Enjoy The Wine. Don't Overthink It. And Thank Your Dad.

I never heard my dad describe a wine aroma or flavor, and I'm sure no one else did either. It's not because he was above it, or beneath it, or opposed to it in any way. I never heard him talk about the constellations, either, but it's not as if he never looked up into the night sky.

 

In fact, had he been exposed to wine education and the intimate culture that surrounds it, he might have gone whole hog. He was into things. He was an expert model-maker, often building airplanes, houses or, in one case, a covered bridge, completely from scratch — following the plans he had hand-drawn. He was a musician, a boater, a war veteran and, because of his work for TWA, a world traveler. Oh, and he built our house. He could create stuff, build it and then fix it when it needed repairs. What he knew, he knew thoroughly, and the same went for what he liked.

 

Cabernet sauvignon was one of those things. It was his favorite wine style, by far. He loved drinking it, loved saying it, loved unwrapping a bottle as a gift on Christmas or his birthday. A lot of times, he pulled the cork that very same day, and other times, when he had a little bit of a back supply, he stashed it away, like a kid hiding chocolate for later.

Pour yourself a glass of wine and read more at the Chicago Tribune.