Transforming Behind-the-Bars Lessons into Tools for Personal Growth and Business Success

Have you ever wondered how the lessons learned behind bars could transform your life? Join us for a soul-stirring conversation with James, an individual who turned his prison experiences into tools for personal growth and business expansion. We venture into the world of Leonardo's Catering, and discover how the James, along with Tony's daughter Dana, used their unique skills to create a thriving enterprise.

His journey extends beyond the confines of their business. We touch upon his personal struggles, illustrating how these hurdles shaped him into the individual he is today. James, in particular, shares his experience juggling personal goals with professional development and how it led him down an emotional path of buying his first home and managing relationships. 

But this story doesn't end with James and Haley. The episode explores their impact on others, especially James's mentoring of Branden, a young man who, through hard work and dedication, found his way into their family and their business. This heartwarming tale of resilience, redemption, and love is a testament to the power of second chances and the indomitable human spirit. Join us for this inspiring journey of healing and renewal, and learn how you too can turn life's challenges into stepping stones to success.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 5:03

Hey guys, thanks for tuning in to the Straight Out of Prison podcast. My name is James K Johnson. This is my story.

Speaker 2: 5:09

And this is Hailey Jones, and this is his story that has now become a part of my story.

Speaker 1: 5:14

So this is season three, episode six. We're calling this blazing a new trail because these years where you know things weren't quite working out the way that I thought they would, I had every thing in my mind that thought that I would get out of prison, you know, work for a little while, maybe you start a catering business, but that eventually I would get involved in ministry and that you know I'd be helping people. And you know, everything kind of fell apart with the church and then everything fell apart with some relationships I had, and you know that was a couple of seasons back. I only stuck on that one. But this one was like I'm here, I have a foundation and I just need to keep going and things did not exactly look like what I thought they were going to look at like, but these were some of the really the best, funnest times of my life.

Speaker 2: 6:02

It's. It's funny because, as we recorded last week, and now I mean this week, keeping going and some conversations that we've had, it's occurred to me. I mean it has occurred to me in the past, though but a lot of people say to you oh, tell us your story, tell us, tell us your story. And you always respond to them like what story do you?

Speaker 1: 6:25

want to hear which part.

Speaker 2: 6:27

Which part? Because a lot I mean the prison story and obviously this podcast is straight out of prison. It's the story of how you got into prison and got out. But there's so many stories and to get hung up on the story of you going to prison and get out, of getting out of prison like actual prison, is one of the stories Like there's, like the journey just continues. I think we and for several, a lot of people, can get stuck on. Maybe there was one big thing that happened and that's all we ever talk about instead of moving forward with the new things that are happening.

Speaker 1: 7:01

New beginnings when, like church people, they say we want you to come and tell your testimonies, like well, that means they want me to say I was got locked up, I was in prison, that Jesus I meant Jesus and he changed my heart and that is part of my story and that's actually the foundation of every good thing that's come after that.

Speaker 2: 7:20

But you did have, but you have had and we all have had. But in your case you have had other stories that were equally as kind of dramatic and life changing. It's crazy yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:31

So it's one reason we're doing a podcast, yeah.

Speaker 2: 7:34

Just so you know. So where are we at now?

Speaker 1: 7:37

This will be the 29th hour of this straight out of prison podcast, which blows my mind that people are continuing to listen to this, but also, like I have friends and people, even family that's like binge listened. I'm like that's pretty cool.

Speaker 2: 7:53

But okay, moving on. Where are we at?

Speaker 1: 7:55

All right. So this was, uh, I guess around 2001 is where I got a big shift. Uh, started going to Steve's church. Didn't really like it. Then my mom came to live with me, yeah, and you know she was found herself in a bad situation. It was hard to have her living in my house, cause I lived in a small apartment, but at the same time I felt like I didn't have any choices. Um, then I got a huge promotion at Leonardo's. Tony asked me to take over the dining room you know we talked about this in the last one but, uh, he allowed me to keep waiting tables cause I was making a ton of money as long as I could run in front of the house. All the servers, the bartenders, the hostess, you know as long as.

Speaker 1: 8:35

I could run everything, I could do whatever I wanted. So that turned into like a, I guess like a gold mine for me. I mean it really did as far as like financial, like I can, we can keep going. But I guess my first thing that I kind of focused on was this thing is just a mess. So I went through and you know I created, uh, for every shift that we had, you know, have more on the weekends for the bartenders, the hostess I created like opening side work, running side work, closing side work.

Speaker 1: 9:05

So everybody, everybody was doing something all the time, everybody was staying busy and ended up just totally redoing the front of the house. And I remember Tony and boo and you know they were just like, oh look, and they would take me back and show them. You know how I'd like structured out everything and just like this is just amazing. And I would always laugh and I don't think I always told them, but I would go back and tell Steve, I learned all that in prison, yeah, and the way that I redid the Leonardo staff with the schedules and the, the, all the structure in the side work and all that stuff. It was basically what I learned to do in the honor dorm.

Speaker 2: 9:43

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:44

It's neat to think about that, but we can learn something from any situation that we're in.

Speaker 2: 9:50

Yeah, I was going to say it's kind of neat, though how? Because I think we all learn things all the time, but to be able to translate whatever it is we learned into a brand new situation that stuck with me, right? I mean, that's kind of neat.

Speaker 1: 10:06

And I guess the reason why more than it stuck with me is because it worked. There was results. If you can see that happen in maximum security prison, you can see those kind of results anywhere.

Speaker 2: 10:18

Well, just like someone said to us recently, actually a gallery started working with said I just thought, man, if you can lead that many prisoners in a, you know, in a what do you call highest security?

Speaker 1: 10:30

camp yeah.

