Don't you hate it when you have something that you want to write about in the middle of the night and you know that if you don't get up and do it, you won't have the gumption or inspiration to write about it in the morning? That's where I'm at right now... Ug...
As most may know, my brother in law Mike and I began brewing our own beer a little over a year (or so) ago. It has been such a great hobby--not only that, but I feel like I've gained a best friend out of the deal too. It has been such a wonderful experience to not only hang out with Mike around a 5 gallon kettle and just talk, joke, and brew--my family loves him and Sarah (his wife/my sister) a ton as well. Going into business with Mike (opening a brewery) is something that I'm excited about from an entrepreneurial standpoint and on a human level of loving him and Sarah and being able to see them and work with them every day.
Unfortunately, even as I've gained such a great bond and friendship with Mike and Sarah through something as simple as brewing beer, I feel like I've driven a gap in between myself and two of the most important people in my life. Since this is a public forum, I will do my best not to mention any names or be too specific (if that is possible). For the sake of ease-of-writing though, I will have to assign some sort of names to them, so I will call them "A" and "B."
As I lay in bed twenty minutes ago, I was thinking about how I might as well be cooking methamphetamine or something (as far as "A" and "B" are concerned). Of course meth is illegal, so that would be touching on a whole new level, but I seriously feel like that is what they think. I know that beer (and alcohol in general) is something that many religions have different rules on (man-made rules, but we won't get into that right now...), but it seems like there is a difference between someone who walks around downtown collecting bottles (there is a 10 cent refund per bottle in Michigan) just so he can go to the grocery store and purchase a 40 ounce of Miller High-Life, and someone who just finds enjoyment in spending the day boiling a bunch of ingredients, and conversing with a friend. The process of brewing is actually more fulfilling to me than the end result (although I won't necessarily complain about the end result...). Seriously though, Jesus and I could have a better conversation about brewing beer than "A" and "B" and I can have... and I bet he could give me some pretty good tips since He knows how to make his batches from just water! (Talk about low overhead!)
"A" really likes wood-working and has been carving ducks out of wood for about as long as I've been brewing beer. It is a hobby that he really enjoys and has built a friendship with other guys who like to do the same thing. For weeks, they got together and not only carved ducks out of wood, but I'm sure they came to appreciate each other more than they had before, and all this happened because of a few blocks of wood.
When I go over to "A's" house, he loves to take me down to the basement and show me the progress of his current project, talk about what step he is on, what he has to do next, and show off any new tools that he has added to his collection. I like looking and listening, not because I give a chicken's beak about ducks or wood-working, but because I love "A" and can appreciate this hobby because it is something that he enjoys. I don't pretend to be interested--I really am interested because it is an opening in "A's" life that I can be a part of, if for a moment, and I can get to know him a little better because of it.
For me, brewing beer is something that is just not spoken of around "A" or "B," even though they are quite aware that it is something that Mike and I do. It's the elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about. It has come up only once with "A" and he simply said that he is "concerned" that I do it. That's it.
Actually, I would love to talk about this elephant in the room with them... I'm sure they couldn't care less about brewing itself (just as I'm not really into wooden ducks), but to be able to talk to them about our latest batch, what we've got going, how we've got a mead that is going to sit until Christmas 2009, how we might like to open a brewery, how the process of brewing is done, how the grains smell like you're baking a fresh loaf of bread as you pour them into boiling water, how the carbonation happens naturally, and how much I enjoy it; yeah, that is something that I wish I could share with them. Not because I expect them to want to brew or anything, but because it is something that I like doing, and all it does right now is make them dance around the topic like it's a land mine.
Yesterday, Mike and Sarah and I went to the Michigan Brewer's Guild Winter Festival and I asked "A" and "B" to watch Brooklyn and Madison because Jessica wanted a few hours to just read, and have some time to herself. "A" and "B" said they would gladly watch the kids, and asked what we were up to... "Are you going to see a movie or something?" When I told them where we were going, it all but ended the conversation, and that was it. They still agreed to watch the girls, but when we went to drop them off, there were no questions of "So where is the festival at?" "What is going on at the festival?", etc. There was not even a "Have fun"... all they said in regards to it was "Be careful." That's it. I'm pretty sure I would at least pretend to care if "A" was going to a wooden duck festival...
In fact, the question "Are you going to see a movie" is pretty revolutionary... Ten years ago if I had asked "A" and "B" to watch my kids so I could go see a movie, it would have been the same reaction I got when I asked them to watch them so I could go to a brewing festival. Today, if I told them that I was going to work at a movie theater, or even open my own movie theater, it would be met with many interested inquiries, but not back then. Maybe if I give it ten years of so, they will be okay with what I'm doing... maybe they will even stop in to the pub that Mike and I start to say hi... or get something to eat... or... drink... nah. But by then, maybe I'll be making methamphetamine and I'll have a whole new obstacle.
Okay, I'm going back to bed now... "A" and "B"... If you read this, I really would like you to be a part of my life. I love you guys. Good night.
