Taking solace in, well, something.

In Sideways, it's clear what Miles does to get through the day-to-day slog. His appreciation of fine wine provides a pleasure that allows him a momentary distance from whatever crap each day shovels at him. The most telling example of this comes late in the film when he drinks his '61 Cheval Blanc. He has just acted as best man at Jack's wedding, where he saw his ex-wife and her new husband. There are a lot of people around after the ceremony, but viewers get the idea that Miles doesn't know most of them and isn't quite in the mood to socialize given what he's been through over the past week. So he goes to this diner, where we see him eating a burger with onion rings and drinking from a styrofoam cup, the formal nature of his tux contrasting the crummy booth's cheap upholstery. He has the bottle of '61 Cheval Blanc on the seat of the booth next to him, and he pours its contents into his styrofoam cup serving by serving when no one's looking. The uncrowded diner with only a few people ordering at the counter and a man and a woman each eating alone on the other side of the room creates the perfect aesthetic environment for the emotional goals of the scene. As Miles drinks from the wine after a bite of his burger, we see in his face and hear in his slight moan that the '61 Cheval Blanc lives up to the weighty expectations surrounding it. This moment gives us the delicate balance between the sadness of being alone while experiencing such an extraordinary pleasure and the exquisite, comforting nature of the same pleasure.

Of course, I'm sure we can all relate to such a thing. In my case, for instance, it's not uncommon for me to stop after a particularly thoughtless, sloppy, and unintelligent student essay I've graded at my dining room table. I'll get up at such a moment, sometimes near tears at the hopeless states of education and intelligence in this country. I'll walk over to my bookshelf and pick up my thick volume of Robert Creeley's early poems. The weight of the book is comforting in and of itself, suggesting as it does the quantity of wonderfully crafted poetry inside. Creeley's hyper-intelligence as a poet, his ability to create hope from ambiguity, and the elegant grace with which he deals with the concepts central to his poems never fail to make me feel something similar to what I imagine Miles to be feeling as he drinks his '61 Cheval Blanc.

I wonder if there's something more to the solitary nature of the two aforementioned pleasures. Is there a sad comfort in being among the small population of those who can appreciate the most exquisitely constructed poetry or the most delicately subtle wines? The sadness of solitude, such as it is, might be countered by the pleasures afforded through these sorts of things. Or maybe not. Maybe these things are just pretentious and sad unless we can find others with whom to share them. Who can say?