Speaker 2: 10:34

Then those same things leadership skills or whatever can apply to so many other situations.

Speaker 1: 10:40

Yeah, anything, and it's true, and I use that. You know a lot. I mean I still use the things that learn there. But then probably the biggest thing that I learned in prison that I was listening to do was I asked Tony if we could start a catering business, and it was because it was in my vision. It was what I wanted to do, no-transcript. I kind of feel myself working for him and therefore a little while I thought maybe I'll just be here, I'll be working with him forever and it's okay, cause I mean I feel like I'm part of family and in a lot of ways he filled a father role for me. He loved me, but he would also let me take risks and do things. I remember my first Valentine's that I worked at Leonardo's. They had like small seating, like they didn't have many tables, and if somebody was eating they didn't have to get up till they were done. And because of the atmosphere and the vibe and the music and all the things, there would be people that would come in and sit there all night.

Speaker 2: 13:01

It lent itself towards staying.

Speaker 1: 13:05

But when you're a server, if you have somebody on Valentine's sitting there all night, it means you're not gonna make any money or you're not gonna make much money. So my first Valentine's I was frustrated because I had three or four tables but I only made like $120.

Speaker 1: 13:18

And I was like this can't be. I mean we can do. We gotta figure out a way to do this better. So the next Valentine's was when he had let me start to be in charge. So I explained it to him and I pulled up the data from the year before. Like, we made $3,600 in this restaurant for Valentine's. That is the most money making day of the year for a restaurant like this. So I asked him to let me do like blocks and put in some extra tables, because most of the tables were two tops.

Speaker 2: 13:49

So explain blocks.

Speaker 1: 13:50

Blocks of times, like we'll have a five o'clock seating, but it's a five to seven. We'll have a seven o'clock seating, but it's seven to nine. We'll have a eight seating and nine o'clock seating. It'll be nine to 11. And everything will be the same. We'll do a limited menu where they have to choose. And he was like struggling to let me try that, but then he let me try it and it totally, like he totally trusted me. After that he like just let James, he made me run everything through him.

Speaker 2: 14:16

So what happened that it made him trust you?

Speaker 1: 14:18

By the second seating we had a top $10,000. So that was, and at the end of the night it was like I think it was 13 or $14,000. So we went from 36 to 14 with just some tweaks and not just. It wasn't just his sales. All the servers made money, the hosts made money Right, naturally. The people were more happy because it was less complicated. We got them in there. They had their two hours. It was. He did a lot of special things for them.

Speaker 2: 14:46

It's funny structure.

Speaker 1: 14:48

Yes, it's just creating a way to make it better that translated. We started doing that for New Years. It was the same and it was just rock and roll, but after that he trusted me. So when I came to him, actually I didn't come by myself, me and Dana, his daughter. I've been talking about that.

Speaker 2: 15:05

Where did you get that idea with the blocks?

Speaker 1: 15:08

Of time. Yeah, I don't know, I was trying to figure out something that would work, like you, just if you look at a problem the problem was with Leonardo's was that it was small and we had a party room and two like eight-person tables, but nobody came out for Valentine's like that it was trying to figure out a way for started off with the problem, then trying to figure out a way how can I get the servers to have five tables each instead of three or four, and how can we come up with a way where I don't have somebody a customer sitting in the bar waiting on the table for three hours?

Speaker 2: 15:44

Right.

Speaker 1: 15:44

And it worked, but it worked for the restaurant, it worked for the customers, it worked for the servers, so it was like win, win, win.

Speaker 2: 15:50

I like that formula.

Speaker 1: 15:52

What's the?

Speaker 2: 15:52

problem. Now let's come up with this.

Speaker 1: 15:54

Well, you have to start with the problem, and it was a problem our to-go business, because this was authentic Italian food and people loved it. But the to-go business was like off the charts, with just like people lunchtime, dinner time. What ended up happening was to-go boxes was shut down, the kitchen it was shut down, the food runner it was shut down the hostess, and so I wanted to start a catering business, and it was always my dream, it's always something that I wanted to do and then his daughter, dana, had left and came back and she needed something like to throw herself into. So she and I actually went to him and said we wanna start Leonardo's catering and he let us Awesome, but ended up in the beginning he didn't know anything about catering. So, again, this is something that I learned in prison.

Speaker 1: 16:46

I learned when I was at BCI, when I was running the kitchen. We had a main kitchen but our dining room was in the middle of the compound, so we basically catered every meal to the dining hall. A lady would come. We'd fill up cambros, which is just a container that keeps food warm for four hours, and send it down, and it worked and so I thought-, man, those prison days are coming in handy. Well, no, they came in real handy during this time.

Speaker 1: 17:11

Because I was like here's what we just I gotta go buy some cambros and instead of doing everything in little boxes, we'll do it in pans. We'll have big pans or small pans, and this will. And also they could cook it before the service start, like if we had the orders. You can utilize your kitchen staff. We do all the catering stuff before we even open. So it stopped our restaurant from getting shut down during service. So it just all it all worked. We went. He took me to Breast Co, which is a restaurant supply place in Birmingham, Was like get whatever you need, you know, let me go through and buy all the things.

Speaker 2: 17:50

That's like the ultimate dream, especially when you're doing some for the first time. I mean, I'm just thinking we have so much experience now with like finances and financial backing, and what is that? Like all the little pieces have to come into play. But for someone to just take you there and say, just pick out what you need, let's buy it from him to make this work Well, he was like that.

Speaker 1: 18:09

He always let me try stuff and we start stuff. And then, you know, we went through the process of getting menus figured out, prices and all that stuff. And then Dana and I, every day for like a month we would just take an hour or two in the afternoon and go to all the hospitals and just say, hey, we're catering, we'd bring them something. Forget what we brought them, we'd give them to the nurses, give them to the doctors, and then that catering business exploded. After that. I mean, actually it got so busy that I had to back away from it a little bit.

