To everyone that shared :
Those were some interesting stories, books could be written and movies could be made with those, some very entertaining, others very sincere and others with emotional connections .
It was so great to hear of your starting days.
I stumbled upon wine making by mistake, being into the hydroponics scene, I have spent almost 13 years now tinkering with plants and waters and chemicals and lights. But there were little to no forums that offered me an inside ( think outside the box ) place to ask, challange and create. But in the ( sub-culture) forums, there I found people that were always pushing the envolpe. We came up with good ideas, some that I now see are on the market, " so I wasn't able to cash in on my ideas like other took and banked now " at least it was great to be on the forefront of the designs.
So while they were hiding in their closets worried about the blue and red flashing lights, my apartments were covered in pipes, tubes , water bubbling tomatotes growing, so on and so forth.
My nitch was catnip, one year at a christmas party I was visiting some friends and family and for some reason their cats were center of attention, I joked and asked if they ever bought their cats cat nip, and their responce was, my cats never liked catnip. I bet them I could grow some hydro catnip that would drive their cats wild, so the bet was on, that following christmas I came over with my catnip and their cats went ape crazy, every christmas after that it was an on going joke that everyone that had cats got catnip as a gift.
So while on the hydro forums, there was a post about how to make your jail house wine, the 1 gallon jug, 3 welchers concentrates and a ballon with holes. I tried it, liked it . but only ever made one batch, life was just crazy, with loses of family members, my divorce and the crazy speed of the northern mantaility, I just jumped in my car one day and headed to florida with no plans, no directions and nothing that couldnt fit in my car.
I got a chance to slow down, stop and breathe, and I slowly decided to get back into the tinkering with wines, now it seems to have calmed me. I have always had patience, plants grow at their own speed no matter how many high tech goodies you use, just as the wine takes it's good old time. it centered me a bit, taught me it is ok to slow down and just be for a moment in ones life.
And as I always liked to tinker every year with making new catnips as gifts with changing the flower colors, and cloning, and this and that just to keep it one step ahead of the year before, to hear people that try my wine tell me it's outstanding, well that just is the best moment, it's not that I do it to fish for compliments, but all the effort, reading, thinkng and patience that goes into wine, just to hear " I love this wine, you really made it yourself ? " is so worth the time spent.
Again, I was blown away with all the stories posted, I hope they keep coming !
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