow get here, while helping myself and my sister.

Got so good at cold emails I was hitting damn near every McDonald’s owner across the country, open rates north of 80% easy. This came after I learned my avatar, thanks to a kind man or two I questioned and dialed it in. A key is learning especially subject lines and that pre-header part — the teaser they see before opening. The magic bullet. Each audience unique, each mind trained to what its desire needs. I started around 20 to 30 percent open rates, refined as I learned each avatar, climbed to 40 to 60, and eventually cracked over 90 on the right list with the right message. Made me laugh when I finally saw how simple the key was.

Reminded me of my old Indian neighbor — his wife didn’t like to cook, so he’d bring over food from his favorite spot, hot enough our eyes ran water. We’d laugh through the tears. He turned me on to unique Indian foods I would’ve never tried otherwise. He was lonely, him and his son, wife always gone working. His pre-header was food — spicy food first, the attractant that opened the door to everything else.

Back in the Obama days, clearance rack at Whole Foods, cheeses marked down heavy, grabbed some wine and beer on impulse, headed to what I worked at the time — a local cigar store, former competitor to my previous favorite smokehouse. Everything paired like it was meant to be. Glorious night. Even lost the hard drive with some early bitcoin on it in a move later, but that pairing stuck clear.

Had all these YouTube channels back then — some preaching, some drinking, some smoking. One cigar video blew up because nobody could place the strange taste. Everybody guessed. I knew instantly: it was from an African nut, the seeds. Long story short, I’d been selling credit card terminals, first sale a repeat customer with an African store. The couple cooked authentic food, imported stuff you couldn’t find anywhere else. One seed’s insides tasted exactly like that cigar. No question. Beware the real cola nut though — it’ll keep you up for days.

I worked and ground and learned many lessons and stuck with it and knew some way somehow these connections would present themselves again. All my food, all my drink, all my past work struggles — they were threading together even when I couldn’t see the needle.

Like this: six degrees of separation without boring you. A friend and I went to a holiday gathering at a cigar store — I used his truck because he’s handicapped — and we bought special things for the shop. When we arrived the place was packed: locals, out-of-towners, regulars who live out of the country. A name came up. I called it out. Everyone went quiet. Turns out we all, every person in that room, in one way or another knew this exact man. I saw that kind of connection happen again and again over the following years, from different places and experiences.

That pulled up an old-timer too — man over 100 we’d share a beer or scotch with time to time. Loved my cigars because he’d smoked most of his life. Ran moonshine young. Brought some of the new stuff over one day, asked him. He tasted it and said yup — that’s moonshine exactly like I remember. My grandmother, my Mommu — she knew that taste too, the original Coca-Cola, and when we traveled we always kept an eye out for it and shared what we could find. I named her Mommu on a painful Galveston day coming back from the beach — couldn’t speak the pain was so bad, but the name was in my head the next morning and it stuck. No one cared but it brought me peace.

One woman I knew when I was younger spent her whole life not trying things because they cost too much. I was selling prepaid burial insurance, just starting. Stopped by her house several times. The manager rolled his eyes telling me how many closers couldn’t get her to decide. Third or fourth visit, her daughter told us she was convinced she’d die in her sleep that night. She did. But before that, she gave a list — caviar, champagne, wine, liquor, filet mignon, everything she’d always dreamed of sampling. The daughter bought it all. She got to experience everything her taste buds had craved her whole life. I went to her wake.

I say do what you can now, as often as you can, without destroying your future. Life is lived and experienced, not put in a bottle on a shelf.

Then one day I drove a buddy for a little gig.

In a dream the night before and in the shower that morning I’d already seen it — heard the exact words he would say. When we arrived at his destination and he started to speak, I knew what was coming out of his mouth before it came. He handed me a few bucks and asked if I’d give one single dollar to his Greek church. He almost presented it — made me promise only if I wanted to. I knew it was right. Said yes.

That night I prayed. Woke up the next morning and there it was, crystal clear: the vision. The cards. Cross-promo mailings, elegant, evergreen, hopping zip codes, bridging people who needed each other — realtors, lawyers, business owners, folks who move real money and would see serious ROI from something that connected them the right way. No arguing with it, no uncertainty. Just clarity I hadn’t felt in years.

And I understood something else that morning too — all those strings, all those trials, all that grinding with no visible fruit — they were preparation. Not punishment. Not bad luck. Preparation. Each one taught me something I would need for this. The strings led here. The cards are the fulcrum to everything I have learned — a long-term system for any whale or entity who truly wants to own their niche. I think in systems. This one is a winner. But that stays under the wings for now.

I wrote this down on February 26, 2025, the morning after the vision came: