Oh my! I found in the magic fridge just now a bottle of Strawberry and Basil Mead, part of the Gastronomic Series from Crafted Artisan Meadery of Mogadore, Ohio. I think that’s right next to Mordor.

This lovely mead comes on with the beautiful aroma of basil, and then you taker your first taste and strawberry is the first to welcome you, and then finishing with a nice basil refrain. 

Basil and strawberry in a honey wine. Are you kidding me? This is a marriage made in heaven. And for those who don’t believe in marriage – it’s just a word, man! It doesn’t mean an actual ring on a finger. It’s a metaphor for the perfect combination of two disparate elements, in this case an herb and a fruit that both scream summer.

And this pairing is beautiful! It’s like a big mouthful of summer. 

Here is another thing that should come out of municipal taps. The taste is so perfect that you, too, feel perfect for the moment, totally aligned and in tune with the perfection of this drink and the perfection of the cosmos.

Really, it’s not fair that the entire world doesn’t have access to this perfect liquid. If it did, all our troubles might fall by the wayside as we find that since the most perfect drink has been created, there is no longer need for political, religious or just plain psychopathic strife. All is now right with this world. I think of Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine, which begins:

“It was a quiet morning, the town covered over with darkness and at ease in bed. Summer gathered in the weather, the wind had the proper touch, the breathing of the world was long and warm and slow. You had only to rise, lean from your window, and know that this indeed was the first real time of freedom and living, this was the first morning of summer.”

Yes, this strawberry and basil mead tastes like an unguessed wonder of a summer day.