Where We've Come From. Where We're Going.
A Resilient Wine recap, for the newbies or the nostalgic.
Someone asked me how long I’ve been publishing Resilient Wine, and I said, “Oh, a couple years. Wait—maybe a year and a half?”
And then I looked back and saw it’s been just a measly 15 months to the day. On the morning of February 16, 2024, I woke up from a fever dream wherein I imagined I was the Messiah ordained to transform and rescue the wine industry from its shit show devolution and potential full extinction. I wrote my first post, proclaiming the “resilient wine revelation.”
It was maaaaaybe a teensy bit egomaniacal. But it was also fueled by a convicted dismay that had been building for the past decade: This growing sentiment that the more convinced I was that wine is absolutely central to our social human nature, and that it has the real potential to bring us all back from the brink of our collective burnout and epidemic loneliness and planet-wrecking consumerism, the more we (“wine” people) were fucking it all up and digging its/our own grave. I needed to do something to save the wine industry—to save the planet… to save myself.
Resilient Wine is me doing a thing: sharing the insights I wasn’t finding elsewhere, telling the stories I believed could make a difference, opening up the conversations it seemed others were too shy or ashamed to have.
It’s only been 15 months of doing this thing. But MAN, it feels like it’s been several years smooshed into one. My life looks so different now. Our world looks so different now. Crises are escalating quickly, but I’m noticing that hope and innovation are slyly buoyed by exactly that—which means you’ll always find them. If you know where to look. And if you’re wise and strong enough to stop letting the naysayers steal all your attention and sap all your energy.
So: Hi! Welcome to the party.
My notes from the recent Napa RISE symposium have been prolific. While I give you a minute to catch up on days 1, 2, 3 and 4, and while I pant, transcribing my notes from days 5-6, I’m sending out this little missive to welcome new readers and to catch us up on where we’ve come from and where we’re going. Above and below, you’ll find quick highlights and links from where we’ve been.
As for where we’re going? That’s easy: onwards and upwards, hopeful and innovative, convicted and in community.
Resilient Wine is Inclusive, Holistic, Pragmatic. Those three original posts outline our intentions: Everyone is welcome, we cheer on any and all aspects of resiliency, and we are constantly adapting to the conditions at-hand.
Resilient Wine addresses opportunities within wine production, farming, Human Resources, finances, marketing, packaging and waste, all the feels that go along with transformation, and more. I’m so very honored to have you along for the ride.
Last night I made a spring vegetable paella and drank an outrageous wine: Alvear Tres Miradas Vino de Pueblo Sierra de Montilla 2021. Yooooooooo, party people. THIS is everything I always want a fino sherry to be but never is, by which I mean it’s old bush-trained Pedro Ximenez grapes grown on albariza, fermented entirely dry, then aged under flor so it socks you sideways with that wild raw almond dank white mushroomy salted creamsicle thingggg. BUT it’s only 13% alcohol!! I drank two-thirds of the bottle and only shared a little with Josiah. It wins as a “resilient” wine because it’s entirely dry-farmed in a sunny, hot, dry area (Andalucía) that’s reported to get less than 600 liters of rainfall per year. I did a bunch of math and Googling and concluded that the U.S.-standard “one inch of rain” is equal to 25.4 liters, so 600 liters would be comparable to around 24 inches of annual rain… which is definitely less than Napa Valley. Lessons. Inspo.
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