You know those movies or tv shows where the parents are playing Tea Party with the kids…? Yeah, I didn’t have parents like that. I did have an older cousin tho, who, whenever we would see each other, would play Food-dyed Uncooked Macaroni and 7UP in a Dixie Cup with me! HAHA. We would use a makeup tray to put everything together, and make believe eating this stuff. It was our tradition. I’m so grateful that her 16-year-old self even wanted to play with my 8-year-old self! I felt so cool and seen.

My bio mom wasn’t the playing type. She was the ‘make sure you are never sitting down’ and ‘always be cleaning’ type. She went to tea parties tho. Lots. She never did take me or my younger sister. She went with my 2 aunts, and she would always come home with a (or a few) teacup and saucer set(s). She was a collector. She never talked to us about it or included us in any of it. That’s why when I became The Tea Lady, I never thought to attribute it to anything she had to do with.

Did I drink a lot of tea? Sure, some. Not “a lot”. And never at home. Always with others. I’d be over a cousin’s house, and their parents would let me have some. Funnily enough, (this just came up the other day) my late paternal grandmother (my best friend + Homegirl) would give me black coffee in a teacup whenever I had breakfast with her! She wasn’t a fuzzy, sit-down-in-my-lap kinda gramma. She would have the same exact breakfast every day. And I thought she was so cool, I always wanted to be around her so I would sit with her at the table. She’d get out a teacup and pour some black coffee in it for me to have. Hahah… Later on in life, we became really close. I’d be the only grandchild to visit her. And when I had kids, be the only grandchild that brought her great-grandkids to visit. Boy, did she love my daughter. I swear, I had her for HER! I would be nursing, and Gramma would be practically laying on my shoulder lifting up my swaddle blankie to watch her nurse!! When my daughter got old enough, we would bring her by and Gramma would be in charge of feeding her. The not-fuzzy gramma became the most involved, meltiest gramma ever in life! And she had this darling 3-piece Victorian style antique couch set, that they’d be seated at. Cutest ever, I’m telling you.

So no, I wasn’t “surrounded” by all things tea and inherited the crown of Afternoon Tea Partying. I won’t go into it here, but my childhood was rather rough (to put it mildly). So, if there is anything or anyone to give credit to for my becoming The Tea Lady I am today (btw, I didn’t give myself that name…that’s just what I’m known as ’round these parts!)- I would thank my Gramma and her special teacup for me.

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