Tom Bulleit - Bulleit Proof

“Huh?”

“Talk to me.”

I swivel toward her, breathe in, breathe out, and then like an internal dam bursting, words, sentences, paragraphs come rushing out, ending with—

“I think I’m having a midlife crisis.”

Betsy collapses into the couch, as if she’s been shoved.

“Is it the wedding? Because we—”

“No, no, it’s not the wedding, it’s not you, it’s me. It’s my life. It’s the choice I made. Betsy,” I say with some urgency. “I have to act now. It’s really now or never. Shit or get off the pot.”

“What pot? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Bourbon,” I say. “Betsy, it takes six years to age bourbon in barrels properly. If I start now, I’ll be 50 before I even know if Augustus’s recipe is any good. I mean, I’m sure it is. I don’t know. I’m probably crazy. But I do know this. Most people don’t start all over at 50.”

“Whew,” Betsy says. “As long as it’s only that.”

“Yeah. Changing my life. That’s all it is.”

We both crack up. Then she snuggles into me.

“Tom, it’s going to be alright.”

“You sure?”

“Absolutely. I have no doubt.”

Then, without realizing it, we simultaneously slug back our drinks.

* * *

On our honeymoon, I confirm my decision and reveal my plan, which is both half-baked and full of passion. I realize I should probably be focusing on other things on our wedding night, but I can’t help myself. I know Betsy will understand. She’s my partner—in everything. I knew that long before we recited our wedding vows.

“You’ve noticed that I haven’t been as quiet lately,” I say.

“Yes, thankfully.”

“That’s because I’ve gone into action. I’m going to do this. I’m going to start my distilling company. I will leave the law firm, at some point. Not right away because it’ll take six years for us to have our first actual bottles to sell. So I’ll step back slowly, gradually, keep my feet in the water, continue doing legal work, both for the money and because I love it. I’m going to bring back Augustus’s recipe. That’s definite. Again, it’ll take time, and there’ll be a lot of risk, financially for sure, emotionally, probably, lifestyle adjustment, absolutely, and, again, I may be crazy, but it really is now or never. I know that we’re talking about a severe uphill battle, or to use a baseball metaphor, we’re starting out with two strikes against us. The longest of long shots. But what the hell. So, what do you think?”

“Oh, Tom,” Betsy says, leaning her head into me, probably swooning from my nearly incomprehensible rambling, “that sounds wonderful. ”

* * *

My law partner, Shelby Kinkead, either seeing a golden business opportunity or taking pity on me, signs on as a founding partner in my fledging distilling company. Meanwhile, I spend hours going over the numbers with Betsy, a world-class money manager, investment adviser, and all-around financial whiz. When it comes to business and life, I run everything by her and can’t get anything past her. She is my first, best, and, often, only advisor—and remains so to this day.

We determine that to get this distilling company up and running, to partner with a functioning distillery, to put together some kind of rudimentary marketing and publicity strategy, to hire a barebones staff, and keep this all running for at least six years while the bourbon ages in barrels, will cost millions of dollars.

“I will have to take out a loan,” I say.

“You know every banker in town. They all love you.”

“I don’t know if they love me that much.”

I nod, take this in.

“I’m going to put this off, for now,” I say. “I need to have a preliminary conversation next week.”

“Which banker?”

“Not a banker. My father.”

* * *

Shortly after my marriage, my sister and I move my father into an assisted living facility in Louisville. My mother had passed away the previous year. She was the life force in our family. With quiet efficiency punctuated often with outbursts of joy, she took care of everything, including taking care of my father. She bought the groceries, cooked the meals, did the laundry, paid the bills, planned the social calendar. When she passed, it was as if the engine that ran our home had been shut down.

Right after she died, I felt disoriented, and then I felt numb. But I wouldn’t or I couldn’t allow myself any public display of emotion. I forced myself not to cry. A generational response, I suspect, or perhaps it comes down to gender. I had been raised to keep my emotions inside, in check. I was allowed a measured, stoical response to difficult things. That was the male, military, and maybe even the Southern way. But one day, months after my mother’s funeral, driving alone in the car, I saw myself as a child in the kitchen with her, the two of us laughing, and her loss overwhelmed me, and I began to sob. My chest heaved and the sobs came harder. I pulled over, leaned my forehead onto the steering wheel, and I cried.

I’ve never known a better man than my father. He taught me how to be a soldier, a fighter, and the value of work. Work defines you and work can save you. His words or my inference, I can’t be sure. And my mother? She taught me how to talk, how to interact, and how to be.

* * *

My mother’s passing does my father in. He appears lost without her. He doesn’t seem to know what to do, where to go, or, worse, who to be. He retreats into his one-room apartment at the assisted living facility. When I visit from Lexington, he appears diminished. It’s as if his whole world has begun shrinking in front of him.

He continues to drink his beer and bourbon and smoke his cigarettes, even though the assisted living place has a strict no-smoking policy. He chain-smokes two packs a day and opens the door of his first-floor room so he can blow his cigarette smoke outside. Always vain and fastidious, he’d started to let himself go, allowing his ashtrays to pile up with mounds of white ash, unemptied, untouched. Visiting him one time, for some reason, I remember when he would take me fishing. I had no talent for fishing, and less patience. But my father had a gift. I would fish. He would catch. He would wade into a pond and pull out a six-pack of bass. I could drop a stick of dynamite into the same pond, same spot, and wouldn’t pull up a single slimy catfish.

I told Dad once, “You know, you really need to exercise.”

He shot me a look of sheer disbelief. “I exercise. I fish.”

A fishing pole in one hand, a bottle of beer in the other, a cigarette dangling from his mouth.

He called that exercise. Several times a week.

When I visit him, we sit, talk some, and mostly stare at whatever vague blue image blankets us from the TV. Then, sometime after my conversation with Betsy, I visit him with a purpose, an agenda. Twenty-two years have passed since I’d told him I wanted to become a distiller. I had fulfilled every promise I’d made to him. I’d completed my undergraduate education. I’d served in the military. I’d gone to law school … twice … and earned two law degrees, become a lawyer. This day, I’ve come to tell him I have not given up on my dream.

By this point, my father has entered his dotage, although his mind remains sharp. I’m 44 years old. I don’t need to ask my dad’s permission to change careers. But he is my father. I still need his approval.

“I’ve done well as a lawyer,” I say. “But I’m going to become a distiller of bourbon.”

My father looks concerned. I can read his mind. He has often told me to follow the money. I can tell he is worried about the finances.