As most of you know Keith is an accomplished sommelier who knows more about wine, the wine industry, and grape varietals than most mortals could ever learn in a lifetime. He has a gift for identifying wines and describing them to perfection. I’ve seen this constantly over the years any time we’d visit a winery or do a tasting somewhere. The vintners and the tasting room attendants would just melt when he ‘got’ their wine and what it was about. At restaurants too, the sommelier would suggest a wine and Keith would respond with query or comment and suddenly it’s like they’re old friends and best buddies, and they go off on a convoluted wine conversation, when all I want to do is order dinner. By now he also knows everyone in the restaurant industry connected with wine in at least two or three cities.
You’d think this would be enough. I mean he can literally dine out on his credentials and the respect he garners. Just check out his instagram. But no – he wanted more. He wanted to be an ADVANCED sommelier. Now, there’s only about 2,500 of these rarified creatures in the entire world. It’s a career stepping-stone for those in the wine world who want to be on the top of the pile in the best of the best restaurants around the world. If he were a youn’un looking to advance his career, it’d seem like a worthy goal. But as an old’un looking at retiring in a few years, why would he consider such a grueling life-consuming multi-year process?
When he sat me down in 2019 and told me that he wanted to do this – or at least try – I was a bit wary. I mean I knew about the grueling study involved. Marriages had collapsed in the process. He said, “It’s going to demand a lot from me, but also a lot from you as well. It’s a major commitment in terms of time, money, and mental resources. Are you up for it? Because I can’t do it without you.” Well, when he put it like that, how could I say no? Plus knowing how well he knows his stuff, I thought it’d be a total cakewalk for him. I’d just have to read him a few flash card quizzes and maybe pour a bottle or two and have him guess what it was. He’d be fine. I was naïve.
First you have to be a certified sommelier. No problem, he’s been that for years. Then, you have to pass a ‘qualifying’ exam to determine if you’re even fit to take the ‘real’ exam. He aced it at the first go. Then, you have to study harder than you ever did for any course in your life (and I’m talking defending your PhD thesis, medical boards, etc) for the first component of a triple exam. This “theory” portion is the stumbling block for most examinees. They use this to weed out people and narrow the candidate field (and charge them lots of money in the process). Studying for it involves whole data centers worth of wine minutae – down to the botanical genealogies of various grape varieties, arcane French wine-making rules from 1850, micro climates in South Africa, marketing boards for wine in Spain, the bureaucratic reasoning for the wine districts in Chile, and the paleo-geology of the Rhine river valley. It is absolutely absurd the amount of tangential crap you need to know to pass this test. So most people fail. Keith aced this the first time as well.
The second part is blind tasting. Keith is really, really good at this also. It’s a little party trick he can perform. You give him a glass of wine and he tells you what it is, where it’s from, what year, and what peasant girl stomped the grapes. It’s pretty amazing. Still, at this rarified level you have six wines to identify (3 reds, 3 whites). Here he didn’t ace it, but he squeaked out a pass.
The third portion is ‘mock service.’ This is where four master sommeliers (only 290 of these in the world, btw) pretend to be very demanding, rude, and know-it-all restaurant customers with the goal of flustering you while you try to pour champagne the right way and answer all their questions correctly, and generally provide them with a world class wine experience. This is a piece of cake for most candidates. I mean, they do this every day in their fancy high-end restaurants. So if you get to this stage, you’re pretty much a shoe-in. Not Keith. He choked. As he tried to explain to me, “I was like a deer caught in the headlights! I couldn’t answer any their questions, my hands were shaking, and I couldn’t think straight!” He failed. Utterly crushed, he flew home and was very subdued for days. I was dumb-founded. How could Keith, the biggest ham in the world, the former rock star used to performing for crowds, the life of the party, have stage fright? It didn’t compute.
After he licked is wounds, he hesitantly asked me if I were game for him to try again? Part of me really wanted to say, “no, you’ve had your chance, let’s move on.” I mean, I could see how much it had taken out of him. Hell, it had taken a lot out me too. We’d become social hermits for a year of endless flash card sessions, pouring six glasses of wine nearly nightly for him to test, and countless bottles of sparkling wine wasted so he could practice his champagne service, and then pretending to be a difficult to please restaurant patron (that last part was the easy one for me). Was I willing to do the whole process over again for another year? Of course! How could I not?
Unfortunately COVID intervened so the exams were postponed for 18 months. This didn’t stop Keith from studying. Right while we were building a house, right during the busiest years of my real estate career. Study, study, study. In 2023 he sat for the exam again. This time however, his flight was cancelled and his luggage was lost. When he finally got to Phoenix he didn’t have his sommelier suit, nor did he have his special solution or holders for his scalaric contact lenses. So, blind as a bat and in someone else’s ill-fitting suit, he failed the service portion again (but just barely!).
Afterwards were the same tears of frustration, the same depression, and a disinclination to try again. He had come so close, yet he felt a failure. We couldn’t tell any of our friends, but all the wine and restaurant industry people knew. They’d been there supporting him at the various tasting groups and study sessions over the past years and he felt very much like he’d let them all down.
Still after moping for a few months, he timidly asked me if he could try again. “I promise, this will be the last time. I’m too old and we’re missing out on too much of life as it is. But this means a great deal to me.” Again, how could I say no? Wine is his calling card. His talent in this regard sets him apart and gives him entrée to places and people that he’d never otherwise have. As he constantly reminds me, he doesn’t have the fancy degrees that our friends have, and he works a blue collar job. So if he needed some distinction to feel he could hold his own, this achievement would provide that in spades.
So in 2024 we did it all over again. Constantly declining invitations from friends and staying home and studying became our routine. Endless bottles of blind tasting wines (24 ‘on tap’ at all times – 12 reds and 12 whites). And mock restaurant scenarios with champagne service (thanks John K, Eric and Tiffanny, and Nick and Nessa for being such willing and dependably difficult restaurant customers).
So off to Phoenix he went for the third time this July. I anxiously awaited the phone call with the results. I had a huge sinking feeling in my stomach when I answered and heard him sobbing on the line again. This time however, it turned out to be tears of joy. It took him a moment to choke it out, but he’d passed!
The huge relief of Keith’s achievement took us both a week or two to process. I’m so proud of him I could just pop! The stress of the past five years is now completely gone. Keith’s got his mojo again and it’s so gratifying to see.
I’m hoping that we can get our (social) lives back and start enjoying our friends and family instead of being recluses. We’ll see! But don’t worry, his lofty new title hasn’t changed him. He’s still the same ol’ loveable Keith. He’s now just extra special.