Dale and I had looked forward to having Saturday dinner with our friends Carl and Pam Taylor at their Palos Verdes home, and now here we were in their beautiful backyard, peacefully sipping our glasses of dry rosé as Carl stoked the flames in his wood-fired pizza oven. He was roasting some huge lobsters and baking a fresh plum tart for dessert. It was the weekend of the terrible shooting in Aurora, Colorado. We weren’t talking much about it, but the tragedy was on everyone’s mind.
As we sat down to eat, we drank some chilled Pigato (a crisp Italian white) with our spaghetti pesto, and then Carl pulled out a six year old Chablis Premier Cru Vau de Vey from Hervé Azo. We enjoyed that incredible wine alongside a rare Jura white that reminded us of an aged Meursault while we cracked into our lobsters and dug out the sweet white meat with our little silver forks.
I couldn’t help thinking we were living about as good as one could live, and, at that special place with good friends, food and wine, the rest of the world’s problems simply vanished, if only for a few hours.
The fact is, there is a mean world out there, but most of it, if not all, is beyond our control. We can drive ourselves crazy by getting serially upset by the bad news of the day—there is a lot to choose from—or we can muddle on the best we can, sharing food and wine and love with the people who really matter to us. That’s what we can control.
At the end of the night, Carl, as he does so well, wrapped it up succinctly with this wry observation:
“You know, Randy, the world is a mess. But the Chablis was good!”
3 comments:
Appreciation of what we do have, those moments, laughs, great food and wine, really all one needs to feel alive in your life and not weighted down by fear, hostility and anxiety. Loved this Randy!
Such is the Way, Randy. . .Thanks for expressing it so well.
Thanks, Samantha and Kim.
Another thing that we should all work on is how our political views drive us into "tribes". I hear stories of friendships ending because someone thinks differently about the way our government should run. When people are at my table I want them to feel welcome and share my food, wine and hospitality. I have strong views like anyone else...but as I get older and, I hope, wiser, I try to remind myself we're all neighbors.
Randy
Post a Comment