Photo Credit: AnnStreetStudio - Chateau de Gudanes
Life can get pretty mundane if you let it. You go through the same routine every day. You get comfortable with the pattern of your week. You find yourself doing almost the same things over and over again. And then you realise that something is missing ...
That spark. That expectation of something magical. You realise that somewhere along the road of life HOPE has died. Where did it go? How can it be recaptured? Is life from now on just going to be a battle against the bills, the boredom, the progress of time?
I took some time to clarify where I was going with this post and to write it down. I don't think I have completed my thinking on this subject yet and it will continue next week. But I needed to start somewhere. So here it goes ...
I am on a journey to shake off the mundane and rediscover the magic.
I am finding myself longing for a little romance in my life. A little excitement. A little pick me up. Something to make my heart flutter. You know, that moment when you catch his eye across the room and he holds your gaze longer than is necessary. Or busy holding your position in a debate, you look up and realise that you are being watched intently and your observer is smiling. Or it might be the conversation that takes a turn for the unexpected and suddenly it gets very honest and real and the veil is dropped and you feel the magic of being listened to intently and understood. You are known and accepted and the other person gets who you are and you feel connected together by this moment of intimacy.
I had just such a moment this week. It was unexpected. I was thrown a life line.
We had just spent 3 hours together picking grapes at Albury Organic vineyard. There were about 30 of us. All volunteers. Most of us had never met before. Different ages and backgrounds. Mainly older retired individuals who lived locally and liked gardening. But also an art student who lived in the suburbs of London and couldn't believe her good luck at discovering all this natural beauty only a stones throw away and was currently in the first flushes of an obsession over vineyards and the beauty of the Surrey Hills. A professional photographer who arrived on a road bike attired in lycra with his camera strapped to his back. A young man, squeaky clean and handsome, straight out of University, who worked in town at the local wine store and wanted to see the other side of wine away from the beautiful labels and high prices. Pete, who lives up in Farley Green and is a friend of my Dad's. He lends the vineyard his trailer and looks like a hippie farmer with his long grey hair but surprised us all by talking about his nights doing gigs at the Ministry of Sound !
Photo credit - Albury Vineyard
Hosting us were Nick the affable vineyard owner and Alex the strong opinionated Italian vineyard manager with 2 fiesty terriers in tow, one named Atilla. Lucy the sweet natured pretty daughter who co-ordinated the volunteers and arranged the lunch. Dominic the handsome young apprentice who talked about his small herd of Highland cows and his own beginnings of a vineyard, 100 vines planted at home.
We worked together picking from either side of the line of grapes. On Tuesday I had worked opposite an elegant older lady who told me about the many jobs she had worked before retirement. Her first and the most fun because she was recruited with her best friend was working as an air hostess on an airline flying out to the Caribbean every week. The job that made her the most money was selling pensions.The job in Brussels got her out of England after her divorce. She talked about how child care in Brussels is much more affordable and life is more manageable over there. I learnt loads and enjoyed her wise advice.
Photo Credit - Albury Vineyard
On Thursday I had been picking with an attractive middle aged Mum with a day to spare in her busy week. She was dressed in exercise gear and was sporting one of those wrist devices that counts her steps through the day. We laughed about life in middle class Surrey and why she never reaches her goal number of steps on a Sunday when she collapses by 3pm. We talked about meeting kids at the school gates, the competition between Yummy Mummies and her first date with her husband. I didn't expect to enjoy her company so much.
Photo Credit - Albury Vineyard
By the time we reached lunch on Thursday I was just warming up to the surprise of good company and getting over my bad attitude from earlier on in the day when I had secretly regretted coming because I was tired, had been stuck in traffic driving over to the vineyard and had arrived to share the day with what looked like a very uninteresting group of volunteers.
I sat down next to a young bearded guy who was alone and had lots of space at his table. My picking partner joined me and another guy who looked like Bear Grylls. I did a double take because he did look so much like him but concluded that surely Bear wouldn't be spending his morning here in Surrey picking grapes. We sat down to a glass of bubbly and food and having shared the labours of the morning together, it struck me that there was now a considerable amount of flirty banter going on. Where did this creep up from? How did these 3 get more attractive than they were this morning? We had started as strangers, distant and polite. Now we were talking about biodynamics and how a cow horn is buried full of manure in the vineyard soil and later when it has fully fermented is dug up and poured out to fertilise the land.
I looked at the guy to my left and said with a smile .. " so are you convinced yet?" He laughed out loud, looked at me and with the biggest grin and a twinkle in his eye said "No. But you nearly convinced me." And there was the connection. The hope. The romance. The stranger who became a friend.
Nick has a quote up on the wall of his wine shed ...
'Great wine requires a mad man to grow the wine,
a wise man to watch over it,
a lucid poet to make it
and a lover to drink it ' Salvador Dali
We are the lovers in the quote. The whole concept of a vineyard is romantic and that is why we came. Nick is the madman, Alex & Dominic the wise ones and someone else, the winemaker is the lucid poet. I mean who else but a poet would distill a potent Grappa and name it after the vineyard terrier!
My little moment in the vineyard convinced me that connecting with people is the best kind of living and my lifeline from the mundane.
( Limited edition 'Atilla's bite' currently available at the vineyard wine shed. )
For more on Albury Vineyard : https://www.alburyvineyard.com/pages/our-story