Sunday morning from the rough..

Sunday morning came in slow… like it knew better than to rush a man who ain’t got anywhere to be.

Seventy-two hours since they laid me back, cranked the lights down low, and went to work like a demolition crew with a medical license.

Nine teeth gone.

Bone shaved down like they were renovating an old house that had seen too many bad years.

I walked in there with a mouth full of history… and walked out with a temporary version of a future I ain’t earned yet.

And right now?

I’m living in the in-between.

No golf. No usefulness. No appetite worth trusting. Just me, a recliner, and a body trying to remember how to be normal while my mouth feels like it got dragged behind a pickup down a dirt road in Hale County.

Down ten pounds.

Not because I got disciplined… but because eating has turned into a chore that feels somewhere between survival and punishment. Soup. Potatoes. Yogurt. Smoothies. I’m basically on a diet designed by a depressed toddler.

And every bite comes with a reminder—

You ain’t there yet.

These dentures… they don’t belong to me yet. They sit in my mouth like a stranger renting space. Tight where they shouldn’t be, loose where they shouldn’t be, rubbing like they’ve got a grudge.

And the bleeding… still whispering.

Not screaming. Not enough to send me running. Just enough to remind me there’s still open ground in there… still something closing up, sealing off, finishing the job they started Thursday morning.

That’s the part that gets a little dark if you sit with it too long.

Because you realize…

There was a version of you in that chair that ain’t coming back.

Those teeth, those flaws, those little things you learned to hide behind… they’re gone. Yanked out, ground down, thrown away like they never belonged to you in the first place.

And all that’s left now…

Is this.

Swollen. Sore. Half-formed. Somewhere between who you were and who you’re trying to become.

Like standing in the doorway of a house that’s been gutted—walls torn out, floors stripped bare—and somebody telling you, “Trust me, it’s gonna be beautiful.”

Right now it just looks like hell.

But I know what’s coming.

That’s the thing.

I can see him.

That version of me that don’t think twice before smiling. The one that ain’t angling his face in pictures or covering his mouth when he laughs. The one that walks into a room like he belongs there, because for the first time… he believes it.

That man’s coming.

But he’s gotta be built.

And apparently… this is how.

Slow. Bloody. A little humbling.

And through all of it… Jan.

I give her hell. I do. That’s part of my charm or my flaw—depends on the day.

But she’s been steady as a damn heartbeat through this.

Checking on me. Keeping me hydrated. Making sure I eat even when I don’t want to. Putting up with the version of me that’s a little sharper, a little more irritable, a little more dramatic than usual.

She’s taken care of me in that quiet way that don’t ask for applause… but deserves a standing ovation anyway.

And I see it.

Even when I’m too uncomfortable to say it right.

So yeah… this Sunday morning ain’t pretty.

It’s a little dark. A little uncomfortable. A little funny if you step back far enough and realize I’m a grown man eating like a toddler and acting like I might not make it through mashed potatoes.

But there’s something honest about it too.

Because this is the part most people skip.

The messy middle.

The part where something gets torn down so something better can take its place.

And one day soon…

I’ll sit in this same chair, drink this same coffee, take a bite of something real… and smile without thinking about it.

And I’ll know exactly what it cost to get there.

And if I’m being honest…

I’ll probably still complain about something.

But I’ll be smiling when I do it.