Erica Landis writes this emotive entry to our 2024 wine writing competition about a moving interaction she had with a customer while working in a wine shop. See our competition guide for more fantastic wine writing.
Erica Landis writes Erica Landis started her writing career in Mrs. Kelly's second-grade class with a tear-jerking essay about a No. 2 pencil. In eighth grade, she went on to write herself and her friends into a 1980's General Hospital storyline. The notebook pages were passed around the lunch table like wildfire. She knew then that she was a writer.
Erica is an experienced content writer in health, parenting, grief & loss, entertainment, travel, humor, biography, and food & wine. She was a 2023 Fellow of The Meadowood Napa Wine Writing Symposium. She is also writing a book about putting her life back together while working in a wine shop after the death of her young son in an accident.
Can You Help Me?
“I need wine. We are having people - lots of people. I’ll need wine. I need some Cabernet. Can you help me with that?”
This was not an uncommon request on any given day. I spent my shifts arranging stacks and shelves, helping fine wine and 50ml shoppers alike, in a suburban wine shop outside New York City. There were cranky and confused customers. There were customers who asked my male coworkers the same question they had just asked me.
There were overwhelmed and over-budget customers. There were the customers looking for reassurance. And a breather. Let’s just chat by Pinot Noir for a minute. We’ll joke about hiding in the kitchen with this $40 silky treat of a bottle while guests drink the perfectly fine boxed wine from deceptive decanters in the living room. It’s ok, really. I’m giving you permission.
Amongst the mothers shopping with kids in tow, exhausted and multitasking to the nth degree, I’ll tell you about how this California Grenache was the only thing that helped with my cramps last week. Like biting into a plum - fleshy and rich. Trust me on this, I will say as we share the ages of our kids and how hard motherhood can be. I am exactly like you - I’m just wearing a nametag.
Daily human stories came and went through those wine shop doors. We shared them in our employee chitchat, discussing what they bought and how often they bought it. I’d often joke with my regulars that I am paid not to judge.
It was a busy Saturday afternoon. A woman in her sixties approached as I straightened the lay down racks, aligning labels for easy perusing. She had beautiful tawny skin and was elegantly dressed. With thin gold bracelets on her delicate wrists and sad eyes that looked like they had been crying.
“I need wine. We are having people - lots of people. I’ll need wine. I need some Cabernet. Can you help me with that?” she asked, with a slight English accent.
“Of course, I can. C’mon let’s go,” and we set off towards the shelves, walking side by side, shoulders almost brushing.
“My mother died yesterday.”
She said it in monotone as we were walking towards the reds. As if it just needed to come out. As if she needed me to be gentle and helpful because she was just slightly out of her mind currently with grief.
She told me about her son. He is a social worker. She told me about a brewery she visited with him in Montana where he’s working. She’s enormously proud of him. The brewery specialized in Oatmeal Stout, and she loved it but she’s not a beer drinker. She should buy some for her son. He’s on his way now from Montana. He decided to drive. He should have flown. Do I think she should buy Oatmeal Stout? And her mother was suffering so much - so it’s for the better.
I listened intently to her rambling scattered sentences while showing her Rhone Valley Syrah and English Oatmeal Stouts. Switching back and forth between wine and beer in the throes of her grief. I led her from row to row, section to section of the store. It was a dance. And I was honored to be dancing with her at this pivotal moment in her life.
As I placed bottles into her cart, careful not to jar her with the noise of the glass hitting metal, a memory of my own was triggered:
It was close to closing time at Lord & Taylor and I needed pantyhose. It was the night before my mother’s funeral. All of mine had runs. My mother would have insisted I wear pantyhose with the pretty black dress I had already bought a week before she died in preparation. I knew she would be gone soon. I knew she wasn’t waking up from her stroke. I just knew, as a daughter does.
I hadn’t worn panty hose in years. I remember being overwhelmed by the size charts and textures and spandex/Lycra/nylon combinations.
“Can someone help me with pantyhose? I need some for my mother’s funeral tomorrow. I’m a little confused. Can someone help me!?” I said loudly in the middle of the lingerie department. And just like that, three ladies rushed to help me at the pantyhose rack, with tears of empathy and the knowledge of pantyhose. I can still see their faces in my mind fourteen years later.
To the customers who needed some extra help with fancy wine to hide in the kitchen… I’m glad I could help. To the customers who needed bottles to give as gifts to people they don’t really like…it was my pleasure.
But will this woman, made even more beautiful by the vulnerability of grief, remember me years from now just like I remember the pantyhose ladies? Will she remember the task of choosing wine for her mother’s mourners and see my face?
I’m so very sorry about your mother is all I said as I showed her towards the cash register, hoping my kindness helped even just for a little bit in this overwhelming sea of wine.
The illustration is the author's own.