The philosophies of life that this writer learned as a ten-year-old child, from her father, over, a cup of, tea, translated…
At age ten, I had my very first taste of, tea, and it was, so, bitter!
As my father retreated from China with the Nationalists, he was still just a teenager, working around the superiors, bringing the foods, the teas, shining their shoes, taking care of the internal workings, worked as a message relay; or maybe, because how he’d known to watch the faces, he’d gotten the attention from his superiors. And, as the war occurred, in the heat of the fires, the superior told my father, to WATCH over the set of teacup and teapot, no matter what!
The days he’d followed the superior officer around, from water, to tea, and, the days became, more and more flavorful, like the teas, and the superior not just taught my father how to take care of his country, be a good soldier, also taught him how to make a good pot of tea, how to taste tea too.
As my father married, the army superior came from China, and handed him a set of teapot and teacups, and ever since, in that corner of our home, there was, that tiny tea table of my father’s, that was, his it place after the meals, the only shame was there was, nobody to drink the teas alongside him.
One evening, my younger brother and I started a war, I’d gone to my father in tears and snot, to tattle. He’d wiped away my tears, feeling bad for me, led me to the tea table, started broiling up the water, to make us tea. As he was waiting for the water to broil, he’d started telling me, “Dad is the teapot, mom’s the lid, we’d found each other, married, and had three tiny tea cups, you and your younger brother, and your younger sister”. He’d placed three china cup onto the table. I was focused on what my father was telling me, forgot that I was upset from before, stopped crying.
Dad then asked, “What happens if the cups bumped into each other?” “they break, of course!”, I’d opened my eyes wide and told him. He’d poured in some tea leaves into the pot, then the broiling water, “What do you think will happen, if the cups shattered?” “You would definitely feel upset, you loved the tea set so!” The three of us all knew, that the set was the gift from General Grandpa, that we need to, be careful with them.
passing the wisdoms of life through a cup of tea…
“That’s correct, you and your sister and your brother, are all my babies, when you fight with each other, hurt each other, get injured, my heart would break for all of you guys!”, then, he’d, patted my wrist with my younger brother’s teeth mark, and I seemed to, understand what he was, saying to me.
Before the tea tables, I’d become, quieted, watched my father’s every move, at this time, he’s dad, and he wasn’t, I was, shocked by how calm he became when he’d stepped the teas. He’d placed a cup right before me, dad drank from his cup, I drank from mine, “Wow, it’s, so bitter!”, I’d started, frowning, stuck my tongue out. “Yeah, that is, how I’d felt, when the you and your brother fight too!”, and I’d, finally, understood what he’d, meant.
The time it took, to make the teas for us, and for us to drink it together, he’d helped a ten-year-old young girl understand, how important it is, to keep the household in harmony, how important it was, for me, to learn to get along with my younger brother, no lectures, just talked on tea, and he’d, planted down a tea tree inside of my mind.
There are a ton of things that can upset us in life, not making a high enough score on my college entrance, broken by love, losing money, framed by someone………and I was always, able to, find my own salvation, through a, pot of tea. “The world in a cup of tea, the moon and the sun, in the pot.”, drinking tea became, no longer, just, drinking tea.
And so this, is the ZEN of tea drinking, and, the writer’s father, taught her how important it is, to try and get along with her younger siblings, she being, the eldest, and, he’d taught her, the important values of family, without, giving her a lecture on it, but using, the simpler explanations, using a tea pot and some tea cups.
Life, the Obstacle Course 