I was thinking I was going to do some big, year-end, The-Cave-is-Awesome round-up, which it is, but the year ended on a story that also began it. So here we go.
2014 began and ended with stories of loss. The second one came in the end of December to talk to me about closing a multitude of lockers filled with many bottles collected over years of trips together traveled, bouncing around various wine countries with a partner no longer on earth.
It began years ago, in Oregon, on a random road with a random sign and an arrow pointing to "wine tasting." They were hooked and it became part of their lives; they, the trips, the wine, and the lockers, all growing together.
There are many lockers filled with wine, lockers filled with all the trips taken together, private jokes, intimate moments, disagreements. Everything that is two lives together is in those lockers. That now will be emptied and auctioned, most likely, two lives emptied and auctioned to the highest bidder.
There is so much difficulty in this, it will be a very difficult NEXT for this person.
January 2014 opened with a similar story twice removed, and the gentleman was retrieving a bottle of wine to open with the friend who just lost his wife. He asked me to Google a few bottles for him, to check in on how they might be drinking then. The bottle he took with him was posted at several thousand dollars. Several. "Drink the good wine," he said, after he told me why he was taking that bottle, and as he was walking out.
So that's my new years moment. All the wine waiting for the perfect moments to be had, do me a favor and just OPEN one of those once in a while, randomly, for no reason, but to drink the good wine that day.
PS: Also this favorite moment from last year.
Two Hawaiian shirts in, two Hawaiian shirts and two tall boys out.
Cheers.
