Of grapes and men
"What kind of grape are you?", inquired mysteriously the sommelier, or in other words, the wine specialist. "Are you sturdy as a Cabernet or tender and frail as a Pinot Noirt?"
It was not a strange conversation, as it may sound at first. We were talking about the love of wine. We were talking about movies. We were talking about a documentary on wines, called "Mondovino" and we ended up talking about "Sideways". For those who have not seen it, "Sideways" is the story of a depressed wine lover, a Pinot Noir fan, who takes his best friend for a trip around the vineyards of Southern California. Wines and grapes are used as a metaphor by a character that is uncapable of talking directly about his own particular feelings. Talking about "Sideways" was not exactly a big detour in my conversation with the sommelier. "Mondovino", the original subject matter, deals with the way wines are being standardized and losing their own particular personalities in order to become a commodity, not a pleasure anymore.
I thought a minute about the original question. I didn't have an answer at the tip of my tongue, so I just made an attempt at a jest.
"I just hope I am not a Merlot. Miles, the protagonist of Sideways seemed to despise it with all his will. But I have to confess that I really like some fruity tasting Chilean Merlots", I said.
The sommelier looked at me with amusement. "Here we can start talking about preconceived ideas about people and wines". He proceeded to tell me that the American Merlots are usually dreadful. "These are the Merlots that Miles is probably used to. But there is one very important detail in the movie". The wine specialist reminded me of the noblest wine shown on the screen, a bottle that the character kept carefully for an important occasion, the star of his cellar, a Chateau Cheval Blanc, 1961 (the year I was born). A wine that was so special that he didn't dare to drink it till the end.
"Do you know one thing? The Cheval Blanc is a wine from Saint Emillion. It takes three grapes in its composition. And one of them is exactly the Merlot", told me the wine specialist. "You cannot discard people or grapes so fast just because some time they didn't correspond to what you expected from them".And he went on to tell me that in this wide, wide world, some grapes managed to come to full glory in different corners of the world, like the Merlots, in Chile, the Malbecs in Argentina, the Pinotage in South Africa, the Tannat in Uruguay. "And the Pinot Noir in the Northern Coast of California and Oregon". I remembered the Pinot Noir from Oregon I had during dinner in december at Victoria and Albert's. It surprised me, because I never thought there were good wines done in Oregon.
The wine specialist smiled again and he repeated it didatically. "You should not discard people or grapes, without giving them a chance to show their full potential".
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