Weird and Unusual: People and Unfiltered Wine

One of our newest regulars is a person I would consider to be a "Character of Petersburg". Probably most people know him if they spend time downtown. He's colorful, both in his manner of dress and his personality. If you saw him pushing his walker down the street, you might dismiss him as old, crazy, and odd. To the average person, his clothes don't match, he wears a lot of jewelry, and he seems to have a sticker addiction. He's missing teeth but I assure you, that's all he's missing. Though he's nearly seventy and living in a neglected apartment building with mold, broken water and gas lines, and unpredictable elevators, he's got his wits about him. His train of thought is something I relate to. The tracks aren't direct. They meander, but they almost always get back to where they meant to go. The first time he came into the shop, I wasn't sure about him. I'd heard about him but had never met him. By other's accounts, he's problematic. Any stories I've heard aren't worth repeating because they are only hearsay and they don't align with my experience. 

Perhaps that's part of the magic of our shop.

What you put out into the universe, you get back. Clint reiterated that to me yesterday when I lamented yet another slow start to a month. 

We don't have the numbers to show for it, but response to our space has been (mostly) positive. Two people have given us poor reviews and after a couple of days of taking those to heart, I had to let them go and move on. 

It's the characters that keep me going. The people who want something different because they are something different. People who like the calm energy that gives you the space to be whoever you are or whoever you want to be. In our shop, you can leave pretense at the door. Be yourself. If you don't know who that is, find yourself. If you don't like the vibe, then maybe the place isn't for you. So be it. 

Not everyone likes wine. Not everyone likes our events. Not everyone likes our food. I am definitely not in the business of pleasing everyone. 

The second time our colorful customer came in, I was working alone. At first when he got himself and his walker through the door, I braced myself for the long conversation about to come. He doesn't stay for one drink. He stays for several hours. I don't get anything done but I always enjoy the time.

That day, a couple weeks ago, after about an hour of him sitting at the bar, a younger man came in. He wore a thin sweatshirt with the hood up. and jeans with the butt sagging so I could see his cow print underpants. He walked with his weight forward as if he was trying to catch up with himself. He wasn't a very big guy. 

After he walked through the door, though, he went left to go around the couch away from the main walkway. He had to walk sideways to get between the couch and our corkboard. His shoulders, though narrow, almost took it off the wall. He finally walked past where I stood at the bar. I said my hellos and tried to gauge what he was doing. His head turned slightly toward me, enough so I noticed he was a bit cross-eyed. Since he didn't stop at the register, I assumed he was here to buy a bottle of wine. Indeed he kept walking to the back wall of wines. 

Now look, as a white woman in Petersburg, I'm probably overly conscious to check if I'm reacting based on some ingrained stereotypes. That said, skin color plays no factor when someone isn't acting "usual". 

Over the course of the next hour, while my older customer and I chatted about who knows what, the young man sat at several tables, got up to look out the front window a handful of times, went to the bathroom for long periods also a handful of times, and asked me if I was "about to charge him for water." I pointed to the glass bottles and small glasses on the tables and let him know he could drink all the water he wanted. He didn't drink a lot, so that wasn't the reason he kept going to the restroom.

After the third time he went up front - using the same route in between the couch and the corkboard (which is maybe 7-inches wide) - I asked if I could help him with something. He said he was waiting for a girl and showed me a text conversation on his cell phone which I couldn't see without my glasses. It likely wouldn't have answered my question anyway.

My older customer stopped talking and watched the young man every so often and then made eye contact with me to determine my stance on the situation. 

In truth - and I kept reminding myself of this - the young man was simply acting unusual. His jeans were so tight I could tell he didn't have a weapon to worry about. I was bigger than him or at least the same size, and could likely defend myself if need be, though he wasn't doing anything that made me necessarily feel threatened.

"Are you worried about him?" my customer asked when the kid went into the restroom again.

"Well, he's just acting weird."

"Oh, don't say 'weird'. We're all weird."

"Ok. His manner is causing me a little concern. His manner is just unusual."

My employee came in for her shift. I told her not to go back to the restrooms like she usually does when she comes in so she tidied the front tables and flower arrangements. While she was doing that, our unusual customer came out of the restroom, and walked up front. He took the same path between the couch and the corkboard, startled my employee, and checked out the front window again.

When he came to sit back down behind the fridge next to bar, he mentioned he was again waiting for someone. Our conversation was awkward with him there and I was trying to keep my eye on him, determine what I would do to keep my customers and employee safe if the shit went down, and also tried to listen to a new customer who had come in to chat. 

Common downtown, the paramedics drove by but this time they pulled up out front of the shop. We assumed someone at one of the restaurants nearby was having a medical emergency. 

The young man sitting behind the fridge said, "My ride is here."

I chuckled and looked to see if he has somehow gained a sense of humor in the past hour. 

"I'm serious," he said. "It's meth transportation."

He stood, now holding one of his shoes in his hand, and walked toward the front. This time, he walked the straightaway path that didn't require shimmying around furniture. He stopped to put his shoe on, exited the shop, and walked up to the EMTs who were waiting. 