Speaker 1: 18:40

But I started doing like the special event catering, like weddings and stuff like that, which was something I always wanted to do. That was exciting. But then, you know, we redesigned the front of the house. We redesigned, you know, we added a catering arm, then we added an events arm. But then you had those people that still wanted to eat in Leonardo's and have their little parties. But we were such a small place we would try to steer them towards catering. But then there were so many people like, no, we don't want to do catering. You know, it's my daughter's rehearsal dinner. We want to come to Leonardo's. We love Tony, want the experience and all that stuff. So it came up with Leonardo's we call it Leonardo's banquets. Well, I came up with like a Tony was big into metals- yeah like military stuff, like a gold metal or you know.

Speaker 1: 19:25

So I came up with a gold menu, gold metal menu, a silver metal menu and a bronze metal menu and it was like, okay, y'all can pick, three of these will make special menus, and it was just another way to keep being able to produce.

Speaker 1: 19:37

Right and I mean that ended up when the restaurant made money. But then I made a lot of money off that because I got to cut off all of them. And then sometime in 2002, while we were rocking and rolling, I had my hands and so many Different things. I mean I was, I was making all the schedules for the front of the house, I was Helping oversee the catering arm of the business, then we had the banquets, then we had the events and I was still making the bulk of my money off of waiting tables.

Speaker 1: 20:06

Wow and it was, but it was getting harder and harder, like to complete a shift because there was so much going on. So I don't even know where I came up with this idea. I think it was on New Year's, when we were short-handed is I took our best sell salesman as far as waiter. This name was Josh. He could always upsell people onto a more expensive wine or to order the more expensive Lobster tail or steak. He just he had a gift at sales which you know I don't possess that I took. I'm not good at sales. I took him and I took Brandy. They have both been there, I believe, before I even started, and Brandy was One of my closest friends at that time, but she was also the hard worker like she was gonna get it done.

Speaker 1: 20:50

So we formed a team for that night. It was me, josh and Brandy. Basically, I would set the stage for the evening. These are all the 300 people we got a weight on. Josh will go through with his Skills and he would take all their drink orders, up sale, do all things. I would come through, take the order so that I know where everything was going and knew how to do the checks. And Then Brandy was like our runner, like she would run food to help us tables, real silver wearing thing to do, and At the end of that night we made Gosh. It was close to a thousand dollars a piece we made. So what? It was insane. Well, no, what in the reason? What we had to do that out of out of a crisis? It's because we had three or four people that didn't show up to work and we had all these reservations.

Speaker 2: 21:37

So I was like and this is just regular restaurant business.

Speaker 1: 21:41

No, I think it was New Year's Eve.

Speaker 1: 21:44

Okay 2002, but after that I came back and I was like I Need to do this all the time, like this would be a way for me able to beat, to be able to Manage everything I need to manage and make money and wait tables. So we formed the big three. It was James, josh and Brandy. You know we we took one half of the restaurant from then on as long as I worked there, and then we we did like regular stuff on that. But we did all the parties, all the and part of that, like you'd get servers that would come in for a minute, they would get mad James, and then they get all the parties and it's like, well, we set them up, we book them, we work with the people. So of course we're gonna do the work, but beyond that, if I let you do it, then I'm gonna have to end up doing it anyway, so I'm just gonna do it. So it was like I don't know I was Money was coming in hands over fists.

Speaker 2: 22:35

Yeah, it sounds like your whole life was ensconced in Leonardo's now Like that's all you did.

Speaker 1: 22:40

I loved it. I loved everything about it. I love the people, I love the.

Speaker 2: 22:45

So where were you at with your? You're still paying, paying restitution, yeah, you're still having to see your parole officer. That was for 13 years, 13. So, yeah, that was definitely still happening.

Speaker 1: 22:57

Yeah but you were really just kind of consumed and I was rocking and rolling, yeah and during that time, you know, tony helped me buy my first house because I had all these goals. You know, I want to buy new cars and I wanted to buy a new house, probably the biggest one, to make sure my mom was okay.

Speaker 1: 23:14

Mm-hmm and then I want to get married and start a family. But I found out the first, you know, buying a car and buying a house, and then, you know, moving in my new house. That was amazing because it was uh, it was a townhouse but I didn't really have time for a big yard or anything, stuff anyways, but it was, everything was new, you know, the Appliances were new, the AC was new, everything was new. And I'd never that's a nice.

Speaker 1: 23:38

I don't know that I've ever moved in a new house like everything was new right.

Speaker 1: 23:42

The AC had a problem with AC and it was still under warranty. So I was like I wasn't the first person in that house, but it was. It was an amazing time and so I was able to, like you know, knock down all my goals of I Wanted to own a home or wanted all these things, but then Dating somebody and getting just wasn't working out. I couldn't never find anybody that I wanted to be. You know, there was a couple girls that went out on a couple dates with and it was just like, oh, this ain't there. And then there was that one part of me in my mind that felt like you know the thing with Shawna, steve's daughter, like she was supposed to be my wife, I believe, but she married somebody else and so it was like this thing I couldn't get over.

Speaker 1: 24:27

I guess, like it and it affected me from being in any other relationships really, but I was so busy with work, so busy with it was like I'd been handed like a blank canvas and and everything had to be approved by mr Fuleta.

