This Is About Tea

As you may well remember, I grew up in a small Canadian city during the 60s. Well, I didn’t grow up alone in a vacuum; I grew up with others. A sister, a Father, a Mother, and a set of Grand-Parents. My Father’s parents. My Mother was American, my Grand-Parents of Edwardian English stock were Salvation Army, and because my Mother was also Irish, my Grand-Parents wouldn’t trust her with a ten-foot pole, let alone their son. As a result, my Grand-Parents always seemed to live less than two blocks away from us; every time we moved, they moved. As a result, I spent a lot of time over at their house; in fact, every weekend between the ages of 5 and 11…

I am making a pot of tea as I write this and it is on account of the fact that I am making a pot of tea that I am writing this.

…I would go to their house in time for dinner, I would stay over night, sleeping with my Grandmother (the thought still unnerves me to this day), and I would go home Sunday sometime after afternoon-tea which took place at 3 o’clock.

I drank a lot of tea at their house. Not just Sunday afternoon. All the time. With every meal. Even simply out of the blue. Tea.

I hate tea. Yes, I have tea bags at my apartment. But they are there only for caffeine emergencies such as when I have forgotten to pick up coffee. I rarely do that; the tea bags I’m using for my pot were bought for me as a house warming present three years ago when I moved into my present apartment. It’s a Ceylon blend, generic; the bags are in the original unprotected card-board box, are nasty, and I have had to throw in a couple of mint tea bags to cut the edge which, if you think of it is rather odd and ironic because the only thing more putrid and inane to me than black tea is herbal tea.

My Mother drank coffee. Even though he would have preferred to drink tea, my Father drank coffee as well mainly because my Mother forced him too. I think out of spite. I also drank coffee at home and my Mother poured it down my gullet in gallons as if attempting to purge any residual trace elements of Edwardianisms that may might still be in my system after a weekend away.

I drank coffee in high school. I’d pick up a coffee while waiting for the bus on my way to University, and once there, I’d sit with class-mates, prof-mates, and we’d all drink coffee before our very first class of the day.

We’d also smoke. Now think about this – the late 70s, early 80s; not only being able to smoke in a university building, a cafeteria no less, but we’re music performance students. A professional horn player gave me my first cigarette – I was in love with him; I would have done anything for him – and a professional flute player taught me how to roll a cigarette with Drum tobacco which I use to this day.

When I mentioned at the restaurant that I work at that I was thinking of quitting smoking, one of the servers remarked that I would never be able to do it. For two reasons. I love beer and I love coffee. There’s just something oh-so satisfying about a cup of coffee with a cigarette.

I’m drinking the tea now. I’m having a smoke and it tastes like crap. Tea and tobacco just don’t go together. If I want to quit smoking, I will toddle tea on a full-time basis, and believe-you-me (I love that phrase), it won’t take long to break the habit.

I lied to you when I stated that between the ages of 5 and 11, I spent every weekend at the house of my Grand-Parents. There was one weekend when I stayed at home and I can remember it to this day. The year was 1967. It was in the summer-time and the reason that I didn’t have one of my weekend sleep-overs was because my Grand-parents had decided to take my older sister to Expo 67. They didn’t take me because they thought I was too young even though I was six and my Mother thought I was old enough. I remember crying because I was so sad and upset. I cried more over that than I did when my Mother bought me a black shirt for my birthday and I was scared to wear it on account of the fact that it was black, and Boy! I wailed over that.

When the three of them came back from Expo, my sister refused to shut up about what a great time she had had and my Grand-Parents presented me with an Ookpik (look it up yourselves; it might be mis-spelt) and some sort of little wind-up train engine. I remember that it was of vivid primary colours and made of plastic – something outrageous in 1967. And I also remember having this vague feeling that the train engine wasn’t an Expo 67 souvenir but, in fact, something they had bought for me in a department store once they had gotten back from the trip; a gesture to alleviate any feelings of guilt they had for not taking me to Montreal with my sister.

One of the things I love about drinking coffee? I can drink cups and cups and go hours and hours without having to pee. I’ve only had one large cup of tea and I have to pee like a whore – my Mother used to say that and I’m not quite sure how it makes sense – so you’ll have to excuse me!