How to Reboot, One Sip at a Time

June 30, 2015 / Cathy Huyghe

I am in the practice of putting wine in context.

It involves looking up and looking out, and seeing the many (many) hands that worked to bring a bottle of wine to the table.

It is what I do, and what I enjoy.

These past few weeks, however, there’s been a problem.

These past few weeks, the context of wine – the news of the world that I normally derive so much energy and inspiration from – has become a bit exhausting, a bit overwhelming, and a bit too much for me to take in.

This will pass, I’m sure.

I am away from home. I have been away from home for too long. I am untethered, disoriented, and tired.

I will be home soon. I’ll rest and reboot and return to what is almost always most compelling for me about wine.

In the meantime…

Can I come back to just the wine, in and of itself?

Can I come back to the pleasure of wine, for wine’s sake?

Just me, and the glass.

Is that enough?

At the moment I’m not sure, because most normal things aren’t normal right now.

Normally I find the news compelling. These days I am fearful of it.

Normally I rely on my body’s strength and flexibility. These days I feel betrayed by it.

Normally I can find quiet, wherever I am. These days the jitters at the edges of my mind are relentless. And noisy.

Normally I love to travel, to step into another place and another way of living.

But right now I am craving the stability rather than the whirl. I crave my own bed rather than a hotel’s even when that hotel is lovely beyond lovely. I crave home.

By now I should know how to maintain my stability while on the road. Regular exercise. Regular periods of meditation. Regular practice of writing. Upkeep of correspondence. Time dedicated to the big projects as well as the daily commitments.

There are more fractures than seams, and more gaps than fill.

I am spent.

There is one way I know that helps in a situation like this: to do the thing that is in front of me to do.

Only that.

If that thing is a glass of wine, it is only that glass of wine.

What will rejuvenate me in a time like this is, ironically, taking that narrow and focused view that is so opposite of what I normally take.