Not hungover, but affirmatively and encouragingly tired. Slept between 3 and 4 hours. After going out with Jesse and bowling, talking about work and the fires, life and our ultimate of ultimate, apexing aims. My business philosophy for day— Visual. And, VISUALIZE. Seeing self here in my office the Windsor Starbucks at which I always park and work. Me, a student in the wine industry, of her language and tones, tone and dominant octave.
Not allowing self to think about how tired I am, nor how long the day is. I have this book and all the wine meander in it. Last night, Jesse bringing over a Pinot I’ve never tasted, nor heard of, but precisely the musical shape and poetic posture I look for in Pinot Noir. Atmospheric and Gothically romanced from first pulse and touch to last.
Visualizing me out of the tasting room and in Burgundy with little Kerouac, and Ms. Austen, wife, and other family presences tasting wine and sitting in that café we visited in ’09. I’m back in Paris, in my head, in my eyes which have all but lost their pinkeye redness and rose petal tincture. I see it, all of it. The time… this morning, meaningless, if you must know. Know exactly which wine will be my focus today…. I’ll recite her words and intentions from when we open to the last set of silly questions are asked. Wine making herself more visual to me, this morning, this exhaustion unusually galvanizing— Thinking about other wine writers that barely write at all but more have panache for outfits, taking selfies with other wine people and wine “celebrities”, or that they have some sommelier cert’. They don’t write, and that’s fine, but when I see themselves self-anoint as a wine writer or wine journalist, I have to laugh. I scratch my head, and here point to flaws, to the convenient contortion and pagination of the word “writer”. I see self, different. A contrast. More honed on the act of writing, here in the ‘bucks with my journal open and revolving and circulating, meditating in the visual of wine and my story, my wined Road and sittings, days in the tasting room and, or, just walking the vineyard at day’s start.
Not sure how I landed on the wine writer and somm’ topic. Hardly a topic at all, especially remembering the multi-purposed and pulsed character and sense, the novel of that Pinot last night. Jesse was exceptionally kind in sharing such with his writing brother. I think it may have tiled and slightly re-written my wine philosophy, why I love wine and why I spend so much time writing about it, why I took sister-in-law Jenn’s counsel so many years ago to have wine be my topic, to blog about it. Wine is for words… my words. The only words I want to speak, frankly. So thankful I’m not hungover, and that all I did last night was stay awake too late and not have too much. Can’t say same for my brother…
Visualizing, see and feeling, sensing and breathing the vineyard before I’m even there.. my office in downtown Windsor or Healdsburg, helping wineries tell their story, tell my story while telling theirs. Wine is for association and intersections, character blends and time, making time our own. My channeling and blending and re-blending thoughts on wine and how I “sell” it even though I don’t see myself a sales chap at all. At all.
Today… a standalone piece. Short story, maybe, but a story. Me, wine. You.