A Cup of Tea and an Apology

The Word, The Way, The Truth & Tea :)

 

Did I tell you that my family has a secret tea recipe? You start by pouring milk and sugar into a pan of hot water and bring it to a boil. Add crushed black pepper and if available, the famous Darjeeling tea leaf, Lopchu. (Alternately, you can use crushed cardamom or ginger, cinnamon powder or bay-leaf). Boil until the color of the tea turns a mellow brown. Serve hot (myself, I prefer cold tea in the summer heat). 

Our parents instilled the love of tea in us from an early age. By now, I am really a tea-person. Not only is making tea an exercise in meditation if you do it purposefully, but sipping it slowly, savoring the taste and aroma, is therapeutic. One needs a comfortable space, maybe a phone or a book and silence to enjoy tea the Zen way. Measured, steady sips. No sound or gurgles. Just sip, sip until it drips like elixir unto your taste buds. People bond over tea as well. 

Tea, conversation and snacks can make family-time and the outdoors refreshing. 

As mentioned in the previous blog, the morning had been a fiasco: mum was hurt and angry with me and she had determined not to soften at my bidding. I quickly thought of a solution: serve her tea after she was done with her bath. I did so gently because she was still smarting from my verbal attack. 

After she had sipped to the dregs, I surreptitiously went over, touched her feet and asked for forgiveness a second time-this time wholeheartedly. She hugged me and reassured me of her forgiveness. 

I felt happy and at peace after receiving mum's pardon. I tell myself that I won’t repeat such behavior but I know I can be harsh and make mistakes all over again. Yet, I have the facility to apologize. What happens when we open up our hearts to seek and give more love? Hurt is guaranteed when we are vulnerable but we will learn from our mistakes. When we love we can face rejection any number of times, but we won’t be poorer for it. 

A cup of tea prepared lovingly and delivered to mum softened her stance. And my apology helped clear the misunderstanding. I understand that my education and grooming alone do not make me worthy if I can’t respect my parents. My rough, jagged edges have been smoothened a lot. If a person grows up with kindness and love, his face is soft and kind, too-most often than not. The harshness in my own gaze has faded (my brother has his private joke about my eyes turning “lovey-dovey” after I fell hard in love). Love from parents, siblings and Universe “HE” has helped me heal from the constant pain of people-pleasing and seeking validation.  I used to feel unworthy before if I said “no” but now I have set my boundaries. 

The surest way to break your heart is to let people trample all over you. No wonder we are advised to guard our hearts. To be innocent as doves and wily as serpents. We must love but discerningly. A cup of tea has its flavors and aroma and the best kind of tea happens when you mix the ingredients in the right proportion and bring it to a long, slow boil to make it a deep brown concoction. Serve hot for effect. 

Similarly, our characters have different traits-some good, others bad, yet still others, excellent. We must constantly look within and see what prevails in our hearts. When we understand our natures better, life will throw tests at us. Often, we will fail but as we start figuring out life and its intricacies, our purpose-how best we can contribute to the world around (it starts with discovering our passions), we can serve a treat to ourselves-a cup of warm, liquid love that will soothe our soul and flow outwards toward people who need our type of love. Tea anyone? With a huge dose of love and and yes, perhaps, an apology.   

 

Meditations

 

The best kind of love is unconditional. As human beings this might be tough to practice though with supernatural grace, we can master such kind of love. Our heart of stone needs to be replaced by a heart of flesh. This kind of surgery is performed only in the heavenly realms. With great pain comes great change. Learn lessons about what pain is trying to teach you. Even if we cannot understand why we are aching we can learn how to bear our suffering gracefully (we should try to remove the pain but sometimes it’s impossible to do so). Suffering can break, soften and mold us into a character of sterling gold. Accept both joy and suffering. That’s the way to break into love. 

 

Why Mothers are Angels on Earth

 

 

Mum loves me dearly. For mum, I will always be her kind, brave, honest, little girl but something happened one morning and the taste of regret filled my hasty lips. She asked me a minor question inquiring about a conversation I had with a friend over phone and I responded with great irritation, even agitation. I overreacted. I thought she was being nosy about my personal affairs and I ended up shouting at her. 

My dad says that the skirmishes between mum and I are totally unnecessary and avoidable. Avoidable especially if I, for one, keep my mouth shut. Earlier the frequency of our fights was greater. With age and maturity, I grew calmer and mellower but on August 1, I lost it because she had asked me about the phone call the previous night too but morning found me angry and emotionally violent. In another moment, we had had a heated exchange and she was gone to the bathroom while I stood alone-sullen, regretful and helpless. 

My love later told me that she was my mum and greater than all my close friends put together and she could have just been curious about my friend’s call so I was an idiot for exploding at a most loving and tender mum like that. “Your friends are your friends, they can’t be your mum,” he said. 

Invariably, I understood then why he is so loved by his family and those around him. It’s because of his prized and cherished values, his compassion towards those weaker than himself and also his respect for his own mother and mine. I admit I am guilty of protecting so-called friends who want to use me and I am now ashamed of treating mum like she was less important than my friends. If anything, she was the one who has stood by me through all of life’s vicissitudes. I mean when my parents are impatient with each other, they try to be gentle because often the situation warrants nothing but calm answers and rational explanations. 

The day began with tempers flaring between mum and myself. She didn’t even allow me to help her with the dishes because she was extremely hurt and angry. I apologized to her half-heartedly and she didn’t accept my apology. I was flustered by then.

