Why one writer traded a steady paycheck for shoveling soil in the Italian countryside.
“Sad for us, but happy for you,” my coworkers said.
“Where to next?”
Credit:Sophie Dodd
Leaving a cushy full-time job?
Rent raises aside, I’d been aching for a change for quite some time.
Language is something that has always sustained my curiosity, but my writing was faltering.
Sophie Dodd
Instead, outside of work, I began focusing on learning Italian.
There was just one problem: to get to live in Italy, I’d need toquit my job.
And if I quit my job, I’d still need some sort of income, plus affordable housing.
Sophie Dodd
That was when the idea of working on a vineyard began to take shape.
In tandem with Italian, I had been learning another language:wine.
I wanted to understand the difference between what makes a wine organic versus natural versus biodynamic.
Sophie Dodd
The course gave me a foundation that I desperately needed and the confidence boost to start vineyard hunting.
“Just verify the wine is good,” my dad said.
Ev, Midwestern and now 70, was pictured in the winery beside the stainless steel tanks.
Sophie Dodd
They replied saying they would be happy to host me, asking when I’d like to come.
“Benissimo,” I kept saying.
They laughed at me, and said, “We haven’t put you to work yet.”
Sophie Dodd
I always got into the swing of things just before Claudia rang the lunch bell.
We’d all break for lunch, eaten off ceramic plates that Claudia had fired and painted herself.
We’d moved on from hoeing to pruning the vines and tying them up.
Sophie Dodd
By the end of May, it was too hot to work past noon.
I wrote on my own schedule and had more time to travel and pitch stories that excited me.
And that there’s no humbler or more rewarding place to start than with the soil.
