Up and ready for the winery, the run tomorrow.  13,1 miles here in Santa Rosa.  Going to do some stretches tonight, and early bed after what I’m sure will be a pasta-rounded dinner, thanks to Ms. Alice who had the vision on our wallet-draining grocery operation the other day to get my pre-run dinner necessities in place.  I drink coffee now, hoping the remnants of last night’s Duckhorn flight and the Umpqua Syrah I opened when home go away.  Jackie plays with his cars and trucks as usual, and I write as usual.  My morning and thoughts and this semester, week 1 done.  Won’t have time to grade today, maybe 2 or 3 pieces tonight (and I should make myself do that), or not.  Who knows.  today I’m in the mood to have the story navigate me, not me control where this chapter goes.  More poetry and more writings to sell and that’s what my daughter, Jackie as well, will have for a father come term’s end.  A writer.

Have to write a piece for both clients tonight, one already written, about the Oregon Syrah, and then the other about a wine club event coming up.

After washing my hands quickly in the half-bath downstairs here in the Autumn Walk fort, I thought of this young mother last night with her daughter, arriving a little after we did, speaking to her daughter in Portuguese.  And I thought, yesterday and this morning, how I’ve failed in that hue, how my son only knows one language.  I’d love for him to know French, but first I need to know French.  So today I re-engage my studies.  A new way of doing things, doing everything, with language.  Et maintenant, plus de café .  (And now, more coffee).  And more French.  I’m not going to start another journal or blog, I’m just going to do what I now simply have to, must, throw myself in the language, bury myself in it– IMMERSE myself in it.  And découvrez la beauté de la langue (discover the beauty of language).  I want to say to my daughter, ma fille, “Bienvenue à notre vie! Je t’aime…” Not going to translate that as I need to know what it means.  I have to catch up with my studies!  I may even buy a text book at one of the colleges!  “Bon travail!” I say to myself (good job), and hope I keep with this.  I’ll listen to French music or a podcast on the way to work and being in my Hemingway-Kerouac-Fitzgerald…  “Allons-y!” I say to myself with more encouragement and instructional tone.  I don’t need to take a class or hire a tutor to be French speaking, soon Jack and his sister will be with me as that little girl, coincidentally named Emma (the leading name contender in notre famille), was with her mother, going back and forth in communications and knowledges.. I think of our ’09 trip to Paris and the first wine blogging mission with Mom, Dad, Katie, and Alice in Beaune– all the shops and people looking around and the interview I did with Mom in the street about all the Chardonnays and Pinots we tasted out of barrel.  Wine is my subject, yes, but so is language, so is how we communication and the description and the romantic evocativeness that we sip.. an idea, for what I guess you’d call a “startup” in all this thinking this morning– everything that interests me and that I love: wine, family, travel, language, teaching, education, learning, French, coffee.. but what.. what —  WHAT GODDAMNIT?

Deuxième tasse de café (second cup of coffee), and I’m rid of the wine ripples.  I’m thinking, thinking about the deadline I’m on, have everything as I need it by M2’s arrival.  I’ll be writing all day today, which looks as thought cooler weather will persist and be prominent, thankfully. 

Jackie looks over at me and wonders what I’m doing, I say “writing”, then correct myself and tell “Écriture”.