As I write this, I am on a quick train ride out of Manhattan. My travel schedule for today and the next eight days will have me in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Sonoma County, and San Francisco. It requires many meetings, being “on” frequently, and the inevitably late nights and early mornings. When I leave on a trip like this, my daughter Scarlet, now seven, says “have fun on vacation Daddy.” I chuckle and think these travels will be fun but certainly not a vacation.

It seems that for anything to work in business, life, or coffee, it must be rigorous. This may seem like a resounding theme in my writing, and at the risk of sounding cliché, it does appear that nothing worthwhile comes easy. But, if you are a likeminded person, you realize that this is the deal you made. If you want something to work well, you need to be prepared to work very hard for it. It puzzles me when others expect that it could happen any other way. All I know is there will be many more marathons of effort.

You may ask yourself, is it worth it? I guess you’ll have to wait and see. But, I think I know the answer.