On the day we memorialized my mother in La Jolla, a double rainbow appeared over the Pacific Ocean. My older brother Tad took the photo above, a few hours before the celebration.

Maybe it was the accumulated sleep deprivation, maybe it was the cresting waves of emotion… or maybe Mother Nature decided to show us that even in the face of grief, there is beauty in the world — beauty that reminds you why you live and breathe despite the crushing, suffocating pain of loss.

A week has passed since we returned from San Diego where we buried my mother. The yahrzeit candle on our kitchen table is not quite spent as I write this.

It’s been the worst of years but also the best.

Daughter Georgia, violist and soon to be 14, made the cut for all-region orchestra earlier this year (wow!) and she’s been enjoying Houston Youth Symphony, another new feather in her musical cap. She’s also been playing electric bass.

Daughter Lila Jane, cellist and going on 13, is excited for first chair at this year’s varsity holiday concert. But even brighter in her life is the incoming 3/4-size cello that her former teacher is lending us until she grows into a full-size. Her current teacher got together with the former: they are both so impressed by her natural ability, they told me, they felt she needs a better instrument.

This was the year that the tariffs reshaped the European wine industry in the U.S. It’s also been a year where wine sales have dropped precipitously, including for domestic wine production.

But this year was also a year of miracles: the collapse of my industry and career dovetailed with Tracie’s growing success as a realtor (poo, poo, poo!). We’ve never had more financial security than ever before thanks to my brilliant and incredibly hard-working partner. I love her and the girls so much.

I’m thinking about that double rainbow as we prepare to leave for Orange, Texas where we’ll celebrate the holiday with Tracie’s family (aunt Ida is hosting this year, for a change).

I remember a line I once read in a prayer book during Yom Kippur: nothing, said the rebbe, heals like a broken heart.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Every since I poured my Houston cousin Neil a bottle of Smith-Madrone Cabernet Sauvignon, a wine he swooned over, it’s become a bit of a shared family quest: to find Neil Cabernet Sauvignon with freshness (acidity), a combination of fruit and savory flavors, and judicious use of oak aging.

Over the years he’s moved away from the oaky-jammy paradigm that managerial class members like him used to drink regularly. Maybe because he’s been enjoying Italian wines with us over the last decade, food-friendliness and freshness have become the two criteria that seem to drive his preferences.

While shopping for our family’s holiday wines last year, I came across the Smith-Story Sonoma Mountain Cabernet Sauvignon at our go-to wine shop, Houston Wine Merchant.

I first met Alison Smith back during her Texas career when she was a supplier rep for a high-profile Italian winery group. I’ve never met her husband Eric Story but I have enjoyed following their winery’s social media — especially their cynophilia.

Although the wine wasn’t a cheap date, it didn’t break the bank either. And it hit that sweet spot between inexpensive fruit-forward, oakier California Cabernet Sauvignon, and the really high end stuff (like Smith-Madrone), which I love but cannot regularly afford.

This wine had freshness, balanced fruit and acidity, judicious alcohol, and no oakiness.

Neil loved it, too, and it was gone in a flash after being served at our Hanukkah party. I highly recommend the wine and the people who make it.

Please don’t stop praying for our sisters and brothers in LA. And please join us for the MLK Day March in Orange, Texas on Monday, followed by our protest of the Neo-Confederate memorial there.

Just had to give a shout-out this week to John Libonati (above) and his awesome natural-focused wine shop Hyphen- in Palm Springs. Yes, Palm Springs!

For a lot of folks who grew up in southern California like me, Palm Springs was often a destination for visiting relatives, family get-togethers, and long weekends just a few hours away from home.

But in my adult years, those get-aways always meant bring your own wine because you’re not going to find much there. Let’s face it: beyond Sherman’s Deli, Palm Springs is not exactly known as a fomo food destination.

That’s all changed now that John, a lovely man from a storied New York restaurant family, has launched his shop. Organic is the baseline, he told me when we visited earlier this week. He wants to get his clients to get out of their “Rombauer” mind set. And it’s working.

Yesterday, during a visit with a hipster colleague in San Diego, news of natural wine in the desert was met with glee.

“I’m going there this weekend!” he exclaimed. “Where is this place?”

He was pleased to know that you’ll find it right on California State Route 111 as you drive into town.

John ran restaurants and night clubs in the city roughly around my same years in New York. It was so much fun to reminisce about some of the characters and players from that now lost era when cool bands still played at CBGB. Natural wine began to become a thing around that time as well.

It’s great to see John spreading the good word to the Golf Capital of the World. Be sure to check his shop out when you visit. You’ll thank me.