By Monte Belmonte
For the Valley Advocate
The somewhat suspect science that has told us for many years that “a little wine is good for you” seems to be going the way of leeching. When it comes to reliable medical advice, there has been some bad news for wine lovers. With the recent Surgeon General warning about the potential carcinogenic qualities of even limited amounts of alcohol, I find myself playing wine apologist. I continually defend wine for its historic and cultural importance. I have said on many an occasion, “Where there was wine, there was civilization!” But my oh my, our current civilization is not making this argument very easy for me.
Years ago, my mother bought me a two-and-a-half-foot wooden sign with the phrase “Wine A Little. Laugh A Lot,” carved into it. My mother knew I loved wine. At some point she made the decision that, since I love wine, I must need a wooden sign about that fact for my house. Spoiler alert: I don’t. If I had asked my mother to take the $20 she was planning on spending on that sign and instead purchase a bottle of wine, I am confident she would have had no idea how to buy me a $20 bottle to my liking. How far we have fallen culturally when we have replaced Syrah with schwag. As Americans, we know so much less about wine and yet somehow love to shell out money to celebrate our love of it.
I recently visited a kitchen accessory and wine store. It was located outside the Valley. And while the decently sized, two-story store had a fair number of fair bottles of wine (and a lovely Sicilian woman running a tasting) I found myself bombarded by the wine-themed related tchotchkes. It was a store filled with doodads screaming “I might be a borderline alcoholic!” Dishtowels that said “Good Friends. Good Wine. Good Times,” and “Warning: The Coffee Has Worn Off and The Wine Hasn’t Kicked In.” Pot holders that read “Dinner is Poured” or “I Don’t Give A Sip.” Socks with the saying “P.M.S. Pour Me S’more.” You could buy a simple white bathrobe for your bottle of wine and frankly what wine bottle doesn’t need a bathrobe. Or instead buy a cloth bag to put your wine bottle which reads “The Secret of Enjoying A Good Wine: 1. Open The Bottle To Allow it To Breathe. 2. If It Doesn’t Look Like It’s Breathing, Give It Mouth to Mouth.” That last one came so close to giving some wine advice of actual value.
When it comes to wine’s place in our culture, we have gone from the possibly apocryphal Winston Churchill quote, “Remember, gentleman. It’s not just France we are fighting for, it’s Champagne!” to a glass emblazoned with “Bra Off. Hair Up. Sweats On. Pop Cork.”
Now, I don’t have a problem with funny pithy phrases, per se. Use any or all of the aforementioned in casual conversation and I’m sure it’s charming. But something about printing all this stuff on every available retail item really rubs me the wrong way. It reminds me of the tedious and hackneyed sayings you find plastered around a beach house. “Happines Comes In Waves!” Isn’t the sheer fact that you are lucky to have a beach house enough? Why the vapid doorhanging?
The capitalization of the “wine lifestyle” also reminds me of Deadheads and Phish fans. When I was a kid I really loved the Phish album “Rift.” But the second I caught wind of how their rabid fan base gratefully deaded, I was out. I resent taking a decent or wonderful thing like wine, the beach, or, I hate to admit it, Phish, and cheapening it by slathering sayings or slogans on every consumable product.
I fully admit that my opinion on these uninspired, pedantic, and tiresome wine-related gift ideas for the wine lover on your list is entirely subjective. But please forgive me. With the earliest known evidence of human beings making wine dating back to about 8,000 years ago, I’d like to think we could celebrate wine culture in a slightly more dignified fashion. Maybe, by making an effort to understand even a few of the most basic things about wine. Like how to buy your son a decent $20 bottle.
One of the reasons why I think I am ruminating over wine knickknacks and not over an actual glass of wine is because of the current condition of my mother. She couldn’t buy me a wine or a sign at the moment. She really can’t do anything anymore. My family has been watching my mother quickly descend into dementia. She has all but lost her mind. Another cliche about alcohol has to do with killing brain cells. We can’t blame my mother’s current mental state on wine. I think she had one wine cooler a year when I was a kid and would occasionally drink a glass of White Zinfandel with my Nana at a holiday dinner. But that’s it. There was a time when she was thoughtful enough to get me a gift pertaining to an interest of mine without actually buying me what I was interested in. Maybe her hesitation about alcohol, both for herself and for me, was because her father was an alcoholic. Safer to get her son a wooden platitude than a Pinot Noir, perhaps.
The Surgeon General warning saying there is “no safe” level of alcohol consumption when it comes to cancer is something I don’t take lightly. Especially since I had my first colonoscopy and they found seven polyps, some of which were pre-cancerous. Did wine consumption have anything to do with that? Not sure. Does this mean I have semi-colon cancer? Also not sure. My mother’s mental condition is also weighing heavy on my conscience. But if you hardly ever had a drink and your brain can still go to mush, why not drink? And this brings us back to the appeal of these wine lifestyle bric-abrac.
Part of why wine has been such an important piece of the human experience for the last 8,000 years is the sense of relaxation it can bring. It’s the conversations about deeply personal and hard topics that happen when you share a bottle with a friend. It’s the subtle release of inhibitions that help you let some of your true feelings bubble to the surface. Is that why we want to put our feeling about wine on merchandise? Life happens. Wine helps. A friend with wine is a friend of mine. It’s wine o’clock somewhere. Wine a little, laugh a lot.
I still have the sign my mother gave me.
