About a year ago, my daughter and I started having what she coined "champagne dates." Basically, we schedule an afternoon that we are both free and go to JJ's Restaurant just west of Country Club Plaza in Kansas City, Mo. JJ's deserves the plug because we have learned a lot about champagne from the servers and owner. For a while we thought we'd try different restaurants each time, but from our experience, JJ's has the best champagne selection, as well as warm sourdough bread I can't get enough of, and they throw in the education for free.
We have a running list of favorites and follow The Champagne Chick on Facebook dreaming of someday visiting the locations and tasting the champagnes she does. In the meantime, however, we're perfectly happy sharing a bottle at JJ's. The first or second time we were there and ordered our champagne, the server asked what we were celebrating. We looked at each other sort of shocked at the question since it wasn't exactly an extraordinary situation, but then it came to me and I said, "Life." Since then that one word answer has reminded me before each champagne date just how special it is to be alive and have that time to celebrate being together.
My ex-husband and I received some very nice china and crystal for our wedding in 1993. They were by far the most expensive plates and glasses we ever owned, but when we registered for them, I wonder if we really only expected to only use them once a year on Thanksgiving. Granted, it was probably just something people getting married did back then, but I think in our minds we would have anticipated using them more than we did. If not, I would like to think we would have registered for other things. I believe we fully anticipated using them for romantic dinners and many more special family dinners than we actually did.
As I reflect on those years, though, even if my husband would have suggested using them, I'm sure I would have said it was too much trouble to get them out, to clean them, and to store them again. At that time, they were packed away inside individual storage bags with protective felt between each particular item. Maybe it was too much trouble, but whose fault was that? Mine. I was so scared of breaking them that we got virtually no use out of them and created very few memories with them.
When I bought a townhome eight years ago, it had two cabinets with glass in the doors so you could see what was inside. In one of those cabinets, I displayed the china and crystal because I had always thought they were so pretty. And I think I had realized by that time it was silly to keep them if I wasn't going to use them periodically, so I at least took the step of getting them out of their protective shells.
In the past couple years, a dear friend and I started scheduling monthly visits to each other. Regardless of who hosted, we generally prepared fruit, cheese, crackers, and cookies or muffins to snack on while we had our favorite beverage. One afternoon as I was preparing for such a visit, I looked up and saw the china and crystal in the cabinet and asked myself right in that moment, "What am I saving these things for?" I love the feel of the china's smooth surface and the sound the real crystal makes when it touches anything.
While I had been using small paper plates prior to that visit which was just fine with both of us, it's not about what it said to anyone else, it's about what it said to me. I had spent my whole life being scared and that day, I took one more step to be brave and not allow fear to hold me back from enjoying china, crystal...or life.
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