To know me is to know I think life is serendipitous.
I had quite literally just written the Editor’s Letter for Magic Potions, where I talked about a book that considered perfume an actual form of alchemy when I read the author’s note on the first page of The Ideal Bartender by Tom Bullock.
Written pre-prohibition by a Black man in 1917, the book sits in an ice bucket on my bar cart with a purely ornamental bottle of champagne my best friend bought me. The book itself was a gift, too. A birthday present along with a bottle of tequila, and two kinds of home-cooked fried fish — an act of romance, if I may say so, because I love fried fish but will never make it because of the smell — but anyway, I flipped open this book.
The second page has a dedication at the top, which reads: “To those who enjoy snug club rooms, that they may learn the art of preparing for themselves what is good.” But it’s the paragraph under that really spoke to me.
“Is it any wonder that mankind stands open-mouthed before the bartender, considering the mysteries and the marvels of an art that borders on magic? The recipes found in this book have been composed and collected. Tried and tested, in a quarter-century of experience by Tom Bullock of the St. Louis Country Club.”
I love synchronicities like that. Which is probably why I usually turn to one of three movies when I need a little comfort.
I watch Christmas movies all year long, three in particular: Last Holiday, The Holiday, and Serendipity.
The Last Holiday when I feel like I’ve been too complacent and deserve decadence without waiting for everything to finally click into place; The Holiday as a reminder my life can be so much better in just one month; and Serendipity, well because anything that’s for me will never pass me, no matter what it looks like.
On Tuesday, I added another one to the list, The Thin Man. I was sitting in bed, browsing white wine glasses online on my laptop. I only have 2 but want 4, and I found the skinniest stem on what looked like a more rounded martini glass. It was labeled the Nick & Nora glass. Who are Nick and Nora? Why do they get a glass?
Nick and Nora Charles are married sleuths in a 1934 comedy-mystery called The Thin Man based on Dashiell Hammett’s novel, published the same year, in which a well-to-do heiress and her husband, a detective who hoped to retire once married, get caught up in solving a murder mystery.
Of course I had to watch the movie. It was available on Kanopy, and now I love the glasses even more. The two throw lavish dinner parties, often serving martinis on a silver platter. When they solved the murder at the end of the movie, guess what was on the table? Gorgeous florals and yep, those skinny-stemmed, delicate glasses.
The glass is now named ‘Nick & Nora,’ thanks to the work of New York-based bartender Dale Degroff. In the ‘80s, he worked to make the newly renovated Rainbow Room that sits (damn near) atop of Rockefeller Center, 65 floors up, a destination to grab a cocktail. Part of his task was glassware, and he wanted to recreate the delicate stemmed martini glasses he saw Nick and Nora sip from in The Thin Man. And here we are.
I love beautiful things with a story, and so I absolutely ordered two of those Nick and Nora glasses. I can’t wait to watch The Thin Man again with my Nick and Nora glass in hand, drinking a recipe out of The Ideal Bartender.
Do you see what I mean about life being serendipitous? The magic is everywhere.
