The Slow Burn: Living to Light Up.

I was chopping it up over cigars with my friend, Micah Edwards (aka Mr. Texas Soul), when he dropped something simple but profound: “Ya just gotta live your life, man.”

As a former professional drummer, that hit me square in the chest. Too often, creatives sit around waiting for lightning to strike. Inspiration doesn’t always come like that. Sometimes it takes hundreds of bad songs to stumble into a good one. Sometimes it’s scraps and riffs pieced together into something raw and honest. Sometimes it’s a melody you can’t shake until it consumes you.

But at the root, what Micah said rings true. You can’t pull depth out of thin air. You have to live. You have to celebrate wins, mourn losses, wrestle with injustice, embrace joy, face grief. You have to stack chapters…good, bad, messy, glorious, to tell a story worth reading.

And isn’t that what cigars are? The stories they hold and the stories they spark.

By the time you’re reading this, I’ll be in Nicaragua. Most likely drinking strong coffee, cigar in hand, staring at the Pacific in San Juan Del Sur, prepping notes for Estelí. Soon, I’ll be sitting across from master blenders, smoking the first cigars that might one day carry the Brolo name. Running numbers in my head about foil and embossing, cut dies and packaging costs. Asking myself the same question over and over: will consumers care about this story?

I’m 41 years old, and I’ve done some L-I-V-I-N. This chapter feels exciting, but I know it won’t always stay this way. There are countless hurdles between here and the day someone lights up a Porchlight, Church, or Back Booth. It’ll be a while before Halfwheel reviews a Brolo blend, or Tim at Cigars Daily raves about the brand.

But when that day comes….these are the cigars I want you to reach for when your kid graduates, when you land that job you’ve been chasing, when you reconnect with an old friend. The stick you light after a long week or the one you share after a steak dinner that makes you feel like a king.

Because to be worthy of a good story, you have to have great chapters. And Brolo? Brolo was made for the moments that write them.

Light Up & Lean In.