Speaker 1: 24:42

But there he had a way of just allowing me to just run with it like anything, you know, let's just do it, let's have fun, and it ended up, you know it's good for him because it was adding to his overhead. I remember during that season I got aggravated with the back of the house because I didn't, you know, I would go back there and cook with him Sometime. But it was a mess. But he allowed me to go back in there and just, I guess, basically go through and redesign. I did the same thing for the back of the house that I did for the front of the house.

Speaker 2: 25:12

And when.

Speaker 1: 25:12

I got done with that. It ended up saving him $50,000 a year in payroll. Wow, which was crazy. I remember boo. She would always show me these numbers. Let me show you what you did here, because she was you know, she was always mad One of my fans, but then when me and her we're getting conflict with each other, we we getting big arguments about stuff well, you still have a gift for that.

Speaker 2: 25:31

Going in and kind of like seeing what the problem is.

Speaker 1: 25:34

I love and restructuring love it. That's why I love it. I'm doing what we do. Team Jones is good, yeah, but uh, there was, uh I Was so busy with with what I was doing that I kind of felt myself where I was kind of Moving away from a relationship with Jesus and then the church stuff in it. It just started being real boring to me. But, then my mom was going to church at Graciantruth so and she was building she would go to church when I would say I wasn't going.

Speaker 1: 26:01

Mm-hmm and it was, which I thought was weird. But remember, in 2001, before I moved to my new house, I got a flyer in my mail that said this new church was starting, church of the Highlands and I immediately had like something jumping me, like maybe that's where I'm supposed to be at, and I took it and showed it to Steve and Steve was like, oh, they're good people, they do small groups like us and, and you know, they got we got their train, our training from Bethany, the same place, they got Louisiana and all stuff. But uh, there's something about my mom being with me and just knowing that she probably wouldn't be able to to take a move. But it's weird that, you know, 13 years later, ended up at Highlands.

Speaker 1: 26:40

He was right, pretty cool, but uh, some something in there like I. I started feeling like I was moving away from, like my, the spiritual part of my life that I wanted to keep in the front. But, it wasn't really happening at the church I was going to and I just felt, just kind of felt like I was drifting a little bit and then Like I quit studying as much as I did, quit praying as much as I did, and just kind of just was doing my own thing.

Speaker 2: 27:05

Well, did you realize that at the time? I know you realize it now, but did you realize it at the time when you were in it?

Speaker 1: 27:11

I did and it scared me, like I was, like I don't, I don't want to get too. I mean, I know I'm busy, I know I've got all these things going on, but I don't want to miss, like the very thing, the gift of Jesus that gave me this life to allow me to do that right and then I think it all kind of came to a head, because I would work, you know, sometimes 15, 16 hours a day and we were off on Sundays.

Speaker 1: 27:33

And then I always took Mondays off to recover because we did a lot of work. But Steve Wanted you to be in church every Sunday and then if you missed a Sunday he wouldn't Bother you, but if you miss two Sundays in a row you expect to get a phone call from him.

Speaker 2: 27:50

And.

Speaker 1: 27:50

I remember this one Sunday afternoon we had had a week where we catered some weddings. It was a week like you know. You just wore out, right and I slept in. I didn't go to church and he called me and he was like mad at me and he was like fussing at me on the phone and I was like yeah, yeah, yeah. But he woke me up out of a nap when the phone rang.

Speaker 2: 28:08

Oh lord, waking you up out of a nap is never good.

Speaker 1: 28:11

He said he was like fussing at me and you know he was a father figure to me, but he said something in this conversation that Stayed with me even to now. He said what's going on? What's going on? You don't never miss work. What's going on? Is Tony, your daddy now? And I was like what, what are you? What are you saying? And then, but it made me angry and I was just like maybe you should as a pastor and as a church person, maybe you should do something to make your church a little better, to make me want to come. Oh, here you go, let there be something to get me there. And we had a big thing. He called me the next morning, I mean early the morning, apologized that he was wrong to say that.

Speaker 2: 28:52

But it's still. Well, let's pause. That is a very interesting thing to say, which I think you know, not that we need to like unpack it again, but just the dynamic of just knowing that I had daddy issues. Is Tony your daddy?

Speaker 2: 29:04

Yeah, well, that he knew you had daddy issues and also, as you said, he had been like very much like a father figure to you in so many ways, like such a blessing and then but also Tony, in very different ways had come alongside you and supported you and helped you do things that practical, yeah, practical things so I mean, and we all do this I mean I'm not like judging Steve at all, because I feel like we all you know do stuff like this, but like that definitely seemed like at that moment he was upset and that was kind of used as a weapon, yeah it felt like it and then that's what made you angry, and I know you and I know when you feel like someone's coming at you, like that, and I can just imagine what you said about the something to get.

Speaker 2: 29:48

I mean you can be Very skilled with your words.

Speaker 1: 29:52

No, I mean but that's the truth. If you're fussing at me for not wanting to come to church, maybe you need to make it better. Yeah, something different.

Speaker 2: 29:58

And he did, he actually and it was a turning point for me. What do you do?

Speaker 1: 30:03

He started a leadership Small group at his house on Sunday nights and he picked out about I think it was about 12 young people like in our 20s to Lack of a better word pour into right. Like we started talking about just leadership, like leadership potential and what are we doing with it. And it ended up being like it. It shifted my life back where I needed to be.

Speaker 2: 30:26

Oh, that's awesome.

Speaker 1: 30:27

And it even got me excited about being a part of grace and truth after that.

Speaker 2: 30:30

Did he use a curriculum or did he just? Was it just self guided?

Speaker 1: 30:35

he was pretty much using like Things out of his own experience Mm-hmm, but it was good. I mean, some of that stuff I've used to this day.

Speaker 2: 30:43

We even use it in our business, like sometimes you just need to sit people down and Is there one thing that sticks out to you through that course that you remember?

