About Aum

I'm always being asked what aum is and I don't think I've ever said the same thing twice.  I've learned that Aum has thousands of different meanings   "the unstruck sound", "a diffinative yes",  "with", the sound of the universe, a frequency, blah, blah, blah...  Simply, aum cellars is a hommage to two of my favorite things;  growing wine grapes into the best wine possible and yoga.  Some where between raising three kids in the California wine country and growing grapes for one of the best biodynamic wineries in the world I try and find a little balance in my day with medatative yoga and hand crafting limited production wines for aum cellars.  I had no idea I grabbed the tiger by the tale, as my friend Jeff Dawson brought to my attention when I amply named my wine "aum".

I was born in 1968 and knew in my heart of hearts I was going to be a husbandry man from a child.  I grew up in Rancho Cucamonga, "The Inland Empire".  Basically the outskirts of L.A. headed out to the dessert. I watched the horrors of human encroachment alot sooner than most.  I watched the vineyards my father and I made wine from turn into mini malls, parking lots, freeways, movie theatres, and tracks and tracks of homes. 

I survived an all boy Catholic highschool in LaVerne California and made my way to the central coast of California staying open to studying many types of martial and medatative arts including kundalini, hatha, ie. ashtanga vinyasa, yogas.  Academically,  it was in the studying of Life Sciences at Chaffey College and further post graduate work in the life science programs through Santa Barbara College and UCSB.  Futher post graduate work in Ecology and Systematic Biology and viticulture at Cal Poly SLO where organic farming was what made the most sense in farming and yoga made the most sense in living. 

There is an adage I have learned to live by.  Be careful what you wish for...  That adage has resonated through my career as a husbandman.  I remember my first year working as a "Super Intendant" for a 7,000 acre ranch in the middle of nowhere along the central coast.  The only cool thing about the job was there was plenty of hunting, waves were relatively close by and I had a shit load of retired friends to hang out and drink wine with and shoot the shit with.

Every one of these friends of mine who were well into their 80's all said about my ideals regarding organics was how farming used to be when they were kids.  None of them took any pharmacuticals, they all either played golf, tennis or chased the opposite sex... and the kicker was they drank damn good wine.  Real wine, wine made from grapes and not manipulated for a higher margin.  Wines they drank were made from guys they may have bumped into at the grocery store.

Nowadays, these same wine brands are owned and operated  by corporations that are owned by liquor distilleries and brewreys half way around the globe.  Wine isn't what it used to be.  The wine's our Grandparents and Great Grandparents drank isn't what we are left to drink in todays stores.  Aum Cellars is an alternative to what we once had.   A primordial sustanence.  If you see food as medicine then aum wines are elixers, an evolutionary tool to reach ones highest manifestation.  Kind like how it was like back in the day.

Namaste