Ring It, Someone Will Come
TASTING NOTES: “Color: Classic Pinot Noir ruby. Aromas: Rich aromas of blueberry and raspberry, with notes of cherry and vanilla. Palate: Concentrated berry flavors, lush mouthfeel, and long fruit finish.” (AbV 14.9%, pH 3.54, TA 0.56 g/100ml)
VARIETALS: 100% Pinot Noir
BARRELS: The grapes were crushed into small fermenters. After cold-soaking for three days to extract rich color, the must fermented on the skins for three weeks to obtain a richly extracted wine. The wine was aged for 12 months in tight-grained French oak barrels (20% new).
PAIRS WITH: N/A
THAT REMINDS ME OF: The winery’s mission-style bell tower — one of the architectural features of the Michel-Schlumberger estate.
There is a specific, almost embarrassing pleasure in hearing a distant bell tower. Not a church alarm going off, not a clock tower doing its hourly bureaucratic chime, but a real bell, rung by hand, for a reason you don’t quite know. It implies a world organized around audible signals — a world where people needed to be summoned. Come eat. Come pray. Come look at this thing that’s happening. The bell doesn’t explain itself. It just rings, and you’re expected to understand.
The best bell towers have names for their bells. Not “the big one” and “the little one,” but actual names, inscribed in the metal during casting. European cathedral bells have been named since at least the medieval period — feminine names, mostly, because bells were thought to have voices, and voices were feminine, apparently. They were baptized. Blessed with holy water and anointed with oil. Given godparents. A bell in Cologne Cathedral is named Decima. One in Exeter is Grandisson. The bourdon bell of Notre-Dame de Paris, before the fire, was named Emmanuel, and it only rang for events of sufficient gravity — the death of a pope, the end of a war, the liberation of a city.
What would ring your bell, is sort of the question. What counts as sufficient gravity in your life? For most of us, the answer probably isn’t “the death of a pope.” It’s something smaller and weirder and more personal. A phone call from an old friend. A parking spot opening up right when you need it. A bottle of something good, appearing in your life, seemingly out of nowhere.