Speaker 1: 30:51

I think, more than anything, it connected me to other people that were Around my age or in my life season. Mm-hmm that we're heading in the same direction and up until that point I only had a relationship with Steve.

Speaker 2: 31:03

Uh-huh.

Speaker 1: 31:04

I just didn't really connect a lot with a lot of the people that were going there. But what ended up happening after that? His church exploded after that because he had, instead of just him being the leader, he had 12 other people out there doing leadership stuff and I was probably the biggest growth I think we ever saw it grace and truth. And then out of that, they asked me to cater his daughter, tanya's wedding.

Speaker 1: 31:24

I don't need and it was one of. It was in my first year of doing wedding catering. I was trying to do it where I didn't charge him a lot. Right so I was doing it by myself and then having people help. I wasn't bringing people from leonardo's like I like I probably they had a couple hundred people. There was probably like a $5,000 reception that we put on but I think only Charged them for costs, so it was only like probably two grand.

Speaker 1: 31:48

So you did all that work by yourself pretty much I was at the end of myself. Well, I got to the end of that. I was like I need to rethink this catering stuff. But I had a chicken recipe. That came up with a grilled chicken tenderloins that we started at their wedding but we actually cooked them there and so many people went crazy over the food at her wedding, at Tony's wedding, but that was really where the idea for Kairos was born was right there which was neat. But there's a neat time.

Speaker 1: 32:18

I mean I was just steady, you know Building up, you know I was satisfied with what I was doing in business, I was satisfied with my home and all things. But again, I was just so lonely.

Speaker 2: 32:31

You were lonely in terms of you are ready for a woman a life a woman Partner.

Speaker 1: 32:39

I was one. But somewhere in the middle of all that, shawna, her and her husband had moved off to South Carolina and she came home during the part of that and Her husband told her that he didn't want to be married to her and they sent her home. And then I found out like some details like there had never been, they'd never been like fully connected. There was a lot of details that I won't share, but she was devastated because the way she grew up, like with their midnight background, you'd be better off to go murder someone and you could find forgiveness for that. Then you would be to get a divorce because that's just, they're just, they don't do that. But she came home briefly for like two or three months and I thought, well, here's here it is, here's my shot. You know Jesus, jesus has got the plan for me.

Speaker 1: 33:29

So immediately, you know I was friends with Steve Tanya, his daughter probably ended up being one of my best friends. I mean because she she's just, I think she's probably seven, like she's so full of life and she would. She would call me out on my stuff like cuz I didn't really Hang out too much with the grace and truth people and she would always say James, you're being anti-social, like won't you get in here and be social, and you know? But she was one of. She was one of my good friends. But when Shawna came home I thought this is Jesus, like Turning it all over bringing her back to me.

Speaker 1: 34:05

Yeah, so I started making up. She didn't have a job, so I started making up reasons to get her to help me with events. Uh-huh, and you know that she helped me with two or three like catering jobs, but then just as quickly as she came, he called her and said never mind. As she turned around and ran home again. Yeah so I was kind of broke my heart again Like we weren't dating or anything like that.

Speaker 1: 34:25

Yeah, just inside you felt like hope and that was yeah, but at the same time I didn't really understand, like marriage and commitment. I got it and I just felt like if she was supposed to be married to me and she married somebody else and she can rectify that, we can just move on. And it was that that's wrong now, but at the time that was my thoughts. But then she left again. So it was like, okay, maybe it's time to move on. Yeah, so she went back, but somewhere during this time I started itching like to start my own. I needed something more.

Speaker 1: 34:56

Like I feel like I've done everything at Leonardo's I could do. You know I was making all the money, like the money just kept growing and growing and growing influence. You know, miss Fuletta came to me during this season and she wanted to do a Leonardo's like South of town and and she was getting ready to retire and she wanted to put some money into starting one like in alabaster where Dana lives, that we could run Together, and so that got me excited. Like, okay, I could, you know, I could, like satellite off, be doing my own thing and. But somehow that fell through and you know they decided not to do that. Like I think Tony thought if we open one south that's going to compete with this one and we don't need to do that. So we ended up deciding not to do that. But then, at the same time, like you know, I was itching to do like my own thing. So I started like Researching how to start my own restaurant. You know what would it be? How could I? You know, what can I do?

Speaker 2: 35:56

It's interesting how people are wired, I think because as much freedom as you had, as much success as you had as much yeah ability to kind of do your own thing within the realm of you. Know what Tony said in his boundaries in his restaurant yeah, and you. That was okay for a while, but at the end of the day, or enough time goes by, I was like who you are, you know and how you're wired kind of rose back to the surface of like, okay, I'm ready to do my own.

Speaker 1: 36:27

I was and I knew that if I, if I did something similar to Leonardo's, that I could probably take four or five people to go work with me. But then at the same time I knew that was not like the way to do, it was not to get in competition with him in any way, because Just a loyalty thing he was like right, he's like family to me, so I struggle with that.

Speaker 1: 36:52

For a little while he used to have a saying like when I wanted to do something that he didn't want me to do, like he would tell me James, we're not doing that. And I would say but, and I'll tell them why we needed to do it. And he would say James, when you start your Restaurant, you can do that, but I, we're not doing that here. I can't remember what it was, it was just Before yeah and so that would always get me started on that.

Speaker 1: 37:15

But one Sunday I went home after church and I was taking a nap. That was, you know, sundays have always been my nap day. But I used to have a TV in my room and and I would put like some movie on HBO or something, be watching movie and fall asleep and then wake up. When I woke up this Sunday afternoon there was a movie on about this. It was. I don't remember the movie, but it was a Jewish Family that owned a huge restaurant, I think you like New York, and there was a man that worked for them.

