Some Who Wander Are Lost (And That's Okay)

What do personal growth, professional development, photography, writing, and wine have to do with one another?

Just over a year ago, I printed a photo book with this same title. I used words from a short poem I had written in conjunction with photographs from my cross country road trip to California in February 2016. Today, sitting in a library in Gisborne, New Zealand, the words hold a new, special meaning.

The comedy of this title is that it borrows from the famous J.R.R Tolkien quote, "not all those who wander are lost." New Zealand is inexorably tied with Lord of the Rings due to the filming here - I myself hiked past "Mount Doom," a few weeks ago. On a more personal level, I smile at how much has changed since I was last feeling a bit lost.

I spent most of my years in university searching for a sense of "home," which became the theme of my first photo book: home/sick. Through this project, I determined that my "home" was in particularly moving moments. "[M]oments of pure ecstasy and awe," I called it recently. "That galvanic happiness." Photographs, for me, have an exceptional way of capturing that emotion, bringing me back to the exact moment that I pressed the shutter, remembering how the subject touched me.

My home in Santa Rosa, mid-summer.

However, when I moved to Santa Rosa, something changed. I actually felt at home in a place. Certainly the moments and people that made up the abstract concept of home were still the most impactful, but they seemed bountiful in Sonoma County. This was welcome, but also caused tension within me; "these bones weren't made to settle / my skin is a sail," my poem said. And now suddenly I found myself digging my toes into the earth, growing roots under golden hills and gnarled oak trees.

The last year and a half has been tumultuous for me, which is how the second photo book came to be finished. There is a certain chaos to constant motion, but it's expected, even welcomed. The chaos that appeared while I cultivated a life in place was not. So I let the turbulence lift me out of Sonoma County; I returned to the road.

However, this decision to a buy a one-way ticket to New Zealand was not just about creative writing, photography, and personal growth. I came here to continue my wine education.

For the nearly three years that I lived in Santa Rosa, I worked at a small, multi-faceted winery. Most recently, I was the brand manager, attempting to grow the portfolio of global wines in the three-tier system as well as to develop new private label brands for retailers, a la Total Wine & More and Whole Foods. I learned a tremendous amount about how the US wine industry moves, from calculating retail pricing based on bulk wine cost, freight, and taxes, to the individual state laws that allow or disallow certain pricing promotions. And everything in between.

I am grateful for the experiences I had with AWDirect & Wine Trees, but it was, at times, extraordinarily difficult. In fact, my initial search for work in New Zealand was spurred by the fact that the company was being sold and my job was on the line. This is some of the aforementioned turbulence that lifted me out of Sonoma County. Additionally, I found that for everything that I did learn at my job, a few major things were missing: we did not own any vineyards or work directly with any grape growers; everything we did in the winemaking process was amelioration, no fermentation.

The last Adler Fels / Corrick house harvest - AWDirect used to crush & ferment a small amount for compliance purposes at a property that has since been sold.

So naturally, I quit my job, drove my car back to my homestead in Pennsylvania, and hopped a plane to New Zealand.

For the last month, I have been living out of a 2004 Subaru Outback outfitted with an air mattress, propane stove, and curtains. Reading, writing, taking photographs, hiking, climbing, and wine tasting have become part of my regular pattern.

And tomorrow, I am pleased to announce, I start work on an organic vineyard!

"I am on the road / But I am at home." I am wandering New Zealand - perhaps a bit lost - but I am happy.