Lost & Found - A letter from great-grandfather in 1920

During this down time, I’ve had the opportunity to go through boxes and papers, organizing my office. One of the packets I ran across were papers from my dad. My mom gave them to me before she died. In this packet there was a letter written to him in 1920 from my great grandfather. It was in Italian and was written in a beautiful script. His handwriting was meticulous. I gave the letter to a friend to translate. This is what it said:

Wine for the Rest of Your Life

“As wine ages, sometimes it goes into this period, let’s call it a hiccup, in which it is not this robust, vibrant, hunk of a wine.” - I wrote in my notes, years ago, about a California wine, (It was a 1976 Jordan Cabernet). The ’76 was Jordan’s debut wine, and at the time, it caused a stir in the marketplace, for it was juicy and bold and sexy and drinkable. In those days, a premium Cabernet from California was rough and tannic, a built-for-the-road kind of wine. Not necessarily an early-drinker, which is now all the rage (and a PR’s person’s catnip). Jordan went on to make many vintages (still does) and their style evolved, morphed, changed with the times. But that ’76, when I had tasted it and written it up in my log, was in a valley, trapped in the fog of its winter.

The wine came out of that fog and further evolved. In fact, the last bottle I had, must have been 20 years ago, was mature, velvety, and still delicious. The crocus bloomed.

Snapshot of a Twenty-Something – the Somm in the Sky

…my very own walk in the clouds

This week, many of the great palates (tongue and minds) of wine descended from their perches to land in Dallas, to judge at the Texsom International Wine Awards (TIWA). There are not enough reasons to make Dallas a destination, in the wine world, save for the commerce. But twice a year, master sommeliers and masters of wine, along with some of us mere mortals, convene together to plow through an amazing array of wines from around the world.

I’ve been judging at this event for more than 20 years, having first been invited by Rebecca Murphy, when she ran it as the Dallas Morning News Wine Competition. As the world of wine has expanded, so has TIWA evolved into a larger, more international event. And with the plethora of talent that has been attracted to Texas, twice a year, because of events like Texsom, it feels like myriads of Muhammads come to the mountain (or mound) of Dallas.

Actually, to Grapevine, Texas. Yes, Grapevine.

What does one bring to a pot luck dinner when the host is a '60s folk music icon?

Dinner with Joanie

Sitting at the bar of a tiny restaurant in the fashionable SoCo zone of Austin last night, two ladies were hugging the corner of the bar. The room was crowded and loud and people were talking in three languages. The younger of the two ladies, she was in her early 30’s, was pouring her heart out at 90 decibels. Bless her heart; she was looking to make sense of her life in this world. She was intelligent, handsome and very fraught with making a meaningful life. Haven’t we all been there?

40 years ago at about this time, I was living in the SF Bay area, finishing up my university studies. The Vietnam War was winding down. The economy having been propped up by military spending was a year away from crashing. College graduates would find it difficult to secure much in the way of meaningful work. The society had been ripped apart into two camps. Those two camps are still wrestling for the soul of the country. It was a mess. In the meantime a friend invited me to a pot luck dinner.

I was 21 and the ability to legally buy wine was mine. I was broke, but wine was cheap. One could always find a bottle of decent Chianti in California. I lived in a house and could have probably brought a dish, but my friend said to just come, there was someone there he wanted me to meet.