Speaker 1: 37:43

That was kind of Running the business and it was a father and son and he was he had worked his whole life. He was an old man, he worked there his whole life and they were getting ready to go out of business and they ended up catching up going out of business and he got like nothing out of it. Like he was devastated. Like I've been doing this my whole life. Like you know, they just now gotta go find another job and I remember there's something about that spoke to me.

Speaker 1: 38:10

It kind of scared me, like I can't put all my eggs in the basket that somebody else owns. Does that make sense? Yeah, and so from that day forward, I just started looking to do my own thing somehow, and you know how that is once you start down a road like that, eventually you'll find it. So when I catered Tonya's wedding in August of 2003, we used a portion of the church there at Grayson Truth. That Was where they had like a little kitchen in a dining room, and the idea just came to me we could have a restaurant here, because the building used to be a restaurant.

Speaker 2: 38:51

So it was your idea.

Speaker 1: 38:53

Yeah, it was a. It was crazy and it sounded far-fetched and at the same time I knew like they wouldn't ever let me do that. So I kind of moved into like a Season of like just paying attention and watching and thinking and think how could this work? And Coming down to the end of 2004, it was just like I knew I've got a. I don't think I've got to ask them for permission to do it or it's just gonna forever be a fantasy in my mind. So that's a little further down the road. We'll probably get into that in the next episode.

Speaker 2: 39:33

We'll definitely unpack that later, because that obviously is a real turning point in new chapter. Well, I know I had to do something different right, but before we go there like family wise, what was was there? Anything going on like big things, family.

Speaker 1: 39:46

Well, mom was living with me. Okay, so she's living with you. She'd started working for Miss Fuleta, right. Then she got on like full-time, right? She became like that to go and she was making money. She was doing all her stuff. She had a little bit of a falling out with Steve's wife Lenora during that time, because mama's the type like if she's busy Doing something else and she don't want to hurt somebody's feelings, she'll make up something.

Speaker 1: 40:16

Yeah like oh, I gotta, you know, I gotta have my toenails operated on or something. And then, but technically, you know, technically that's lying. And that happened where she blew Lenora off a couple times and then Lenora got her feelings hurt. So they kind of had a, they kind of had a little bit of a rift where they quit hanging out so closely. But I mean, relationships are like you're in different seasons of your life or closer to different people at different times.

Speaker 1: 40:41

Yeah and she was just all into. She was into work and you know I was helping her put her life back together. I help really. I had to like force her into okay, you got to figure out why you don't have your driver's license. We got to get that, get her driver's license.

Speaker 2: 40:54

Then I helped her get a car and insurance and all things kind of like what people had to help you do and you got it Prison pretty much, yeah, and then I helped her, helped her get her first apartment and helped her move into it.

Speaker 1: 41:03

So mama, mom was good, I'm that person needed to be. But the family stuff during that time like on my mom's side you know there are still a lot of rifts from when we got arrested. And then my cousin that got out of prison Somewhere during this time my me mall. She passed away in 2000 and I think it was 2003. Yeah, the end of 2003 she won her grandsons, or really great grandsons, to be your paul bears. So my co-defendant just got out of prison and we were like Carrying our grandmother, you know, to her final resting place together and I never even acknowledged him, never looked at him, I just felt like I was moving on from that part of my life. But my uncle burn, he was the oldest one of them, the only boy, and you know it was his wife, see, that always helped me with everything right and still did. You know he got diagnosed with cancer beginning of 2004 and he has had cancer on and off since he was 19 years old. That's crazy.

Speaker 2: 42:06

What kind of cancer?

Speaker 1: 42:07

in the lymph nodes Wow so he was 19.

Speaker 1: 42:11

Well, he was going to Vietnam. He was in boot camp going to Vietnam, had already been had his orders and they found some lumps under his arms and they gave him like a medical discharge and he went through chemo and all stuff and he survived. And then he had a daughter, my cousin in Laudano. They came back, I think when she was in elementary school, and they told him to prepare, basically get ready to die, and he beat it. They came back when I was in high school. Basically they had told him, this time it was in his liver and they said you won't make it to see your daughter graduate from high school, you know, get your affairs in order, that kind of talk.

Speaker 1: 42:48

No, we he beat it again, survived, saw his daughter graduate from high school, saw her go to college, saw her get married, saw her have kids. When I was in prison in 1994, it came back again I forget where it was this time, but again he went through all things. He beat it. He was alive, you know. It made his health suffer Like he couldn't work after that. So he was retired after that.

Speaker 2: 43:17

Ash Cancer. Ain't got nothing on Uncle.

Speaker 1: 43:19

Bernard no, but he wanted to live yeah, I think it was his daughter Like he wanted to see her get to the place and he did. She got married you know, had babies. But in 2004, when it came back again, he told me. He said son, I'm 58 years old and I'm always be 58.

Speaker 1: 43:40

Oh wow, he said no, it was just like. I can't do this again. I'm ready. He had come into an experience with Jesus Like he was, he was ready to leave, he was done Like he's, like there's no reason to keep trying to hang on. And I believed him. And there was something about the human spirit, the human will to live.

Speaker 2: 43:58

So he said I'm 58. I'm always going to be 58.

Speaker 1: 44:01

Meaning this was in the spring of 2004. I'd went down there it was around Mother's Day. I planted her a flower, my aunt's through, I planted her a flower bed for Mother's Day gift. She's one of those people that has everything, so you do stuff for her.

Speaker 1: 44:12

She loves it. And he told me. He said I'm 58. I'm always be 58. And I knew his birthday was in December, so that Mother's Day was a few weeks out. I felt like I was supposed to get my family back together. I was like it was like a gift from Jesus and it sounded crazy and I didn't think nobody would do it. But I told Sue and we planned a big barbecue. I went and did all the food and a hundred percent of my family came and they reconnected everybody for gave everybody what month was this?

