i'd rather be at marterella winery | virginia

I told them it looked like a country club when we pulled up. Zander asked if I'd ever seen a country club, and Matt asked me, too, and Ryan, well, I think he'd gone off to have a smoke, but he probably would have concurred with the others. "Because," Matt finished for Zander. "This looks nothing like a country club."

I tried to keep explaining what I meant, in that rambling way I do sometimes - when I have a point and it's buried somewhere, but I can't find the words to spit it on out. For a writer, it's a real problem to have. I said that it was the manicured lawns that made me think that, and didn't they agree? Had they ever seen a lawn so well-manicured that wasn't at a country club?

They looked at each other and back at me and shrugged and left me standing in the vines, lost in my thoughts. The sun was doing that thing where it shined so bright it put a haze on every picture, and I kept taking them anyway because it's one of my favorite filters. And I thought more about this country club conundrum.

I thought of my lawn at 465 Freestone Drive, my childhood house, the home I had from years 6-21, the address that I put as "permanent" when my school address and internship addresses were nothing but fleeting. That lawn was always messy, and it was always a toss-up who would mow it, about two weeks after it first needed to be mowed. My mom on the riding lawn mower, her big, thick, curly hair going everywhere and a smile that is bigger than everything in life playing on her face - it's so funny that she fought mowing because I think she lived for the power of that motor under her control. My brother with a standing mower when the riding one broke down, headphones in his ears, and hair longer than the trendiest cut. And when the headphones weren't in, his best friend Andy sometimes walked along beside him, and they had conversations over the sound of the mower, and I don't know how they did that, but they circled the yard like that, talking the lawn into neat rows, sweat dripping from their foreheads to the blades below them, growing them again.

I've always liked things a little messy and a little un-put together. I used to ask my mom when she would worry and get anxious over new people or family coming over to 465 for dinner, "Why does it need to be clean? This looks like it's lived in. Isn't that better?"

I laughed myself out of my thoughts - and have you ever done that, think so hard and get lost so hard in another place and another date, and you laugh like you're back there in that moment, and then you're in the present, standing in a row of vines in front of a well-manicured lawn laughing? I must have looked crazy, but I didn't bother to see who noticed.

I walked into the tasting room, where the guys had glasses and a fourth was sitting for me. An '80s punk rocker congenially welcomed me and asked all our names, and she became our friend for a half hour. Her outfit was a Halloween costume, and the rest of the staff was dressed up, too. The owner came by and personally said hello. And the winery there at Marterella is situated on well-manicured grounds, but it's in an old house with live music played just a little too loud and tastings are poured from a functioning kitchen not unlike the one at 465, and it's small and personable and produces a modest number of cases of wonderful reds, and it feels lived in and homey, and that is better than perfectly put-together.

We sat outside with cheese and sausage and big glasses of Merlot in that hazy bright sunshine, and a golden retriever fetched us a ball. Later, the guys jokingly asked if I wanted to see pictures of a real country club.

I never live these things down.

if you go...

Marterella Winery

off rt 15 (from 66) in Warrenton, after Manasses and before Sperryville

red & white tasting flight: $15

my wine picks: Sangiovese, Merlot