Poor Robert's (Wine) Almanac

Preamble:

I’ve been writing all my life and constructing this blog for several years now. To challenge myself and the status quo I am trying to change up some of my presentation styles. I’ve never seriously written in the third person except in collage writing classes, so I decided to give it a try. The characters in this effort all exist, but the conversation, not so much. I’d love all feedback, including literary criticism. Even at my age I keep learning and my readers comments help keep me young.

A Conversation with a Great Bottle of Wine

He sat in his study on a cool winter evening and thought about life and his in particular. He’d lived a good long time and done a lot with his life but somehow he still felt young and vital. With his good health, he knew he still had a good run ahead. As he sat there thinking it struck him, even given his expected longevity, he’d accumulated way more wine than he could probably drink in the time he had left. Even yesterday while browsing a local wine ship he bought a bottle of one of his favorites that probably would not hit its prime until he was very old. In his reverie he rose from his recliner and walked to his wine cellar, his pride and joy, and opened the door. Inside he kept some of his favorite friends, many old, some new, but all close to his heart.

In retirement visiting his wine became a regular pastime. Today he came to visit one of his oldest and dearest friends. He walked to the far end of the cellar and on a top rack he found the bottle he’d come to see, his prized, 1947 Fonseca’s Finest Vintage Port. The wine in the bottle was a mere bunch of grapes the spring of his birth. He’d found it in London some twenty-five years ago while on a business trip and while expensive even then, he bought it and brought it home to this cellar to rest for its eventual day in the sun. He planned for his family to open this bottle after his passing to toast, or roast him as they saw fit. It is after all a very celebratory wine which he hoped his family would feel worthy of his life. He, very gently removed it from its rack so as not to disturb any of its aged sediment, and carried it to the tasting table in the middle of the room where, again gently, he placed it in a silver serving cradle to rest a while.

Seated at the table he contemplated this great wine and thought “well old friend we’ve been together a long time and I’ve aged well and have a lot of good years left in me, I hope you do too”. The bottle just lay there staring back at him when he heard a little voice respond “I’m not doing so badly either, thank you for asking. Life roughed me up a bit before you brought me here, with my growing pains on the vine, slopping around in that oak barrel for two years and then bumping from wine shop to speculator and back for twenty-one years hoping for a permanent caring home. You’ve treated me well and this cellar suits me. Frankly a couldn’t ask for a better environment to age and grow old.”

The old collector checked up “in all this time not a word and now we talk?” He found himself wondering about his sanity as he actually verbalized his thoughts. He couldn’t really be talking with a bottle of wine, could he? His mind spun as he contemplated the moment and what it meant; insanity or a true out of body experience – neither seemed very comforting. His thoughts ended abruptly as he again stared at the all too dusty label of nestled in the server.

“You talk about the years you have left, well thanks to the environment in this wonderful cellar of yours I’ve got a good number left as well”

“In for a penny, in for a pound” thought the collector “has the cellar really made that much difference?”

“Oh! You have no idea” the old bottle exclaimed. “When you bounce around from pillar to post in all kinds of temperatures and different climates it really ages you fast. You have no ability to put down roots and get the rest you need to age gracefully. A bottle of wine mirrors the human condition more than you think. If you don’t get enough sleep you get unpredictable, irrational and pretty unpleasant – it’s not that different for us. If we don’t rest we can be just as unpredictable and unpleasant.”

“I knew aging made a difference, but I guess that with the modern wine methods producing wines meant to be consumed young it hasn’t occurred to me that aging conditions still really mattered.” The collector replied

“Believe me it does, some of us old fashioned souls still need to be cared for to really peak and become enjoyable. Sure you can drink a wine before it’s time and you can splash us into a decanter and bring out some of our potential, but it’s never the same as real old fashioned aging in a good cellar. Do mind if I as you a question?”

“No not at all” the collector responded in amazement.

“I’ve noticed you’ve come in and out the of the cellar a lot over the years and it seems to me that lately you have been opening more bottles with screw tops. In my world its cork or nothing at all, screw caps are for jug wine, not fine wine. Why have you switched to lesser wines especially since you have so many really good wines in here with corks?”

The collector smiled “you sound like some of my blog readers who still think that screwcaps means cheap. The wines you see in the cellar with screw caps are still really fine wines, and with the variation in cap liners available today some of them will age as well if not better than cork. You may have noticed that a lot of my newer wine with screw caps don’t get laid down but stand up on shelves. Why you might ask; simply because the liners don’t need to be kept moist like cork so they will age just as well standing as laying down.

Besides, there are a lot more people in the world today than when you and I got our start and a lot more wine being consumed and screw caps have an environmental impact as well If all of the world’s wine were closed with cork we’d kill of all the cork trees and then how do we close wine bottles?”

“I get that but promise never to pour me into a bottle with a screw cap. As young as I feel I am way too old to change my closure”

The collector heard his wife enter the cellar and turned to greet her “Oh I thought we had company, I heard you talking in here” she uttered with a curious look on her face.

“It’s just me and my wine conversing about old times and the state of with wine industry”

“I wonder about you sometimes, talking to your wine, but I guess I won’t worry until it starts  answering” she said as she turned to leave. “By the way lunch will be on in a few minutes.”

“I’ll be along shortly” the collector replied as he turned back to his prized bottle and winked.