Bragging? Maybe. Only a little.

I am so very, irrepressibly pleased with the newest development in my life: a job at a gorgeous winery in McLaren Vale.  For those of you tracking my progress, this means I have two jobs... both fantastic in their own ways... to keep me busy all summer.

The general theme of this blog has been not to name names or specify places (protect the innocent), so I'll follow suit here.  I will however, show off a picture from the winery's website, just to emphasize what I mean when I say 'gorgeous:'

It's such a great feeling to have a position for the right reasons, at an organization where the philosophy jives perfectly with passions I was already developing.  The winery is very keen on sustainable development, organic growth (of the business and the vineyards alike), and honest creation of quality.  And the wine is definitely quality.

The whole place resonates with a lovely purity of spirit and practice.  Sheep and cows graze in pastures alongside the vineyard, cover crops grow freely between rows of grapes, fish swim in the reservoirs that provide irrigation to the property, a pile of natural fertilizer sits in the sun with its earthy rich stink filling the air.  The winery dogs are as adorable and friendly as can be.  The winemaking philosophy is a modernized, hands-off approach: wild-yeast ferments, natural malo, aged oak regimens.  And there's a window in the cool, dark barrel shed that looks out across the vineyard, so it's impossible for workers in the cellar to forget that this product--which demands scientific attention and will be shipped to all points of the globe in glass bottles--this wine actually comes from a real place... right up there, where the sunlight is hitting the crest of the green hill.

Perhaps I'm obsessing a little bit, but perhaps that's as it should be.  I feel incredibly lucky to be included in this business and in this industry, and am thrilled to get to work.  I've been pooling my talents, honing the resources for a good long while now, and finally I'm in the position to use it for a good cause!  And there's more to learn!  Always ways to grow!

Then too, this position finally gets me on track towards a happy future that I've been blueprinting for some time now: working hard to cultivate, sustain, and promote a beautiful little piece of the world... (somewhere!)... hopefully one day adding in the blessing of my own beautiful family to raise, take care of, and proudly send into the world.  Its a profoundly fulfilling and edifying dream.  It's all about living in the now, for the betterment of what is to come.

I don't think it's totally crazy to think of wine as a savior against a robotic and soulless future.  Really now:  What better product than wine--with its hedonic peaks and scholarly valleys, its modern growth and ancient roots--to draw the everyday consumer into its nuances?  A lot of people want to get geeky and proud about wine knowledge, but I think wine lovers revel in yammering on about wine because it's fundamentally a glorious, unanswerable mystery.  Every vintage, every vineyard, every bottle offers a new opportunity to marvel at what nature has produced and man has harnessed for a moment.  How is it possible to drink wine without honoring the grapes, the vines, and the land from which it is born?   Nature--given her own way--never fails to awe those who are still, and quiet, and looking out across the landscape.  There's a beautiful, inexplicable flowing continuity of life bound up in the land, and wine invites us simply to bask in it.  

Or get nerdy about it, or pay too much for it, or share it with friends on the beach, or simply unwind.  What a gorgeous, happy life!