After drinking our portions of a second 1995 Margaux, rated 100 by Winespectator and 95 by Parker, Lynn and I are still discussing and trying to understand what a First Growth means. Cognoscente since the 1700s have agreed that Margaux, Margo, or whatever it has been called since its beginning, is among the best of the best. So why do we like 2003 Cantemerle more? I guess our sense of style is not the same as the experts. We like a little more funk, more earth, more imperfection, etc., than what the perfect and near perfect wines afford. This wine’s nose tells me it is a First Growth – it has that kind of class. The finish is very long, as well. The midpalate however lacks richness of mouthfeel, and it does not have the concentration of beautiful, classy Cabernet Sauvignon that I would need to rate a wine best of the best for me. What it has is perfect, but it is reticent, almost a little too dry. There is a hint of tea, bespeaking that it is possibly not a 40-year wine or too young to fully appreciate. And I wonder if since we are not perfect we cannot fully appreciate perfect wine.
The perfect alignment for both Lynn and me last night was, as is often the case for me, our waitress, Noel. When I extol the magnificence of my waitress on this forum, I have many detractors, I know. They think I am an a-hole to do it. Rogov says he doesn’t even want to know his waitress’ name. Just serve me, please; thank you.
Noel, noel, the woman would be near perfection for me, if I related better to the term. She would be a 98 out of 100. I would never in a million years express what might make her 100, - how pompous, how arrogant of a human being to say he knows what makes something of value, whether a wine or a woman, perfect. The Angels would say and the thing would shoot straight up to God’s right hand if it were perfect.
Noel is out of a four-star movie set in yore, like Remains of the Day, or something like that. She belongs from another time when some people had infinite class. She looks Anglaise. She is classier looking than most of the patrons: where she has lived, what she has experienced, what she knows, her grace, how she stands, so erect, her face, and hair, her figure. No details, I am going to stop that. She is there rather than somewhere else because of the complementary magnificence of the restaurant's owners: they know class, in their cooks and in their staff, so that the best want to be there, to be appreciated and to be demanded to be their best.
Noel knows that I appreciate her, like her. I communicate that, with my appreciative eye contact, offering her a glass of my First Growth, allowing her to approve the wine, by just smelling the cork, like I do. She knows wine. I try to make her evening as good as mine. She met us at the door, standing in the hostess’s spot, she knew we were coming. She told us how happy she was to see us again, and insisted she take our coats at the door, explaining that she would like to because she had nothing to do at that moment. She was at another table when we finally left. I heard her call from the cold winter’s night, as we neared the intersecting street where our car was parked. She had to amplify her voice almost to a shrill for me to hear it over the din of Main Street. Standing on the cold steps, she called out: “Good-bye, Lynn and Covert, it was great to see you!”