A Wine Collection With a Story in Every Bottle
her pain. About six years ago, she developed diabetes. In 1996, she finally gave up wine, the last alcohol she reluctantly released.
"I abused the privilege," she said frankly. "I forgot everything I taught you - about smell, taste and texture. I just drank it, and before I knew it, two empty wine bottles were sitting on the counter.
"When I lost the ability to tell if I was drinking a Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel or a Syrah, and didn't really care, I knew it was time to give it up."
Liddy sold her business last year when she remarried - ironically to another Vietnam vet. Liddy found him a job. Her new husband, Randy, doesn't drink, which furthered my belief that I would inherit the wine cellar.
Although the wines gather dust in her basement, Liddy is under no time constraint to part with the collection. She and her husband plan a trip soon to Vietnam to ease some old wounds and allow Liddy the opportunity to see where life was altered for the two men she loved.
I suspect there will come a day when she will release her cellar, a case at a time, with a story and a memory. When I think of the times she and Jerry spent in their cellar, I can only hope that she spends some of that time, and those stories, with me. The wine becomes secondary.
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