Building from scratch

Until recently, the building I have been doing is that of startups or new products inside large companies. Taking something that was merely an idea, and making it into something real - a product or a service - always felt life-affirming to me.

Since this type of building is usually intense, I rarely had any time for a hobby - I never even given it a thought what my hobby could be. When Covid came crashing upon us, on-screen life started feeling limiting. And while I did love my role as a Techstars MD which allowed me to be helping other founders launch their startups (via Zoom), something was still amiss... And it was important to take some time away from the screen.

One day, I came across a video of a woman moving to Alaska and committing to building everything there from scratch. She was going to post plans and videos of building the house and all the furniture - and she was promising to make everything doable by even a beginner.

I have never built a piece of furniture in my life - but her approach was very direct. It reminded me of one of the principals of the Lean Method we all love so much in our startup world - get out the door! Just ship it!

So I drove to Home Depot, bought a saw, a hammer, nails, screws, sand paper - and followed her first plan - an Adirondack chair. Amazingly, it turned out beautifully! This gave me confidence to keep on building - a table, a chest, a potting table, a pergola, an outdoor shower...

When friends from NYC arrived almost a year later, and saw my arsenal of outdoor and indoor furniture, one of them commented: "I am not surprised at what you have chosen as a hobby - you are a builder by nature at work -- and this is yet one more way to build...