Be careful of what you wish for!

by Mark Deamer

So what's the verdict Doc? I have put this question to my G.P. once before. "Well if you continue to play contact sports you will probably need walking sticks by the age of 40". And with that simple answer my dreams of persuing a career in (semi) professional sports vanished. I was playing colts rugby for Sarries at the time as well as being on the youth books at Barnet F.C. I'd had a good first trial at Luton Town F.C. and was going to have a game in a B-team. When I had two months of luck that is at best described as unfortunate. I broke my shin twice in the same place and fractured my knee cap. I thought I would never feel that bad again.

  But in hindsight (reliably assuming I would have never made it beyond jobbing lower league sportsman) it turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to me.

 Having always assumed I had a sporting career infront of me I did not take school all that seriously and I have the kind of qualifications to prove it.  So when sport was no longer an option I grabbed the first thing that came my way; a sales assistant job at Wine Rack.

 My previous experience of wine was almost non existant. The odd bottle of something medium dry and German and most importantly cheap, with my family at the sunday roast and Christmas dinners and such. Now here I was with a manager who would open a bottle at the end of a day and was so enthusiastic about this stuff in a bottle (which I subsequently disovered also came in red, pink, fizzy and dry) it started to inspire me to ask questions. I seemed to have an affinity with it. I wanted to know more and ever since I have been on a quest. It's a quest I will never fulfil and I never want to. A quest to know and understand every nuance of wine.

 This quest has taken me on a fantastic voyage. Ten years + in retail with Wine Rack and Oddbins learning from like minded people was followed up by finding myself as a sommelier. I had the the flame of passion fuelled again, by the way wine interacts with food. More learning. Being able to share directly with customers the understanding of that symbiosis and feeding off their reactions. I was in a good place.

 Fast forward to October 2008. I contract a mystery illness. A year of tests and inconclusive results.
"So what's the verdict Doc?".  "You have Parkinson's syndrome". "what's that?". "Well it's like Parkison's Disease but not degenerative. Could just disappear.......... or it might not."
 As a sommelier it's fairly important to have a steady hand. I can hardly grip a bottle with my left hand and I have uncontrollable and unpredictable shakes with the right. Career over. Love affair over, everyone knows long distant relationships rarely work out. Flirting is not as satisfying as being romantically involved.

 So the next time as a sommelier you sit down at 2 a.m. Sunday morning after 150 covers when no-one sat til 8:30p.m. anticipating a bastard night bus ride home, knowing you are back for lunch service in 7 hours. remember how lucky you are really.