What I inherited from my mother’s father

I was working on this piece in the week before my mother died last month…I never got a chance to share it with her.

I was raised in Ventura where I grew fruits and vegetables in our backyard under the tutelage of my father, Kenney Lawrence. Later, I was my grandfather’s eyes and his hands when he could no longer work his land up above Cemetary Park.

My grandfather, Manny Paquette, was a challenging taskmaster and so difficult to please that my mother, Suzanne Lawrence, didn’t want me to take the job. He knew exactly how he wanted everything done, he was a perfectionist, he grew up in the famous Shepherd’s Gardens in Ventura, and he had been working that earth for 50 years.

After my first week, my grandfather told me I worked hard, and more importantly, I worked smart. He liked how I listened, how I followed his directions, and that I asked good questions. He appreciated how I gingerly handled the seeds he had germinated, how I climbed deep into his fruit trees as he used to. The thoughtful way I pruned them pleased him also.

I paid attention to him and to the land, listening to it and loving it the way he did. I did what I was asked but also could tell him about the red tailed hawk, the quail, where the roadrunner roosted. I could describe for him the texture of the soil, the air, the chamise on the warm afternoons. As I worked his land, I understood it and him.

My grandfather always enjoyed wine and wanted to make his own, but he never did. He grew grapes but not enough to do anything with them. It was more of a dream.

When he hand built his house on the hill, the first item of business was digging a hole into the hillside. This was the 1950’s and his neighbors were sure it was a bomb shelter. Instead, it was a wine cellar. He carved by hand a massive door out of redwood and entered it into the Ventura County Fair: he won a first place prize.

When he passed away in 1997, I inherited his cookbooks, his wine making books, his wines, and his cellar.  But I’d already inherited his sense of smell, his love of fine food and decent coffee, his interest in wine.

And so much more.

Here’s a link to a video with images of his house, his land, and his cellar door.

The Case of the Absent Wine Predator

Today on Wine Wednesday, I want to explain yet another absence from regular posts as Wine Predator.

I’m sad to say that, just a few days after I posted the you tube by Jo Diaz of my adventures in Portugal and the you tube  by Zev Robinson of the Catavino trailer which features an interview with me, my mother Suzanne Lawrence passed away suddenly and unexpectedly at 72, and right on the heels of the accidental death my dear poet and blogger friend Paul Squires aka GingaTao.

I never got a chance to show her either video…and a lot more, of course. We were finally going to start transforming her extensive research and writing into a blog followed by a book.

While my mom wasn’t a wine drinker, she had a wine cellar which she loved and which I tended. For the past 18 years or so she lived in the house my grandfather built, complete with a wine cellar snuggled into the hillside. For 14 years, my mother took care of her parents who daily celebrated “wine-thirty”–I didn’t have to worry about my grandparents drinking my wine–by that stage in life, my grandpa was fine with inexpensive jug wine which they had with cheese and crackers every afternoon as they enjoyed the ever-changing view from their hillside home.

My mother enjoyed the view, also, and she lived there another six years. As often as possible, I would come up to say hello, at times bringing a friend to enjoy the view and a bottle of wine from the cellar. We would also come up for special dinners like Christmas eve, marked for me with a trip down into the wine cellar. Other times, I’d call to say I was running up to get wine.

Even though we never shared a bottle of wine together, we shared a cellar. Continue reading →

Wine Predator: A Blog Worth Celebrating, says Jo Diaz with photos from Portugal!

When Jo Diaz of Juicy Tales aka Wine Blog Org told me I was runner-up for her contest to win a trip to Portugal with her as the guest of Enoforum Wines, I felt great. Then when winner Sonadora aka Wanna Be Wino had to cancel at the last minute, within days, before I could even catch my breath from jumping around with excitement, I was on a plane to Portugal.

Although we had each attended the North American Wine Bloggers Conferences in Santa Rosa, Jo and I didn’t know each other. But once in Portugal, we came to know each other well. As we explored the castles and countryside, the wineries and the vineyards, she kept catching me and taking photographs of me in the craziest spots taking photographs or the view. She warned me that she was going to do a slide show blog post “Where’s Gwendolyn?” taken after the “Where’s Waldo?” books.

I didn’t know that she was going to feature my blog in her “Wine Blogs Worth Celebrating” and use that opportunity to present a video of her photos of me in Portugal!

Here’s what Jo said:

Gwendolyn Alley, of Wine Predator and Art Predator, was my traveling companion to the European Wine Bloggers Conference and to visit Enoforum Wines in Portugal last fall. We shared nine days of our lives together… strangers in a strange land (only as it relates to the United States). She’s continued to reflect on our experiences. And, I don’t know anyone else who throws his or her entire body into taking photographs the way Gwendolyn does. She’s always writing about her passions of art and wine, and has a unique skill that I always enjoy.

