Last weekend I went to hear Ruth Reichl, editor of Gourmet magazine, give a reading at Mondavi in Napa, an event organized by wine writer Joan Zoloth for the Napa Land Trust. It was absolutely gorgeous out, and made me wonder why I don’t head up there more often being that I’m only 45 minutes away. What’s not to love about the rolling hills, rows of grapevines at every turn, big bursts of lavender and blooming herbs, sunshine and the promise of  wine. And meeting Ruth. 

I am a big fan of Ruth Reichl and have been for years, and not only because I think she has done an excellent job as editor in chief of Gourmet, making it to my mind, a much more interesting read (including the sometimes controversial stories by known novelists–think lobster dying a slow death), but because I adore her writing and insightful no-nonsense view of the food world in which she swirls.  Her first 2 books, Tender to the Bone and Comfort Me with Apples catalogue a string of memories–her early food impressions, falling in love, opening a restaurant in Berkeley, becoming a restaurant reviewer, motherhood at 40, and more, many of the stories bringing her back to her mother’s table, not always a good thing as she readily explains. Ruth’s mother suffered from bipolar, and it’s not something she shies away from in her storytelling, weaving the beautiful and the chaotic with tremendous wit, and heart.

Her new book, Not Becoming My Mother: and Other Things She Taught Me Along the Way, is even more personal, an investigation into her mother’s life, the mother she didn’t know but learned about through her letters and notes (stored in a box that she opened on what would have been her mother’s 100th birthday, she died in the 1990s), as much as the one she did. It’s an intimate portrait of a once independent woman who fell into the traps of 50′s styling motherhood (not working, and being bored to tears) experienced by so many woman of her generation, and who despite debilitating bouts of depression, 4 years after her husband died and years after her children were gone, pulled herself out of bed, took in house boarders and made new friends, ultimately living the life she always imagined for herself.  It’s a reminder that it’s never too late–and as a mother, especially–for writing, painting, playing, going to work, dressing up or making new friends, and ultimately living out our dreams, the greatest lesson Ruth said she learned of all.