My first time…

Everyone remembers their first time. Or, so I assume. The shadowing nervous anxiety that colors your cheeks and forces sharp, shallow breaths. The lip biting tension of the unknown that you know you’re supposed to enjoy, but not entirely sure just how to. The warm, creeping escalation that showers your senses, tickling your spine, making the back of your knees sweat harder than Tia Tequila in the San Diego Chargers locker room. The nervousness of showing weakness, underperforming and embarrassing yourself. That was me, when I tasted a First Growth Chateau Margaux….

I was lucky enough to weasel my way into a Grand Cru 1999 Bordeaux tasting that a distributor was putting on in St. Thomas last weekend.

At 9:30 in the morning.

That’s right, 9:30 in the AM, a mere six hours after I had finally dozed off with a cursory neat Negroni from the hotel bar. That was after the glasses of Piper Heidsieck Brut Rose and a deafening bottle of 2005 Casa Lapostolle, Clos Apalta, Colchagua Valley we lathered on over dinner. Needless to say, I was not in the best tasting shape. I didn’t think I would be able to get in, but for a brief storm that grounded flights from St. Croix that morning thereby opening up some extra seats. To make matters worse the hotel sundries shop was out of Tylenol and Advil. (Hey, Marriot, seriously, you have a couple hundred people here for a two days of serious drinking and you forget to restock the ibuprofen? Weak sauce.)

I make it down to the ballroom that the tasting is taking place, fashionably late, and sneak to my seat. Four glasses sat in front of me with a mere ounce of each offering. My eyes drifted over the names on the tasting notes to that silver object what I believed my true salvation. A water pitcher, just out of reach… I softly asked the woman to my left to fill my water glass, conscious of the sour morning breath I expelled with my hoarse “Thank You” (my apologies to those around me, but better to have wicked morning breath than minty brushed teeth for the tasting) I then focused on the matter at hand.

First up, Chateau Ausone

I will admit, I was a bit hesitant to take a sip. On the projector the instructor was giving us a blow by blow of the great demarcation of 1855 that designated what a Grand Cru can be and…. well, look it up. It’s interesting, I swear.

Finally he looked around the room and smiled. “Go ahead” he prompted “Take a sip”

So I did. And you know what, it was nice. Damn nice. My mouth was waking up slowly, so I took just a little in and swirled it through my cheeks and covered my tongue. Light and tannic, I didn’t pick up much else at first, which I blamed on the pounding in my cerebellum and the florescent lighting.

I nervously looked around the room at the other participants. It’s funny sometimes, watching people taste wine. Everyone approaches it with a different zeal. You have Mr. “I’m gonna stick my shnozz as deep as I can in the glass until my untrimmed nose hairs are sticking to the side and I’m literally snorting this wine”. The dotting woman who stares at the “legs” for several minutes with a disdainful look, as if the imperfections of the molecules will show themselves if she just glares through squinted eyes long enough. Then there’s my favorite, The Serial Swirler, you know the guy who swirls his glass with such vigor and concentration that you know he’s unsatisfied unless he creates a vortex of flavor so rich and complex it’s more devastating to the palette than a visit to Switzerland is to Roman Polanski. (zing!)

(quick side note: for some reason whenever I hear the name Roman Polanski it always reminds me of Jeremy Irons as Claus Von Bulow in “Reversal of Fortune”. Has Jeremy Irons ever been any creepier than he is in that role? I don’t think so. And he’s a creepy guy. I bet he’s a serial swirler.)

Then again, maybe I’m missing something by not trying one of these methods. I may have to modify my tasting behavior. See, I’m not sure that I have enough knowledge to fully grasp what was in front of me. I’m untrained and stalled by years of bourbon appreciation. Just because it costs a small fortune for a case, will the novice receptors in my mouth have the capacity to comprehend? Either way I’m still hungover and at a significant disadvantage.

Up next was the Chateau Margaux.
(I have had only one passing experience with Margaux before. I was working at a swanky hotel in Portland, and a gentleman came into the restaurant with his soon to be wed daughter and her fiance. In 1978, the year she was born, he bought futures on the ’78 Margaux with some friends.

He could only afford a single bottle.

So he held on to it, promising himself to keep it carefully stored all those years until the eve of his newborn daughters wedding.

It was corked.

I watched a man, on the top of the world a few minutes before, a man who waited nearly 30 years for this moment to share with his only child, crushed and reduced to tears over, literally, sour grapes. That’s a powerful bottle.)

The color reminded me of True Blood for some reason. A dark red substance, steeped in archaic mystery and reverence. The inky drawl on the nose that whispered currants and leather were equally enticing and led me to trepidation.

I hesitated briefly, then took one long satisfying draw.

It was silky and light… but, then it grew and hints of bold dark cherry were hinted at with a subtle spice that lingered. It was a delicate reminiscence, like a lingering first kiss that keeps you up at night, giddy with anticipation of more. I took a deep breath and held it. I wanted the moment to last. And I remember every nanosecond of that moment. The shallow buzzing of the digital projector, the murmurs of approval the crowd around me was sighing. The finish that wouldn’t leave my lips. This was an important turning point in my burgeoning career as a professional drinker… I know that I didn’t completely understand what I had just come across, but somehow I knew that one day I would.

We next tried a Chateau Lafite Rothschild and then a Mouton Rothschild, but honestly I don’t remember much of them. While the crowd, Wine Spectator and Robert Parker preferred both of those, my head was still swimming in Margaux.

I know, I’m totally discounting two amazing wines, but damn man, that Margaux was good.

So I did what I thought was unthinkable when I entered the room. I spent $325 dollars on a single bottle of wine that wont be ready to drink for another ten years and you know what, I don’t regret it a bit.

Ten years from now I will celebrate my fortieth birthday. What better way to toast such an occasion than with a bottle of wine that I bought as an early present when I could nary afford nor truly appreciate it. I have ten years to grow and train my palette to receive such a gift. There are surreal moments in life that transcend the greenbacks in my bank account and I have the next ten years to anticipate that moment anxiously. Ten years of nervous giddiness. Ten years of wonder and suspenseful excitement.

Ten years to look back fondly at my first time…