Wine II: Squeeze

Good morning. Today begins the second décade of Vendémiaire, Year CCXXXII. It's the month of winemaking. Our theme this time is squeeze.

There's a tension in the concept of squeezing, which is appropriate on a meta level, I suppose. It's both a horrifying and violent act, one in which something is utterly obliterated by pressure, and a warm emotion suffused with love, an act of comfort and care. Your main squeeze is your partner, not a fruit you're slowly torturing in your basement. Stress toys get right to the heart of this, giving us a safe outlet for feelings of aggression while triggering, through muscle memory, sensations of tenderness. Each squeeze of a rubber ball is like a respiration of emotion – anger out, love in. But regardless of which meaning we take, there's also another connotation to squeeze: that of the desperate, last-ditch grip.