Speaker 1: 44:44

What have been May, I guess it was okay, it was crazy. And it was weird because I was like you don't do stuff like this in my family, you don't.

Speaker 2: 44:53

But I knew I was supposed to but you mean you don't do stuff like that or you don't just stuff like that and it'd be like good and everyone gets a lot, or they don't even show up. Right, but what?

Speaker 1: 45:03

you know, just like six months prior was when my me mom passed away. So everybody was kind of tender, everybody came, everybody found forgiveness, my uncle burning even. You know he just thanked me and it was all good and he ended up. You know it was September. He took his last breath and you know, and I know he's in heaven and I'll see him again. But after that it was like I don't know if that's discernment or it was just Jesus, like you can do something to make this better. And we did, basically catered it. You know, we did barbecue and all stuff and they had just had a pool put in. We did it on his property down there. They live outside of Fink City, out in the country, and it was good. It was sad.

Speaker 2: 45:46

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 45:47

Sad but I think one of my biggest takeaways from him, uh, his funeral. The morning of his funeral it was storming like and I was with my aunt, sue and she said it's rain. How are we going to bury him if it's raining? And I put my hand on her and I said it's going to stop raining, just relax. You know we're going to get there, because I was driving her that day and we went into a funeral and we came out and there was not a drop of rain.

Speaker 1: 46:14

But when we went to his, where we buried him, I just looked back and there was probably the people for days, like just people everywhere, and it was people in suits, people in overalls, people because he knew so many people and affected so many people over his lifetime was him telling me one time when I died, probably won't be 10 people come to my funeral and just noting like how many people were there. And it was a. They did a military funeral where the Marines put the flag and it was beautiful. But coming off of that it was sad, but it was also he wasn't in pain anymore and he had decided he was ready to go. So I think I don't think everybody my mama didn't deal with that like that, like she, yeah, she didn't, but I did.

Speaker 1: 46:59

And then um, right after that, steve asked me to be a little more involved in the church stuff. Um asked me to start teaching adult Sunday school classes and you know that made me feel like I was getting ready to start doing like ministry stuff again and that I don't want to say fired me up, but it just got me back on course Excited you yeah.

Speaker 1: 47:17

With the, you know, with following Jesus like I can do all this other stuff, but I can also, you know, help in this way and I ended up doing adult Sunday school classes for him for gosh for about three years.

Speaker 2: 47:32

Oh, wow.

Speaker 1: 47:33

And it was. You know, a lot of us sharing my story and you know getting free and stuff like that, but uh, it was always, it was never lost on me that there was a lot of conservative. Uh, you know people that have been in church all their life, grew up, that were sitting there letting me teach them the Bible, which was weird but good, but uh, well in that setting.

Speaker 2: 47:54

I feel like it's more common now even.

Speaker 1: 47:57

Well, I had one guy's name was Doug and my mom would be in my Sunday school classes. And then there was this one guy.

Speaker 2: 48:05

Sunday school. That's such a Southern thing, I think.

Speaker 1: 48:07

Yeah, we don't know.

Speaker 2: 48:08

I mean, well, I mean, I didn't really grow up with Sunday school classes and I know like especially our international listeners, and Sunday school is kind of like the little mini church before the big church, where you're studying something.

Speaker 1: 48:21

Yeah. Yeah, and for like meeting people and having groups of, but really the only reason that to have an adult Sunday school is because if you got kids, you're going to bring them. So what are you going to do? Just sit there. So if you have an adult Sunday school, then everybody can be doing something. Right. And they were only 45 minutes, um, you know, I kept them on topic, I didn't have to do it, I'm sure you did.

Speaker 1: 48:42

Well, no, the way he, the way Steve designed his church, you didn't do it Like just forever you had seasons, yeah, like a or semesters. You know you had like a spring, a summer, winter, and so that was fun. But uh, also during this time was when I met Brandon. I think we need to throw that out there, since he's faithfully not listening to podcasts.

Speaker 2: 49:06

Brandon's, our adoptive son. He is Um or maybe y'all adopted me into y'alls family.

Speaker 1: 49:12

He would probably say you're adopted. Yeah, um, it was sometime around this time Leonardo's red ran the kitchen in the back. So, um, when we needed extra dishwashers on the weekends, he would bring somebody from his neighborhood. So he came in because you had to have somebody help with the dishes on Friday, saturday nights, because there were so many more like one man couldn't handle you to. So he brought in this kid. He was tall, um, hard worker, he was working himself to death back there and I was like who's that kid back there washing dishes? And so, uh, what, any crazy young, he was 14. I was listening to say that, um, james was like that's my little cousin Brandon back there. He'd be bringing in just to make some cheddar on the weekend.

Speaker 2: 49:55

And uh, make some what on the weekend?

Speaker 1: 49:58

They called cheddar was money.

Speaker 1: 49:59

Oh, let me get that. I'm going here and watch these dishes make this little cheddar, um. But he stood out to me because he was working so hard and he wasn't complaining and he was sweating. I'm like hang on, I'm working this kid to death. So I was like making up conversation. I found out he was 14 years old and I was like Tony, we can have a 14 year old working here the labor people come in and shut us down and he's like James, relax on the weekends. Nobody looking on the weekends. Um, and that's uh, that's James and Jermaine's cousin, that it is okay. But he came up to me. He was a hard worker, he did good.