I was dumbfounded. We all were. It was silent in the shop, or I had stopped listening, anyway. 

The young man got into the back of the EMS truck, they closed the doors, and within minutes they pulled away.

What stuck with me - other than the whole event - was the comment, "Don't call him weird. We're all weird." It forced me to be more descriptive. Just because something is weird - meaning different from what I'm used to - isn't particularly specific. With this young man, I was concerned but not worried. He unsettled me but I wasn't afraid. That said, I do remember my heart pounding so hard I thought briefly that we were having a small earthquake. So maybe there was fear. Fear of the unknown. I didn't know what this young man was doing, what he might do, or what I might do.

I like that I was forced to find a different word. 

The situation didn't call for me to describe him, necessarily, but for me to describe how he made me feel. Him being 'weird' isn't helpful. I'm weird. My customer is weird. And he's right. We're all weird. 

Later, the incident made me think about natural wine, but more specifically unfiltered wine. Unfiltered wine can sometimes have a taste that some might consider 'weird'. But we can do better than that. Weird is not at all specific. 

I'm not neck-deep in the wine industry. To be honest, after having been involved in the yoga industry, I don't know that I ever want to be part of anyone's 'industry' again. Talking about just about any aspect of the wine world is almost like talking about politics these days. Many topics are highly controversial. Or, at least they are if you give a shit. And I, personally, do not.

So many things in life right now are divisive and fueled by some influencer's opinion. Boy am I tired of that. 

At the wine expo in Richmond last year, the man doing the sake tasting poo-poo'd and mocked natural wine and really made me think of him as just an asshole. A snob. Why can't we just let people like what they like? 

I, for one, seem to prefer unfiltered wines. There's something about their funkiness that I dig. Being unfiltered probably doesn't work for all wines, though, and that's why I like drinking wines where we let the wine maker do what wine makers do best. Make a great bottle of wine. If being unfiltered helps tell the story better or bring out the flavor or help express the terroir, then I'm all for it. Still, though, I may not like it. It may not be for me. It may not be for you. Huzzah!

But, if you taste an unfiltered wine for the first time and your first response is "This is weird", I'm going to ask you to try a couple of things before you totally write it off.

1. The first sip is just the first sip. It usually takes several to get acclimated to it. That goes for any wine, filtered or not.

2. Maybe it needs to warm up a bit. I like all of my wines chilled, but even 50 degrees may be too cold for some wines. Warm it in your hand (in the glass, of course, unless you drink wine like a dog).

3. Maybe it needs to be chilled a bit. Most rooms, unless you're a Hobbit or Dwarf and live underground, are too warm for wine. "Room temp" in my shop is 74 degrees. In my house it's 65 degrees. Either are far too warm even for a red - for me. 

4. Try it with food. Not all wines are meant to be enjoyed without food. Some wines are enhanced by something fatty, something nutty, something sweet, something savory, just like some foods are so much better with a good white, a good red, and even a delicious orange.

5. Make sure you're not actually drinking the sediment. The crystals at the bottom of an unfiltered bottle of wine are not meant to be drunk. I mean, you can taste them if you want, but they're not a delicacy or anything. 

6. Let the wine sit for a bit. Decant it, perhaps. A deep red, with lots of tannins and decent acidity is better decanted regardless of being filtered or not. Just because it's a natural wine doesn't mean it's best right out of the bottle. 

7. Try a different unfiltered wine before you totally write them off. You know what, I would challenge you to not write anything off entirely. I just got a non-rosé guy to order two glasses of rosé the other day. What I most appreciate about people is curiosity and a sense of adventure.

When you taste any wine, actually, wait a bit before you decide what it is you think you taste or smell or feel. Think about the details you could use to describe it. 

Unfiltered wines could taste funky, but that's almost over-used. What is funky to you? Funky like a stinky cheese? Funky like dirty gym socks? Or funky like earthy, mossy, piney. There are some unfiltered white wines that have made me think of my mother. Her oil paints. The smell of oils on canvas. Mostly, though, turpentine. But in a good way. Remember that your memory of a thing directly impacts your feeling of it. I like the smell of turpentine, but to many people it's too strong to the point of feeling toxic. Maybe you're comforted by the smell of gym socks or wet dog. Or erasers.

Also, when you think of the description of wines, think about how you describe people. We're all connected, you know. We come from the same places where our wines and coffees and cheeses and meats come from. We are of them, they are of us. 

In January, the second Wednesdays' wine tastings will be creatively based. You'll learn the usual stuff about where and how the wine was produced, but we'll add a creative element. Don't be afraid of this. Think of it as a way to get to know yourself better, too. Any chance you get to dig deeper into words is a chance to dig deeper into humanity and connections. 

Sure, wine is made of grapes and yeast, just like people are made of blood and bones, but that's not the only way to describe a wine. "It tastes like grape juice." "She sure had a lot of bones." It's just obvious. 

Be curious. Be adventurous. Be weird. But mostly, be you.