Earlier this week I took a few bottles of wine to a friend--actually, she is my teacher but explaining the exact relationship would be a distraction from my point--who had expressed a fondness for both syrah and sangiovese.

     When I gave her the package of wine she plopped down in the middle of the studio and began examining each label, a look of delight on her face.  She reminded me of a child on Christmas morning, excited, eager, grateful.

     I felt a little sheepish.

     It is so easy, here in Sonoma County, to take wine for granted, especially if you work close to it, as I do. Samples arrive on my doorstep almost daily and sometimes I think, sheeesh, more wine.

     It is easy to feel overhwhelmed, especially when storage space is limited, as mine is.  And then there’s the recycling that the packaging requires, no small thing. And I have twice broken a toe rushing from one room to another and failing to see the cache of wine bottles behind the couch. Ouch!

     And so the look on my teacher’s face slowed me down a bit.

     Have I grown jaded, cynical?

     Maybe just a little but only temporarily, I promise.

     How lucky we are to live in this wonderful place, where the land gives us such an extraordinary bounty. I will never be able to drink all of the wines that find their way to me but I will never again take them for granted, not even briefly.

     And speaking of sangiovese, I have in general been disappointed with the varietal’s performance in California. But a couple of weeks ago I tasted DaVero’s   It is delicious, smooth, full and easy to drink, the best example of sangiovese I’ve seen in California.

Michele Anna Jordan