I decided it was time I started accepting responsibility for my feelings and actions. Especially while dealing with family. This war of words had spoilt the otherwise beautiful early morning ambience. 

Good thing that “he” (I will be referring to this wise fairy of my partner as “he” hereon) gave me a showdown for my disrespectful behavior towards mum. She deserved better, much better. She deserved a huge ribboned gift, a kiss and many “thank you’s” for letting her children be children in her eyes but I was not going to sit there and ruminate for long. When she had cooled down, I served her a cup of hot tea, explained about the phone call and apologized.

 

Mum nourishing plants and people with love.

 

Meditations

 

A word of advice to children: At times, a parent can be tough on you. The other side of love is discipline. An ancient adage goes, “Spare the rod and spoil the child.” While we cannot take the rod in literal terms today except in extreme cases, we must let our children know that if they err, it is going to harm themselves most of all. Love and discipline must be the foundational tenets in raising a child. A child who can respect his parents and at their advice, improve his ways will definitely reap the fruit of the first of the Ten Commandments which states: “Honor your parents and you shall live long on the earth.” 

The Grace in The Break

Light "breaks:" we need them

My father calls me “unreasonable.” Well, he called me unreasonable when I called him up on the last of July, and told him I had got a broken toe. He usually does not compliment me (we share a strange connection wherein affection borders on disrespect and sarcasm and I mean this as sheer, outrageous humor, also the absolute truth) but this time round he accused me outright of not sleeping late nights and scurrying around unnecessarily (probably like a rodent) when I should be in bed sound asleep. He was partly-wrong and partly-right. I can sometimes stay up whole nights doing things that take up all my time. But on this particular night, it was not past sleeping hours and I had been arranging stuff on the top of my wardrobe when I slipped and fell down from the chair in a direction that lay undue linear pressure on my feet and cracked the axillary bone, as an X-Ray showed the next day. I thought it was just a severe sprain and I remember that I hardly slept that night but as I moved around, I was wincing in pain. The swelling was little so I didn’t doubt that I had a fracture to deal with. 

The next morning, my brother took me to the hospital in a cab and I walked all the while (should have used a wheelchair)- this included walking up and downstairs four times but I did it with brother’s steady support. I really thought this couldn’t be more than a sprain though I gave myself the benefit of doubt-leaving room for what I now call the “toe-break.” A break in the literal sense because the past five months after we shifted to our new residence had been hectic though exhilarating. I was so stoked to get a space and room of my own and I was happy in a long time because my relationship with my would be-partner was blossoming. Also, my mental health had improved after a depressing episode of what I call the “pseudo-possession” syndrome. 

My garment shop had been doing okay during the first few months after I shifted it to our building from the town. I could at least manage to raise rent and make small payments for the stock investment while also paying for my food, entertainment and maintenance bills (as a woman, who doesn’t have the last?). But that was it; there was no extra money coming into my savings and whatever little I could scrape was used to get by daily.

In fact, to spill the beans, people thought that now that I was a building owner (sorry, my dad is, not I), and that I had a shop here where I supposedly didn’t have to pay rent (no judgement, but I pay rent because I believe in being a responsible daughter), I must be very rich. I don’t ask dad for money unless it’s completely necessary and I can’t arrange it on my own (I have a sense of hyper-independence for which my love teases me but I know it is good-natured). So, the fact is, I have never been good at making or more to say, keeping money which I don’t regret (I do believe in living, and sharing what little I have). 

However, I do wonder at God’s grace. I am forty years old, almost. And I had a fulfilling stint in journalism for a decade. I had my good and bad times. I also had my heart broken more than I care to count. But through all this and more, God has stood by me and provided me all that I needed, even wanted. On the days that I was flat broke, I still ate nourishing meals, drank clean water, wore good clothes and had a roof over my head. I have a family who has always loved me for who I am. And genuine friends to help me. 

Since yesterday, I have had long bouts of sleeping during the day while I wrote and did creative work at night. I also took part in a sleeping marathon which rested me completely and put me in the most congenial of moods. I woke up, communicated with my partner, chatted with friends, spent time with mum, prayed and ate wholesome fruit, cornflakes with milk and spicy Maggi soup (asked mum to season it with a lot of fresh, green chili). 

What more could I learn from this little episode in life? The “breaks” in your life can come in the form of broken bones but through them, God teaches you to put the brakes on the accelerator of your life as well, come back to him and find yourself in rest and healing when necessary.  

I have been so caught up in the whirlpool of life-doing the daily chores, fulfilling my domestic and relational duties and trying to make money that I had forgotten that my body and soul were weary, crying out for rest-physical and spiritual. Now, I have the opportunity to recuperate, withdraw into my soul and churn out creative work. 

Yes, while the world moves on frantically shouting, “More, more, more!” the cry of the soul is most often to slow down, breathe and say “Yes, I need less.” A break can do wonders for your body and soul provided you know how to rest. My rest right now looks a lot like taking deep naps, eating healthy, good food, reading, listening to music, writing, praying, loving and sleeping some more. This is grace, too. Time for a break! 

 

        Meditations  

 

Movement and achievement are totally necessary. But our bodies are not meant for energy and action alone. The body requires rest, nourishing food and exercise. Just as our soul also needs solitude, calm, retreat and time to meditate on the mysteries that our world holds (existential dilemmas included). Think “balance.”