I don't know about gardening, but I've certainly sacrificed financially in order to be able to farm. When you consider the huge capital costs, you have to love it. Anyone who doesn't love it would be far better off selling out.

Granted, it isn't that physically demanding. The biggest amount of labour I find is repairing/modifying equipment, and that comes with interesting problem solving challenges, which my programmer mindset tends to enjoy.

Still, I can see why gardening would be seen as appealing.

> your wife is mad that you can't take her on vacation

Why would anyone get mad about that? My wife is a grown adult, she can pay for her own vacation. Farming is my vacation.