Love affair with wine

Wine and I have been steadily getting acquainted over the last five years. I’ve had a little bit when I was a little younger, but probably not as much as I would have had my parents raised me as a pure wog. As only my father is Italian and we don’t really hold too many traditions strongly, things like coffee and wine were introduced in a much more relaxed way, probably a good thing.

It’s only been in the last two years or so, more-so the last six months that I’ve really been getting into wine.
Tonight a great friend and I shared a bottle of 2004 McLaren Vale Shiraz, and goddamn was it great. It’s not the most expensive wine, but it isn’t at all the cheapest, clocking in at a fairly decent price.

I’m still glowing from it.

It’s so hard to describe good wine – it isn’t just alcohol or just another beverage – the closest approximation I can make is having your body kissed from the inside. Good wine sinks into your stomach then slowly spreads out through your body, your blood caresses every fibre of your body – it can lift you up, mellow you out, pretty much facilitate any way that you want to feel.

One of the best things about wine I think is that it gives you a high and leaves you fully in control of your actions and senses. Of-course like any drug, too much of it will send you off the deep-end, but I’ve always been aware of my drinking and have never been drunk, with absolutely no desire to be. A lot of that is actually a part of my father’s guidance as a youth in regards to alcohol and of-course in particular wine, and I’m ever thankful for it.

Wine is so many things all at once; it can be full-bodied or gracefully aloof, even detached. It can be sensual, seductive, playful, brash, solemn or just plain fun. It has the presence to impact instantly, yet has the power to linger for hours both in the mouth and the body hours after it’s been consumed.

Though I’ve had better wines than the Shiraz we had this evening, it was still pretty good, and I don’t think I’ve ever been ready to appreciate it the way I do right now.

Good food, good wine, good coffee, good music, good company.
That’s life.