Maybe, just "maybe" my tea really is that good!

Whenever I make my Mother a cup of tea, she closes her eyes, smiles, and says dreamily "you make the best cup of tea" for the past 20 years, I believed it unquestioningly. But lately, I have wondered: just how good can any one cup of tea be?, Compared to the others, that is.....

Over the last 20 years of tea making, I too have become a Mom, and although my daughter is just coming up to the age where she might want to or be able to actually make me a cup of tea, I think that I am starting to get the whole child-praise thing: We praise our kids, their efforts, their art, their anything, so that they will feel better about themselves. Why do we do this? I think it is so they will feel loved and pass that love on. and on. and on. I think I finally get it.

So during the most recent visit, when I gave my 77 year old mother a steeped cup of dark orange pekoe with lots of real cream and sugar, and she closed her beautifully wrinkled eyes, smiled and said "you make the best cup of tea", I smiled, and said "I love you too Mom" she laughed that wonderful Irish laugh - she knew that I was "on to her". It was a blessed wee moment especially because my daughter (who has to know about everything that is going on at all times) piped in and said "WHAT? WHAT? What are you guys laughing about?" Thank-you God for these moments in life!