PInot noir

I had a boyfriend who named his dog, a big black standard poodle, Pinot. As in noir, as in black. cute. nice dog, nice man. That was my first introduction to Pinots. I moved to Oregon in the silly glory years of winemaking, when everyone with a slope thought they could, and would, make wine.

We had fruit wines that would rival Maneshevitz, apple wines ,rhubharb wines, and finally everyone thought we should make wines like California. Cabernets flowed in the gulleys and we were wrong. Ours was not an Italian wanna-be climate, we were the Rhine with salmon. We had finally figured out that we should grow Gewurtztraminner, Riesling and other om-pah-pah wines, suitable for small sausages and German style Spatlaleze sweet wines. Our microclimates, deep valleys with mists, rain and south facing slopes lead themselves to the type of wines that the Romans figured out would work in the Mosel, Saar, and Ruhr valleys, let alone the Rhine with the Loreli, Wagner, and lederhosen.

Topless dancers, folk music, bell bottoms, hippie beads, and organic grapes, and the lure of counter-culture music led in the 70's. The wine followed the same path. I now have diners with mega mansion owners who planted the first Rieslings and were the old hippies. Cabernets eat our dust.

I could trade my weight, up and down, in Pinots in Calistoga. Actually, I could drive to Napa with my Subabru, the Pinot car equivalent in Oregon, loaded to the roof rack with Pinots. I could return with the Mercedes, the Lexus and the Volvos of wine.

Twenty years ago, I traveled with boyfriend post divorce guy to Calistoga. We had broken up, o.k, I found that out in the MIDDLE of the trip, but he still wanted the free trip, to search for cabernets. We survived, and drank a hell of a lot of Cabernet in our post-coital denial search for vino. Cabernet bottles lined the dresser, not lingerie. But, we still had a good time, after I verbally beat him up.

However, in a Freudian wine sort of way, I don't like cabs anymore. Cabs. That also means in jewelry the faceted, rounded ready-to-set gemstones. Cabernet is the same way, faceted, and full of terroir, the ready-to -set flavor from the earth. Cabs must breathe, and they have gravity, weight, and nuance. I don't want to drink gemstones, I want stones. And they make me flush with a blush...so I stopped drinking them.

On to Chardonnays, the darling of the post-Cab era in Oregon. After lots of blondes, ( who can say that with a straight face) oak planks floating in a sea of butter, cabs have finally settled down and I tried them. But, personally, I prefer the lightweights, the trainers, the Vouvray, Souave and white Rojoas. No cabs. No blood red wines, less nuance, less pairing problems, more shift to light, and God forbid easier to get out of the carpet. A metaphor for my relationships certainly.

On to Pinots. After twenty years drinking only whites including champagne and Aste, I think I have grown into Pinots. Oregon wines have grown up. No strawberries hovering over the cork. In fact, many corks have never seen a God-given tree, most are like test tube kids, grown in the lab. Wines are in aseptic boxes God love them, and not amphore. No Greek gods of wine here, but the gods of the viniculture and wine degree.

But Pinot IS the wine of Oregon. Everyone likes them, in fact, they have priced themselves out of the state. I was in Panama this winter, and found a wineshop with Oregon wines differentiated like California, and ( oh my God) Washington wines. Pinots were out of sight in price, even my friends down the valley with theirs. My neighbors in Panama! Guess I had better pay attention to the neighbors.

Like always, my metaphors and life lessons are home grown, even found in Panama. Pinots are home grown. They too, have nuance, complexity, gravity. They beg to be discovered, and I have followed Barbie instead of her darker cousin. I need a little red in my color, a little blush in my cheeks, a little blood in my sex-starved veins. Maybe I should look at the men in the same way; complex, not duplicitous, with focus and locality. I do not need to travel to Calistoga, they are at my own back door. Pinots are a locality, a myth, a national article in Wine Spectator, and time to re-discover. Put the Chardonnays on the back shelf. Pop the cork, forget the cellaring, and move on.