I turn 30 in
a month, which is apparently supposed to be some sort of terrible milestone for
women (at least that's how it seems to be whenever I’ve heard others talk about their
30th birthday). I’m sure some people will find the fact that I’m unmarried
and childless after three decades on this earth to be something I should be
pitied for, but I honestly don’t care what those people think. I’m more worried
about what my younger self would think about the path that I (we) have taken.
When I was in
elementary school, second grade I think, a teacher had us write a letter to our
future selves and seal it inside a hollow walnut that was supposed to be opened
when we were 30. Since I’ve never been a patient person, I opened that sucker
up when I found it several years ago tucked away with other random grade school stuff my mother refuses to throw away . The only part of the letter I remember now was
the hope that I’d have purple hair, and since I’d been in the habit of dying my
hair burgundy by then, that was the only prediction that had come true (yes, burgundy
counts as purple as far as Adult me is concerned). It was honestly kind of
depressing to read because at that time I was in my early 20s, had moved back
in with my parents and worked at an incredibly soul-crushing job. I couldn’t
help but think that my eight-year-old self would be ridiculously disappointed
in us. I suspect I would feel the same sort of guilt if I’d waited to open it
until now though. There’s no way the little girl who wrote that note could’ve
predicted the sort of unfortunate choices she’d make in life or that the world
would be the way it is now and how much all of that would affect her hopes and dreams
for the future.*
I did get better
with age (thank god) and so did the bottle of 1990 Michel & Marc Rossignol Volnay 1er Cru Les
Pitures we opened recently:
This wine is 100% Pinot Noir from Volnay which is located in the Côte de Beaune (a sub-region of Burgundy). Domaine Rossignol has been in the same family since the 16th century and are known to produce wines that age very well. We’d been hanging on to that bottle
for over a year now, waiting for the right time before deciding it was now or
never. It was light-bodied, delicately perfumed and a bit jammy with notes of red fruit,
pepper and violets. Unfortunately, it seems we had hung on to it for a bit too
long since after the first glass it proceeded to break down slightly. Still, it
was a delicious wine and I doubt my younger self would have been disappointed to
know she’d be drinking such “fancy” wine at 29. It really is the little things
in life sometimes…
*Though even at 8 years old I was already on the path to becoming the very cynical, sarcastic person I am now, so its not like my hopes and dreams were all that grandiose. At least I'm pretty sure I'd given up on my Doctor Ballerina aspirations by that point...
