Sampling

Silence.
It’s all quiet and silent this early morning, while I walk the vineyards to sample the grapes. A silence made of wind and of the vines’ breath.

Ten steps forward, the vine on my left, I pick two berries from the cluster.
Ten steps forward, the vine on my right: two berries more. Go forward for thirty-two rows, back and forth.

I stop and listen, and taste. My fingers gluey with the sugar, feeling so close to the harvest.
Back at the winery, I gently squeeze all the berries, then analyse the juice: Babo, acidity, pH. Just for verification, ‘cause the vineyards have already told me all that I will need to know to make the wine.
The vineyards told me the story that the soil confirmed, the soil that brakes and crumbles under the Sicilian merciless sun, the same story that the ocean repeats every day with its salty breath that flirts with the grapes. 

I am alone: the grapes and myself and the wine that I want to make - that I hope I will be good enough, and sensitive enough to make. Step by step, every year further, every vintage feeling more confident about myself.

I immerse myself into that microcosm, trying to feel its energy, hoping I will be good enough to pinch from the land and from the sun and from the sea their well kept secret.  

I recorded this audio last year, while sampling.
It looks like the same story, and basically it is, in many ways. But every year, every harvest, I feel it's a completely different one.