Click here for the pdf-formatted version

Bye-bye 2024

Book of Bertil. 33

Cabinets of Curiosities are glass cabinets, or sometimes furniture, where "rare, new, singular things" are stored and displayed. To use Littré’s definition: There is a heterogeneous mix that includes Naturalia, Artificialia, Scientifica, and Exotica. One of their functions was to help people discover the world, including the distant world (in time and space), to better understand it, or to confirm the beliefs of the time.

Preamble:

By tradition or conviction, every year I share my predictions of what I believe, hope, and wish the next year would be. To do this, I return to my Cabinet of Curiosities to project myself into a retrospective reflection on the distant and present world (in time and space) of our humanity. In this last newsletter, "Bye Bye 2024", I take the liberty of sharing with you my thoughts, sometimes fair, strange, esoteric, disturbing, provocative, but always honestly delivered.

Verse 33.1.01:

Naturalia

In my Cabinet of Curiosities, I have an ancient sketch of our round Earth drawn by Aristotle (384 - 322 BC), but I also have a copy of Galileo's (1564 - 1642 AD) condemnation by The Inquisition in 1615 for having defended his theory of heliocentrism, and thus scientifically proving that the earth was not flat. This makes me think about the meaning of the term democracy that appeared during ancient Greece, but which lasted during the Roman civilization, this "Democracy" which gave the right to all (the people) to have opinions and to debate them publicly, has declined in a deep forgetfulness of its original meaning. The ninth principle of modern democracy (20th century) is the principle of tolerance, which implies that all opinions and beliefs must be respected, even if they are different from our own. Because tolerance is essential to guarantee a peaceful and respectful society. However, it seems to me that the 2000s were the cornerstone of a new democracy that can be called "social autocracy", a democracy that promotes the exclusion of the ordinary, of the non-different. A nuclear society, divided into groups, no longer religious or political, but included or excluded according to their differences. Thus, if the wines of yesterday unified the differences in the (non-religious) communion of sharing, today this same wine disunifies by segmentation, and condemns the ordinary not by its quality and honesty, but by its non-political status... Natural Wine, LGBTQ Wine, Pro Wine Label, Woman Winemaker Wine, African American Winemaker Wine, Pro Wine Something, etc. So, I would like 2025 to be the start of a global belief in free choice and tolerance in a democratic reunification of wine in its primary sense, i.e. to be a wine of tolerance, a democratic wine. To do this, reread Newsletter #8 "Sommelier" and #10 "Wine list".

Verse 33.1.02:

Artificialia

In my Cabinet of Curiosities, I also have an epaulette of Brigadier General Ralph Wise Zwicker's jacket. This innocuous object links me to the memory of conspiracy theories in history and, in particular, that of McCarthyism and McCarthy who declared without tangible proof on February 9, 1950, a speech on the "enemies within". If we know how destructive these theories can be in a democratic society, the same is true for the manipulation of cork producers against progress by making consumers believe that a Stelvin cork is only used for the sale of poor-quality wine at a cheap price. These conspiracy statements provoke resistance not from the consumer, but from the producers who promote the cork by exposing them. To do this, reread the Newsletter #13 "Supreme Cork Ruling: TCA v. Stelvin" and the blog "Naked bottles are in fashion". I predict as Australia and New Zealand do the abolition of the cork or plastic stopper within the next 6 years, and this to put an end to this despotized conspiracy that destroys the environment and therefore humanity with chemical fires.

Verse 33.1.03:

Scientific

But in my cabinet, I also have a collection of old pendulums. I like to animate them and let them go from left to right before seeing them stabilize in their center at the point of inertia, regardless of the length and duration of the movement. Which makes me say that the adage "What is old is new, and what is new is only old reinvented". Thus, the new trend of stoneware amphorae for winemaking is a return of a product from the time of ancient Rome; That the concrete vats so much in vogue today date from the beginnings of the industrial revolution; That the ovoid shape of these vats dates from the birth of the first hen on earth; That orange wines are more than 3000 years old; that biodynamics is 100 years old this year; whether Natural Wine dates from 1909 or for others from the 80s; that organic farming dates back to well before the 18th century; that regenerative agriculture dates back to the early 70s; that the blended wine has existed since the creation of the  wine bottle in 1632; that the wine label has always been a marketing tool; that wines of carbonic processes  and therefore chillable date from the 50s. But that the wooden barrels have only been used to educate and refine the wine since the 19th century. So, what is this new trend of the pendulum's return in the coming years? My prediction after questioning my psychic pendulum, is that wine without tricks, without gimmicks, without BS, will return. Classic and honest wines, simple but delicious, wines from real passionate winemakers will be "the new of the old" of tomorrow.

Verse 33.1.04:

Exotica

This part of my cabinet is filled with small, heterogeneous, unique and very patriotic objects. Including a grossular garnet stone from the Eastern Pyrenees to remind me where I come from, a red wooden clog to remember that my close ancestors immigrated from Sweden, a badge of arms of two leopards to remind me that my great-great Uncle Normand in 1905 pleaded as a lawyer for the civil party for the separation of the state and the church and the establishment of a French secular state. My father's Hippocratic oath to never forget the ethic of serving humanity, a fleur-de-lis to unite my beloved Quebec with my wife's American origins, a red bamboo chair from the Chinese province where our daughter comes from, to remind me that difference makes the unity of a family,  and finally a fifty-star flag so that I never forget that I am an emigrant who has been welcomed and therefore I am an American citizen by choice. It is therefore difficult for me to deny my, our origins, and that the whole of this country is an active volcano of cultures and knowledge from all over the world, in a limitless modernity. It is therefore impossible for me to conceive that our wines are not the extraordinary result of this emanation. But also, that you must first know where you come from to fully appreciate who you are. So, I predict that America will rediscover the extraordinary quality of its wines and winemakers, and that American consumers will become very patriotic and proud of the value of their assets. So, in 2025 be the tipping point of a spectacular new movement "Be kind again” by drinking American first.

Ultimo

Before closing the door of my Cabinet of Curiosities, I want wishing you a good, happy and a year filled with compassion and respect in difference and in democracy “and don’t forget to “Cheers” at midnight and to be kind.

Addendum

And you, what do you have in your Cabinets of curiosities?