Page 117 of Before We Say Goodbye
“I suppose so, but I feel the pressure. People know who I am up here. God knows why, but they look up to me. They’re hoping that our wines will help us all get on the map. I don’t want to screw up.”
“That’s adorable,” Bec said, “but don’t put that pressure on yourself. Keep doing what you’re doing. Have fun. These wines don’t have to be perfect. You say it all the time ... no wine is perfect. Just capture the year. I think this is a solid start of the tale of our journey to Red Mountain. I can’t wait to see where these wines go.”
Otis sniffed his own glass and noted the bright and dark cherry notes evident in all the reds so far. “It’s a special place, isn’t it? Unique. I don’t quite have her figured out, but you’re right—it’s fun trying. I can see the potential on the horizon, perhaps only a few vintages away.”
“Isn’t that nice, that your life is about the challenge of a new vintage, about learning and growing and seeing what comes. You know what I look forward to? Opening up this tasting room. I want to be behind this bar and welcome people, pour our wines.”
“I suppose it will be nice to finally have something to pour into the eager mouths of the public. We could open next summer, if the wines are ready.”
“Might need to figure out our label design then. Have you thought about it?”
Otis dipped his chin. She was making a joke. He’d thought about it endlessly.
“Simplicity is what I want. Red Mountain in big letters. Till Vineyards under it.”
Otis and Bec shared a smile. How fun to be doing this again, but on their own terms. No investors, no money worries, hypothetically nothing to prove.
As planned, Rebecca opened the tasting room that next summer, and she took on her new role with bright joy. They hoped to one dayeliminate their distribution network and sell every case on property. What a dream, but it would take a few years.
In the meantime, they’d have to rebuild a distribution network. Sadly, the distributors they’d used for Lost Souls and Heartache showed little interest. Otis had anticipated an uphill battle to push unknown terroir, but the more he heard and learned, the more he realized he’d underestimated the challenge.
He could see why, though. Forget promoting Red Mountain, which would eventually be paramount. He had to first convince people to give Washington State a try. Most people didn’t even know that this state made wine. The winegrowers and makers needed to get out there and spread the word and preach the gospel. They needed to hit trade shows and present at general sales meetings and drag bottles around to every retailer and restaurant and wine bar in the country—and the world. But very few had any interest in doing that.
California had such a big head start. Oregon too. What Otis saw on the mountain was a lack of vision. Many winemakers didn’t care whether or not Balthazar in Manhattan poured Washington wines, or whether, God forbid, Bedwetter wrote about them. As point of fact, Bedwetter had never written a word about Washington State. He’d certainly gone on and on about such wineries as Archery Summit and Domaine Drouhin and the like in the Willamette Valley—all their glorious pinot noirs stealing any potential Washington attention. Not that Otis wanted Bedwetter to write about his new venture, but he wanted him to recognize his new state.
With regards to Red Mountain, Otis saw many more problems. Arguments about water rights. Disagreements over insecticides and pesticides. Tension over whether they should pave Sunset Road and who should pay for it. Basin Disposal had stopped picking up trash from wineries on Sunset Road because the gravel was destroying their new trash trucks. That meant that each winery had to carry their trash out on a daily basis. How could Red Mountain take over the wine world when they couldn’t even agree on paving their main thoroughfare? Otis’s votewent to paving. He saw a region where the same enthusiasts who visited Napa would fly up and spend a day tasting the stunning wines of a new frontier. He saw a place where everyone even used the same branding. He wanted Red Mountain to be recognized as an American Viticultural Area, and have its own logo, its own glass, its own trade shows.
Don’t get him started on the food. By gods, Rebecca hated it when he brought this up in public, but the people around there, their idea of a night out on the town was to go to the Cheesecake Factory. Or Applebee’s. For God’s sake, one winemaker mentioned his love affair with TGI Fridays, and Otis’s heart had hurt for a week, thinking that a proper fine-dining restaurant in the Tri-Cities area might be decades away.
For now, when he took Rebecca out on a date, they’d have a piece of previously frozen flounder with I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter! mashed potatoes and canned green beans ordered off a menu with over one trillion options, paired with a glass of flabby Sutter Home chardonnay marred with more oak in it than the entirety of the Cascades.
Ah, oak. The French talk about a kiss of oak, the slightest bit to round out the edges of a wine. Americans overdid it—to put it lightly. Forget a kiss, some of those American chardonnays had endured a properfuckof oak, slathered in an overabundance of oak’s secretions like an overly seasoned dish prepared by an amateur chef. To make it even worse, these wines weren’t even aged in oak barrels. The winemaker would shake large bags of flavored oak chips into the tanks, letting them impart their aromas before yet another filtering. They might as well be making Doritos! It was enough to send a man like Otis to his knees.
The highest hopes at the moment were that the new Asian chain called P.F. Chang’s might grace the Tri-Cities with its presence.
Let it be said, though, that Rebecca didn’t share such distaste for the chains of the Tri-Cities. First of all, she was delighted when Otis took her anywhere, as there had been a time when he’d gone months without taking her on a date or bringing her flowers or even taking her on a stroll hand in hand. More to the point, she adored the CheesecakeFactory and would run her finger along the four-thousand-page menu with delight. She had no qualms about Applebee’s or TGI Fridays either. In fact, she looked forward to the potential arrival of P.F. Chang’s.
Otis took it as a reminder that no one, not even Rebecca, was perfect. He’d tell her that, too, as she moaned with delight over a salad she’d put together from the buffet.
“You make everything a war of principle, Otis,” she’d respond. “For once, let go and enjoy a few bites. The food’s delicious.”
He’d pinch the bridge of his nose, take a last look at the bland rice pilaf and the overcooked popcorn shrimp on his plate, and mumble a quick prayer.
She’d always get the last word with one of her favorite subtle, passive-aggressive jabs—one that she must have picked up from a psychotherapist over the years. In the Southern states, they might have patted your thigh and offered, “Bless your heart.” Rebecca would say, “It must be hard to be in your skin sometimes.”
“Well, it is, thank you for noticing.”
The wines from Till Vineyards were bloody there, though. Nineteen ninety-seven was far cooler, a fine vintage from the start. Budbreak had been on time; the mild temperatures had allowed for even ripening. The young vines yielded nearly twice what they had the year before, and the resulting wines inched one step closer to bringing Otis the pleasure he desired.
“We’re not there yet,” he told Mike over the phone one day in early winter, “but we’re getting closer. Zeroing in on the right picking date. Figuring out canopy management. I think we might even drop a little fruit. Some of the blocks yieldedsixtons an acre. Can you believe that? I’d be happier with four.”
“How about Vance? Did he come back?”
“Barely saw him. He has a team that manages irrigation—horribly, if you’re wondering—and then they picked their cherries in August, but no complaints. I think he got the message. You mess with Otis Till, youget the horns.” Otis winked at Rebecca as she prepared a fresh bouquet of flowers for the kitchen table.
“That’s great, Dad. Seems like you’re really happy with the move.”
“It was your idea, my boy, and a great one. It truly was a phenomenal year, and I’m happy things are going well for you too. A Seattle lifer, you say?”