Wow, huh! And I’m in great company: Jo’s list included

Joe (and Amy!) Power from Houston who I met on the WBC or Bust bus last month; they’re great generous people who write Another Wine Blog

Tom Wark of Fermentation who does wine PR

Sonadora (who was supposed to go to Portugal in my stead and instead went in January 2010) of WannabeWino

Wine Journalist Steve Heimoff (who I “debate” in this video from the previous post!)

my pal Ken Payton who writes one of my favorite wine blogs,  Reign of Terroir

Alawine… which produces lists  Top 100 Wine Blogs (one of these days!)

Paul Gregutt, Northwest wine writer

Robert Whitley ~ Wine writer, publisher, and wine competition organizer  Wine Review Online

Laura Ness of My Vine Space, a wine writer from the Santa Cruz Mountains

Stark Silver Creek which covers all things West Coast, including food and wine

See Jo’s original post for all of her comments about why she chose these blogs!!

Watch Wine Predator In WBC Documentary Teaser!

At the Wine Blogger’s Conference last month in Walla Walla, Catavino (aka Ryan and Gabriella Opaz) invited me to sit for an interview with documentary film maker and photographer Zev Robinson. He’s doing a film on the Wine Bloggers Conferences with a focus on European WBC organizers Gabriella and Ryan Opaz and Catavino. They wanted me to discuss my experiences at the three North American Wine Bloggers Conferences as well as the European one.

So although I  knew I might miss some of the final tasting of the conference, the one that paired 10 tidbits with various wines, we took that time for an interview where I spoke honestly and passionately. I compared the conferences I’d attended and discussed the wine blogging community in general. Some of what I had to say I knew when I said it might be controversial. I come to wine writing from a career in academia and journalism, and that shapes my perceptions and experiences.  I come to wine blogging from being active in online poetry writing communities which obsessively debates similar topics: how to guide people to find the “real” deal, the wine writers or poets who really know something about the topic.

Watch the video to get my opinion on that controversial topic! This is just a teaser! He plans to do more shooting at the European Wine Bloggers Conference in Vienna in October where he’ll get some video with the always outspoken and provocative Ken Payton of the blog Reign of Terroir.

Anybody got a spare plane ticket to Europe by the way? I’d really like to go to Vienna to this year’s Wine Bloggers Conference there!

Where Did Wine Predator Go?

After putting up 18 posts in a half dozen days during the 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference in Walla Walla Washington, I returned to my summer job: teaching two sections of a 5 unit college composition class. It’s got me working 50-60 hours every week, teaching one class 12 hours a week during the day and the second class 12 hours a week at night. I barely have a chance to open a bottle of wine much less blog about it!

I did, however, get one of my goody boxes thanks to my WBC roommate Erika Szymanski. I got so much good stuff at the Wine Bloggers Conference–books and other materials–that I couldn’t get it all home! So she packed up all the paper products and corkscrews etc and shipped it to me for $15. There’s a few bottles of wine and a bottle of beer too that she’ll send me when it seems like the weather cools down enough.

So I’ve carefully put it into a box with my other materials from previous wine blogging excursions and expeditions including the previous wine blogging conferences (four!) and will get to it as soon as I get through this stack of midterms. Or maybe next week’s research papers. Or…

Too many writing ideas and too little time! Putting it away sure made me itchy to get writing!

SEA to LAX: Back from 2010 WBC

I missed my flight last night (and so did several others!) because of a gnarly accident on the interstate, but I made it back home from Seattle to LAX this morning in time to teach my 10:30am class (thanks to help from my husband’s cousin Scott!)

There’s still so much I want to write about! Even with all these posts up about the 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference which ended yesterday in Walla Walla Washington, I have a half dozen half written posts and notes for a dozen more!

I haven’t even discussed the glorious B & B Vine & Roses and the wonderful talk I had late into the night with Tim Sinclair of Sinclair Estates on the night before WBC. Or the adventures of the WBC-Or-Bust Bus or Saturday’s #jackpot bus (yes that’s an inside joke) and sooo much more!

I will do my best to continue posting regularly and I hope you will continue reading Wine Predator. It’s so easy to subscribe to this blog by email and get the latest news about my prowls for good adventures and good wine–just click on the link in the upper right hand corner. If you’re on twitter, follow me, and I’ll follow you back. Just click on my twitter feed on the right side bar.

And please comment before you go! Say hello, especially those of you who were at WBC! I love visitors who comment! That way I can go visit your blog too!

WBC 10: In closing…next year will be held in Charlottesville VA

And in closing…

Some thank yous to many worthy folks. Some info about next year’s European Wine Bloggers Conference in Vienna from Ryan at Catavino…And now, where will next year be? The drum roll please….

The 2010 Wine Bloggers Conference will be held in Charlottesville VA in the Omni Hotel in downtown with an evening reception in Monticello.

According to the announcment, “The conference only works if people go for it.”

We’ll see if they do. Will I be there? Well, VA was my third choice if that’s any indication…I was really rooting for Paso Robles. Virginia is a long way to go, but I know I’d get a lot out of it just as I have the previous ones.

You can register starting now for the 2011 Wine Bloggers Conference to be held in July 2011.