Speaker 1: 50:35

But he came up to me he probably was working there two or three months one Saturday night and he said I hear you and your mom talking a lot about your church and I was like okay, he said I want to go to church with you and I said he was 14 years old. I said that's fine, you know you want the address. And he was like oh, no, no, no, I need somebody come pick me up. So I was like my first one was like no, like I'm not riding all over the world on a Sunday morning. But I just said, okay, give me an address, make sure your mom says okay.

Speaker 1: 51:11

And I fully went with. The full expectation is that I would pick him up and I'll take him to church one time and then I'd be the end of it. But I thought I can do it one time. Yeah. But I went and got him, took him to church and he fell in love with the youth group and never stopped going. And then somewhere during that process, like he had older cousins that were thugs, you know, they had him driving a car around you know, just doing stuff that was going to lead him somewhere.

Speaker 1: 51:43

And he was a good kid. But I knew, like from my, the way I grew up, you can be a good kid if you're in a bad environment, something bad is going to come out of it. And we made such a connection that I felt like this was like a relationship that Jesus put in my path for purpose, and the purpose was to help him not go down the same road that I went down and we ended up. He ended up really becoming like my son I mean, they called him my son. He loved grace and truth. He loved the people. When he got 16, he got promoted at Leonardo's where he could be the food runner and all that stuff when I opened Kairos in 2006. He was actually there with me, helped me launch it. You know, he's been a part of my life ever since listening, and we are total opposites I'm white, he's black, I'm short, he's tall, um, introverted, he's extra.

Speaker 2: 52:34

I would say he's more the extreme version of me. Yeah, I'm more a more extreme version of me.

Speaker 1: 52:39

He is, but he's a. He's a dreamer.

Speaker 2: 52:42

He's a visionary.

Speaker 1: 52:43

But he is, he's just, he's the. And everybody you know, my mom, my granny, everybody fell in love with branding and he won't take no for an answer. Oh yeah, he's. We'll talk about some of that in the future.

Speaker 1: 52:54

I can't wait to talk about this was this was where I met him and you know he, you know we're connected to this day. Okay, beginning of 2005, this thing with Kyra's was starting to take shape in my mind and I knew this was what I was supposed to do. And I had this thought, like well, if I did it in church, maybe I could do a restaurant business and ministry at the same time. So that was uh kind of starting to. You know, I was writing stuff down, dreaming, praying, thinking about what to do next, and then, right in the middle of that, um, shawna came home again, this time forget that's all.

Speaker 2: 53:34

Buckle our seatbelts, because the next episode is gonna be exciting yeah, I mean, there's something about re-passion through this.

Speaker 1: 53:45

I was so excited during this time like I had the business, I had the girl, everything I thought I wanted.

Speaker 2: 53:50

I don't think I realized until we're talking about it right now how parallel on the timeline how it was. Shawna coming back and you starting Kyra's it was all the same, okay, which? Makes sense. But I just didn't realize.

Speaker 1: 54:04

It was kind of like right there together it was just kind of like everything was starting to come together. Everything was falling to place the way I wanted it falling to place. You know, this time, once I knew that they were really getting divorced, I didn't let it be quiet about you know. I thought you know we could be.

Speaker 2: 54:22

James is like you're my girl, yeah so you're gonna be mine.

Speaker 1: 54:27

Well, I felt like something was stolen from me with her. I felt like which is so interesting? I did, but it affected my mind and my heart and my, it was like an obsession.

Speaker 2: 54:40

Would you say that? I mean hearing you talk about it. It sounds like an obsession, did you feel? Do you feel that?

Speaker 1: 54:46

oh yeah, it got bad, it got real bad. I mean before it got bad it made more of a fantasy, I would say, okay, then there was a lot of like things that you could put into that. But I mean, steve actually helped me later on. He was like this is fantasies always go bad, and this is the fantasy that you started in prison. And I was like how do you know that? And he said I remember the questions you used to ask, and it was.

Speaker 2: 55:14

He was right, okay, we're getting a little head, so let's stop there, because I think this is a great place to end and pick up next week yeah, so we're gonna title the next episode.

Speaker 1: 55:22

We'll just call it Kairos. I mean what I think so Kairos fully loaded.

Speaker 2: 55:28

Let me just say Kairos is the name of your restaurant. Yeah, okay, but also the meaning of Kairos is like a special moment in time god special time which is what you thought was happening with Sean as well yeah, so it's very appropriate for both both things.

Speaker 1: 55:46

That's good, yeah but what you don't know, what you don't know and what you think is going to be wonderful can end up being not back to life yeah, so I've got this. This season, like wrapping up the season, was a great season. It was there, was, it seemed like anywhere, we could go, anywhere, do anything, you were on your way, not that I didn't make mistakes.

Speaker 1: 56:10

I did make mistakes, but it's like it's easier to make mistakes, learn from them fast. If you got momentum and we had a lot of momentum absolutely we're rolling, we're rocking and rolling, doing the thing. Give me all the momentum and then you get to this this next season, I would have none of that. So, yeah, I'm headed into a honestly one of the hardest seasons of my life besides prison.

Speaker 2: 56:32

Okay pause now. You're dying to talk about it.

Speaker 1: 56:36

Stay tuned, folks, we'll see you next week. Bye, hey guys. Thanks so much for tuning in to the straight out of prison podcast.

Speaker 2: 56:44

For more exclusive content, head over to our website, teamjonescocom yes, you can subscribe by clicking on the become a patreon button and that's going to get you access to our for real real, which is very different than the highlight real some very juicy content there it's stuff, or you can look us up on facebook and instagram straight out of prison podcast yes, that takes the story to a whole new level, where you can see some of the people that James talks about in his story and see some of the places that he's been. I've been loving it, and you know prison recipes.

Speaker 1: 57:20

Yeah, good stuff. We'll see you soon guys thanks, bye, bye.