This upbringing stood in sharp contrast to the lifestyle I encountered each time we traveled to visit my dad’s parents in Southern California. My grandfather was a successful international banker, and the modus vivendi they enjoyed leaned more to the club than the country. They were world travelers, having lived and worked overseas in Hong Kong and Australia, and exposed me to a manner of style and grace that I found utterly alluring.
Of course, on the heels of this came the Eighties, and the homogenizing effect of global satellite feeds from MTV and Ted Turner’s Superstation WTBS. It was the era of big hair and even big brands, and I have to admit to having enjoyed more than my fair share of Bon Jovi and Budweiser. But it was this period of consolidation, when the number of breweries in the US hit an all time low, that also saw the birth of craft.
I spent the Nineties, like many of my slacker peers, effectively dropped out of society, living out of my backpack and an apartment in a high school friend’s parents’ garage while studying economics and Eastern philosophy in an attempt to chart a path outside of the “system”. Craft was booming, an obvious adjuvant to the entire alternative movement, and I became a “beer snob”, snubbing the commodity brands of my past for the humblest, most local producers I could find.
During the 2000s, I finally found in land fire management a career that allowed me to live out the tenets of the Lloyd Dobler quote that had been my guiding star, and I became a near fully functioning member of society. Craft, organic, and local became a mainstay of my “low impact” lifestyle. I looked for every opportunity to live out the “reduce, reuse, recycle” credo that had been instilled in me during my formative years in the cradle of the environmental movement that was mid-1970s Seattle.
After a decade toiling under the weight of government bureaucracy, I was looking for a creative outlet, and I found it at the bottom of a glass of Rough Stock Whiskey. Blogs and YouTube were booming, and I had just stumbled headlong into the next chapter of the craft beverage revolution, micro and locally distilled spirits. As a kid in rural Montana without satellite television, magazines had been my lifeline to the outside world, and as I drove home I imagined a digital periodical that would serve to share this exciting new facet of craft culture with locavores, spirits enthusiasts, and conscious consumers alike.
That was several years ago now, and while there have been challenges and growing pains, we have enjoyed every moment of our journey. I mean, it’s hard not to considering the incredible community we get to be a part of, the wonderful people we meet, and the amazing craft spirits we get to enjoy. We’ve created a website, published magazines, produced videos, and generally done whatever we can to promote craft spirits and microdistilling to the world.
For me, it’s been an incredible gift. An opportunity to learn and grow, and to realize in this one endeavor all the factors that have influenced me over the years. Of returning to a more natural balance, of taking responsibility for my part in the cycle, of refining taste and experience. Of choosing a life, distilled.
My name is Cobey Williamson, and I am a microshiner.
