a taste of taste

Taste honors someone’s standards of quality, but also the distinctive way the world bounces off a person. It reflects what they know about how the world works, and also what they’re working with in their inner worlds. When we recognize true taste, we are recognizing that alchemic combination of skill and soul. This is why it is so alluring.

But unlike irony and satire, taste is earnest. It doesn’t like to fake it and it can’t be too far removed from reality.

Intelligence, as well, is really a kind of taste: taste in ideas.