Answering your question
you can’t predict drought or hail,
but you can predict disease in grapevines.
That’s why the vine grower makes use of the rose bush,
it’s more sensitive to plague,
it detects them first,
and that provides him with precious time to respond.
Explains our guide, Mónica.
A thirtysomething Amazon of tubular nipples that stand on end
when they come into contact with her embroidered shirt.
I see myself reflected in her,
we’re both survivors of the labour market.
We have both savoured fear
and that taste of deceit and sourness.
The first deposits of melancholy
that you find when getting older.
I picture her crazed by the deafening
ticking of her biological clock
practising postures in front of a full-length mirror
leading a Spartan life of creams,
workout routines and sugar-free yoghurts.
Holding on to numbers so she can feel human, useful
If God doesn´t exist, at least let shopping work.
There is no fog here, and the sun
heats the red soil more and more.
Mónica, displaying all her charm and her gift for sales,
invites us to go into the winery, a classic building made of stone and wood.
We’ve been married for seven years.
For some time now, I cheat on my wife systematically, whenever I have the chance.
I guess it hurts me to see the hate in her face, when it should be carried secretly,
like burns.
I don´t know why we are still together
My parents divorced when I turned eighteen.
My father never got over it: in his last years
he seemed one of those men sentenced to follow the trail of sadness that some women leave behind,
like ocean liners sinking their passengers with them.
I don´t know what annoys me more, these people or your walks at night.
At least, they touch each other.
To escape from ourselves, from the sinister calm of dormitory towns and the forty days of fog,
we decided to visit this winery.
Bloody fog!
After a short while, two Jehovah´s Witnesses knock on my door.
There is always fog on my birthday. Today is my birthday.
You know we don´t celebrate birthdays
But I liked it so much... I remember mum used to make a cake and eat it looking at the photo album and listening to the radio.
Uncle Julián dressed up as Buffalo Bill and my brothers as indians.
They played capturing me, tied me to a tree and shot blunt arrows.
Once they forgot to untie me for the whole night. Birthdays…
Well! The Bible says birthdays…
Where does it say so?
Where?
I get the urge to tie you to a tree and shoot real arrows at you.
Good morning! I’m Abraham.
Good morning! I’m Zacarías.
How are you? I’m Carlos
It’s my birthday
Happy birthday
Thank you
Do you know true love?
Come on in
They have sat on the edge, barely touching the back of the sofa.
They were very pale and looked serious and disciplined, one foot in madness and the other in civilization.
They have refused a cup of freshly made coffee.
Maybe the devil lies in stimulants.
And they have given me two magazines, ¡Despertad! and La Atalaya,
with a question on the cover: «Do you know true love?».
What do you say about that?
They are lying to you.
When I saw them to the door, to the white hell of fog, I confessed my skepticism about religions.
Hahaha! Your Jehovah is only an invention to prevent people from jumping out the window.
Your prayers do not get to any heaven! They just vanish!
We’re alone!
The guided visit lasts forty minutes and includes a glass of wine and a gift for every couple,
which is not bad for three euros.
Mónica explains the process of bottling and looks at her watch unconsciously
like a young blind girl who does not control her eyes yet.
Excuse me!
Of course
It’s Claudia, from the office. She can’t find the Pardo file.
What do you mean you can’t find it? In the filing cabinet, in the blue folder.
It should be there.
What do I know! Keep looking. I’ve got to go.
Claudia again?
I’m an estate agent.
I earn a living looking for advantages in houses that do not have any.
I like old buildings.
New buildings are neutral, clean, empty; no one has been born or died in them.
I prefer them loaded with the past, children’s fingerprints on the walls, loose tiles and tobacco stains.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been able to sense the energy of houses.
Some heal and some are furious, some keep secrets and others never knew happiness.
I observe skeptically the couples´ excitement when they sign the contract.
They still don’t know the cement of habit and the theory of neverending unsatisfaction;
the beauty and sadness of discovering that we are compatible with more people.
Marriage is a poorly designed cage;
freedom is a hostel sagging bed and sex without questions with a divorcée who drinks gin and Red Bull and doesn´t know your name.
- And we have come to one of the most exciting and pleasurable parts of the visit. The wine tasting.
Mónica’s tongue and breasts quiver when she utters a certain variety of German grape:
The grape, Gewürztraminer
Since I was a child, I’ve been fascinated by breasts, like a heroin addict by the lights of fairground rides.
The maceration and fermentation of the wine
Mónica tells us about acidity and tonicity. About maceration and sensations.
About the miracle of fermentation and how the wine sleeps.
While listening to her, I realise that every year that goes by provides the couple with a degree of acidity similar to that of wine.
We grow older, change and become acid.
In fact, every one of us is this substance Mónica is talking about:
an isolated, turbid wine that only wants to be treated well.
In a round, windowless room, our guide proposes an activity with some methacrylate vases.
We are going to play guessing smells. What would we be without the fun part of life?
The game consists in guessing the smell in the vases and checking our answers on a panel.
Mónica has a warm voice… and those eyes… She’s pretty,
too pretty. Beauty invites to mistrust.
In the shop, shortly before saying goodbye, Mónica shakes our hands, one by one, fixing her eyes of Siberian Husky, and invites us to have a reddish glass,
And now I invite you to raise your glasses and make a toast together. Go ahead!
Do you know the origin of toasting? Do you want to hear the story? I´ll tell you. In Ancient Greece...
She explains the origin of toasting, of how Greek hosts raised their glass,
showed it to their guests and tasted it first.
It was their way of assuring their guests that the wine was not poisoned.
Aren’t you drinking?
There. It’s not poisoned. Come on.
Are you sure?
Yes
You drink first, then.
I take a sip and savour it before I swallow.
I don’t know about wines.
Perhaps the fog we are escaping from is inside us.
On the way home we don’t speak.
There’s a reason why the songs on the radio contain so few words. We get used to everything.
The ear gets used to listening to mediocre music, the brain to small talk, the heart to manage bad love.
We protect our feelings like fruit in a greenhouse:
in cold storage units so they don´t spoil. But suddenly…
"Nobody but you
can understand me
and words are not needed
only a look
A stupid pop chorus, a sweet wrapped up in a melody, touches us more than all the tenderness in the world.
and uncover thoughts”.
Discreetly, I wipe a tear away and turn off the radio, at the very instant when we leave the sunlight and the red soil and we step into the fog, into helplessness…
You´ve killed it!
Just like you killed me.
What the hell is wrong with you?
I’m pregnant.
Are you sure?
Do you want to have it?
Yes.
Are you sure?
What names do you like?
I don´t know.
Lucas...
Mateo…
And if it’s a girl?
Marta, Lydia,
Claudia…
like your whore of a secretary!?
Don´t start again. That happened a long time ago.
Can we go?
The torrent of reproach leaves us at the door of our house, where a rosebush, planted like a tomb in the middle of the fog, withers away, diseased by us.