|
"Unbelievable" is the first word that comes to mind when describing this evening's memorial service for Deb Whiting at Red Newt Cellars & Bistro, where she was the chef and her husband Dave is the winemaker. But "bittersweet, emotional, inspirational, healing, and reaffirming" are not far behind as descriptors.
Expecting a large crowd from the local wine community, I left home early, only to be trapped in bumper-to-bumper traffic along the normally vacant Route 414 near Hector. Police, fire department, ambulance crews, and other volunteers were all out in force helping people find parking. A very long line of people, exchanging hugs and tears, waited patiently to get into the winery. And I was there early!
The wine community, not surprisingly, was all over, with many winemakers pouring their competitors' wines with pride. But they were probably just one-tenth of the well-wishers, the others being local farmers, food processors, distributors and "competing" local chefs who gladly accepted and displayed the hundreds of dishes to pass from people who, like me, could never cook like Deb but offered their foods from the heart.
There was enough food to feed an army, and its enemy, which Deb&Dave undoubtedly would have wanted out of fairness and compassion. And many, from near and far, were people who had simply dined at Red Newt, met Dave&Deb, and never forgot the experience.
Red Newt is not a big place--a modest tasting room, the equally modest bistro, and a deck overlooking vineyards and the lake--but it somehow expanded to accommodate at least a thousand people sipping wine, enjoying heatfelt homemade foods, hugging, crying, and laughing on a perfect summer evening.
In the bistro, Dave graciously accepted a thousand hugs despite broken ribs, along with friends' tiers wetting the shoulders of his shirt, looking into the black eye behind his glasses. At 8 pm, sparkling wine was poured, he jumped up on the bar, and proposed a toast to Deb -- daughter, aunt, mother, wife, friend, chef, business partner, and lover -- and the tearful, joyous crowd responded with a toast to Deb, Dave and Red Newt.
This was a classic wine country celebration. We grieve for the loss of our friend, but toast to the joy she gave us. We may disagree on some things, as families do, but never on our love for our own. We know that a precious life has been lost, but that Deb's life will go on in all who knew her.
After my visit last Friday when the Bistro was closed for our local gathering, it opened again on Saturday and several wine country colleagues went to show their support and dine. All the foods were prepared by Deb's staff, based on Dave's instructions to keep the business open. Those who went said the food was terrific, and that "Deb would be proud."
At Red Newt, you don't eat a meal. You experience an inspiration. The ingredients are pride in local products, patience for seasonal ingredients, the respect to let fresh express its natural exuberance without interference, and the harmonious pairing of food and wine. And the final recipe is always far greater than the sum of its parts.
Deb knew all this intuitively, and practiced it daily. She has inspired so many others that the Finger Lakes will never be the same. Just better, forever.
In that sense, the most reaffirming, and healing, legacy from tonight is realizing that Deb's passing is not the end, or even the beginning of the end.
It is just the end of the beginning.
Jim Trezise
|
