2009 Robert Chevillon Nuits-Saint-Georges “Les Perrieres”

“For ye are the faith and the light.” Or maybe it was, “For ye are the truth and the light.”

The words were in my mind when I opened my eyes. They were there because I’d been dreaming and the words were the last words in the dream. In the dream, I’m in an industrial space and there are people around—millennials, probably in Denver, in a brewery or maybe the backstage of a theater. There are catwalks and cement walls, loading docks and scaffolds. An event is about to occur.

A rail-thin young man with clear skin and glossy dark brown eyes asks me how I’ll be spending the rest of my time here. The question is casual, along the lines of, “Have you been to the museums?” But in the dream and later, when I’m awake, I understand what he’s really asking me is how I plan on spending the rest of my life.

I know how my response will sound. The words are already a spoken thought. I want to say the words because I want the young man to know how much I appreciate the layered depth of his question but I wait because I’m worried that, out loud, my response will sound churchy. And I want to make sure the young man knows the words aren’t mine. In my hesitation, I offer him silence, like an invisible package. I put my hands around the space in front of my stomach and extend my arms but it seems stupid to hand silence to a stranger so I say, out loud, “For ye are the faith and the light.” Or maybe it was, “For ye are the truth and the light.”

The young man looks more than a little concerned, so I explain, “That’s what our daughter does. She says that to people.”

The moment I wake up I tell myself to get out of bed and write down what I said, because if I wait I’ll forget the words. They’ll change from unconscious words into conscious words and I’ll never remember them the way I said them in the dream. Instead, I stay in bed and watch the light. It’s one of my favorite things, to lie there and watch the sunrise redecorate the room. I’ve never heard our daughter say those words. She’ll quote from the Gospels but those words aren’t in the Gospels. It’s another ten or fifteen minutes before I get up. Maybe twenty. I put on some clothes, give the dogs their biscuits, and do things around the house. The whole time, I keep asking myself, was it, “For ye are the faith and the light”? Or “For ye are the truth and the light”?

Mid-morning, I’m angry at myself for not getting out of bed right away and writing down the words but  then I give myself a break. It was unclear whether it was “faith” or “truth.” I woke up with that uncertainty. It was a feature of the dream. After I give myself that break, I sit down and do what I can to translate the dream into English.

Which brings us to the 2009 Robert Chevillon Nuits-Saint-Georges “Les Perrieres.”

In the glass, Chevillon’s 2009 Les Perrieres has all the hallmarks of a wine that promises more than it can deliver. Many of the 2009 red Burgundies have this flaw. Their depth of color is so impressive, you start celebrating before you swirl. Then you swirl, inhale, and taste, and your world comes crashing down around you. The wine peaked in high school. Its best moment was its color.

Chevillon’s 2009 Les Perrieres is the opposite of that unfortunate process. If anything, its stunning garnet color understates the balance of the wine’s bravura performance. The bouquet is a maze, a puzzle of angles and tangents. If you follow one tangent, the rest disappear. If you try to embrace them all, you get lost in the maze. The surprise is how satisfying this disorientation becomes. It’s like falling in love and trying to hit the hold button. You know you’re going to fail but the prospect of failure can’t stop you from trying.

On the palette, the 2009 Les Perrieres delivers the liquid equivalent of delayed gratification. Its color was extraordinary. Its bouquet brought you to your knees. And now this. Flavors as noble and true as the stars. Textures as complex as they are simple. Time—all the time in the world—folded into a glass of goodness.

The finish extends and resolves the 2009 Les Perrieres’s gifts by making you feel lucky. The Greeks believed you should open your best wine for strangers. Of course that’s easier said than done. The first time we tasted the 2009 Les Perrieres, we drank it with a couple we’d just met, and all I could think about was how much I wanted karma to be real. As the four of us sat there, marveling at the 2009’s finish, I felt for the first time in years that I had both fate and karma on my side.

In dreams, the barriers between the senses lose definition. Sights, sounds, aromas, flavors, and textures no longer speak for themselves. They speak for each other. What do they say? “Enjoy it while you can.” Or maybe it’s, “Enjoy it while it lasts.”

One Bottle is dedicated to the appreciation of good wines and good times, one bottle at a time. You can write to Joshua Baer at jb@onebottle.com.