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3 comments:
nobody ever got killed by a wooden duck.
as i was reading this, i was cynically laughing while imagining a huge wooden duck staggering around looking for his car keys, smacking his little wooden duck kid around, and calling his wooden duck wife a whore.
of course not all beer drinkers/brewers are alcoholic wife beaters, and lots of wife beaters are not alcoholics. it's just what i was imagining. dude, i don't care that you brew. you might not believe that, considering our past interaction regarding this topic, but i don't know if you ever really got what i was saying. anyway, we all have baggage and that makes us more sensitive to some things than others, maybe more sensitive than we should be, or sometimes less.
do you even know who this is? ha. it's connie, in case you don't.
you know better than i do, though, that a and b see that as an industry that destroys people's lives. i think it's a lot to ask them to be happy, or even neutral. it'd be hard for me if i were them. most likely for different reasons, but still. to sit around and listen to you talk about it, and they're supposed to smile and ask questions? ouch. a rock and a hard place for all of you, i'd think. the great thing is, you all love each other like mad, and when it comes right down to it, that's what's motivating them to feel how they feel.
i'm encouraged to read that you want to share your life with them. i mean encouraged in the sense that i want to be like that with people in my life. lots of us just shut people out over things like this, and none of you have done that. how great is that.
a wooden duck with cirrhosis. ha. a beer belly. what would a slurred quack sound like? were there wooden ducks on the ark?
on second thought, maybe someone has been killed by a wooden duck. severed artery from an unfortunate slip of the knife or something. 'quaaaaackkk....'
"Quaaaaak..." Love it. :)
I understand where you're coming from, Connie, and I appreciate what you have to say.
I think it is hard for me to simply see this as an industry that destroys people's lives because there are a lot of industries that have that potential, but are more acceptable than home-brewing by straight-laced, conservative, "wish it was still the prohibition"-ists.
Restaurants serve high-fat food that raises cholesterol and gives people heart attacks. Gun stores sell weapons for hunting/target practice, but every once in a while, someone buys one to kill someone, or an accident happens on a hunting trip. Lawyers, doctors, teachers, or salesmen can become work-aholics and completely neglect their family, ending their marriage in divorce. Pastors can get a little too intimate in a counseling session with a woman other than his wife, or can run off with the church secretary. Airline pilots can crash planes, killing hundreds of people.
Obviously all of these examples are just potential day to day mishaps that go on all over our planet, some of the casualties of living. Every hobby, job, or activity can possibly end in a negative manner, or cause some sort of bad repercussions. This is no news to you, but this is what I think of when people (like a and b) are dead-set against things like movies, playing cards, and beer.
I could be a pharmacist and that would be fine... but kids in schools are selling addictive pharmaceutical drugs like Vicodin and OxyContin; drugs that I am prescribing and are then being taken and used abusively.
I could work at Perrigo (I actually did), making cough syrup (I did that too). The cough syrup could make someone drowsy and they could wreck their car on the way to work.
I could be a diamond dealer, selling rings and beautiful jewelery to newly engaged couples... all the time knowing that the products I sell are most likely from slaves in diamond mines in Africa.
Working at a coffee shop (or drinking coffee...or brewing coffee) does not seem like a big deal. But most of the coffee (with the exception of "Fair Trade") is from under-paid workers in South/Central America who are being taken advantage of by large corporations like Starbucks.
This is not what I intended to say in reply, and may I say with the utmost sincerity, I say none of this in anger, and am not even really directing this at you, Connie. I'm just talking... putting down my thoughts. Please don't take any of it personally or think that I'm trying to lecture you...
Without rambling on and on again, I would just like to say that with all of the very real injustices, and life-ruining possibilities in almost every industry in the world, I have a hard time understanding why certain things are singled out. For the most part, doing anything in excess is going to get you in trouble, alcohol included. But that shouldn't necessarily make the whole thing wrong just because some people will most certainly abuse the product that you are making/selling.
Well, I'm going to go take a shower and then put on my designer jeans made by a child laborer in China.
i get it. i don't think all of your examples apply, but i'm with ya, and i agree in principle. the inconsistency ranges anywhere from slightly annoying to extremely frustrating. the moral standards of any culture are in constant flux, and the church subculture is no exception. you gotta admit, though, that complete consistency in this world is virtually impossible no matter what we believe, and you can undoubtedly find several more examples besides your jeans in your own life like i can in mine. what should we do? try to fix them all? give up and not try to fix any of them? i think most of us fall in the middle and pick a few to care about, and ignore tons of others. i also think almost all of us follow cultural trends, which is why everybody and his brother is green right now and considers it immoral not to be. so a and b follow their subculture's trends. who doesn't. and is there really anything wrong with that.
put yourself in their shoes. pick something you think is immoral (whether you have a solid base for considering it immoral or not) and imagine someone close to you doing that for a living. tough stuff, ya know?
my point was more about comparing wooden duck carving to beer brewing. the potential for negative results are nowhere near equal. unless you're carving wooden duck bongs.
just curious about cost effectiveness. drinking is quite expensive. how do your home brewing expenses compare to buying beer? not counting your initial investment costs for equipment.
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