Italian wine and the pursuit of power

Meanderings from the streets of Palermo

I’m back in my family nerve center, if only for a few hours. It is winter, the moon solitary above the deserted streets, save for a few cold and lonely Africans setting up a table to sell their wares. Soon, the Palermitani will sweep out among the streets and the alleys, on their way to market or church or coffee. In the meantime, Palermo is all mine, and I do what I often do in Palermo, camera in hand, notebook in mind – I walk in search of where we are.

Along the way I come across my little wine bar, the one in La Vucciria. I step in to have a coffee, maybe with a shot of Marsala, just for old times. The place is far from the bustling spot it will be at noon, but for now, it’s mine, just as I’ve always held it in my memory from the first time I walked in with my uncle. It seems so long ago, 1971.

Has the battle for Italian wine in high-traffic retail been lost?

Now that I’ve scaled down my activities in the wine trade, I spend more time shopping for groceries, including the occasional bottle of wine. But I’m finding something about buying Italian wine in high-traffic retail (groceries, convenience stores, drugstores) to be very discouraging, verging on the sinister. The battle Italian wine has waged, interpolating itself into the greater American culture in the last 50 years, has been lost. It’s disheartening. And it’s disgusting. Because it treats Americans in search of Italian wine in those outlets, as if they are a bunch of immature babies just looking for a sweet lollipop.

So, let’s dig in and take a look at this situation.

Black Coffee, Green Bananas and the White Fog of Winter

After a holiday season which bordered on indulgent, and passing through the time of the winter solstice, breezing right on into the new year, the days are getting longer. Every day, when it is born, will be the longest day of the year, until the summer solstice. It’s all uphill from here.

But the world of wine is lumbering in its own dark days, filled with fear, drama and uncertainty. It’s as if the bright place I would escape to, my little world of wine, has been infested with the same turmoil that the greater world is lingering over. It’s too much for this observer. There has to be a way out of this rabbit hole. Or, so says, the optimist within, the resilient one, the man in the back of the room who is not shouting “FIRE!”

Where to, Now?

Let’s take a little skin trip. Step outside of your little world, just for a few minutes. Let’s go to Italy.

“Ahh,” you say, “Been there, done that.” And yes, maybe you have gone to Italy a time or two.

There is another Italy, one that is elusive to most of us, even those who speak the language fluently. It isn’t an Italy of words. It isn’t an Italy which mandates judgement, or even preference.

It’s something I have seen inside the viewfinder of a camera, and hints of it in films. I’ve felt it while hiking in Abruzzo and driving my motor scooter around Pantelleria. I’ve smelled it in the kitchens of aunts and grandmothers, and tasted it on numerous tables, both majestic and humble. And I’ve sipped it from the finest crystal glasses to the commonplace tumblers. Still, I keep looking, thinking there is something about Italy that evades many of us.