Let me tell you why this community exists — because it didn't start with a business plan. It started with a glass of Rombauer Chardonnay and a Caesar salad about 25 years ago. I remember the moment exactly. I took a sip of wine, took a bite of salad, and something happened that I didn't have words for yet. The two things elevated each other. Suddenly, 1 + 1 = 3. The whole experience became something neither one could have been alone. I didn't know what food & wine pairing was or why people cared. In that moment, I just knew — oh. This is something. I've been chasing that feeling ever since. Fast forward through 25 years in the wine industry — retail stores, wholesale, competitions, writing, educating — and then Covid hit. And everything got very quiet. And very real. My dad was in hospice in 2020. As I reminisced I realized many of my favorite memories with him lived around a table — food, wine, laughter, stories. In the last week of caring for him, a bottle of wine became something to look forward to each evening with my mom. We'd retire to the couch, pour a glass, and escape for a couple of hours into Schitt's Creek. It was small and it was everything. When we said goodbye to him, we sent him off with a glass of Prosecco. It was the most perfect, imperfect thing. In 2023, I traveled to Georgia — the country — and witnessed something that I had been missing. An entire culture organized around the table. Around connection. Around the ritual of gathering and pouring and being present with each other. Wine wasn't a status symbol there. It was the reason to show up. Over the last two years, I've been asking two questions over & over: Why is the wine industry struggling? And what can I do — in a way that's authentically mine — to draw people back to wine? The answer wasn't more education. It wasn't more memorization of regions and varietals and tasting notes that sound like nobody actually talks. It was this: help people trust their own experience. Stop asking them to conform to someone else's palate. Start asking them to pay attention to their own.

I appreciate being a part of this group and being able to share the pleasures of a good glass of wine. Currently enjoying a glass of Reustle Tempranillo Cluster Select from Prayer Rock Vineyards