So aromatic it scents the whole room!: Rooibos Pear and Honey ... From SBS Teas...
"Delicious as a dessert treat or anytime of the day and night. Sumptuous sweet pear and smooth honey unite in a lovely tryst of smooth sweet devotion to your cup. Be prepared to stun your guests and taste buds with this decadent tea!"
"In the evening I go up in the desert where you can see the world all around -- far away. The hours I spend each evening watching the sun go down -- and just enjoying it -- and every day I go out and watch it again. I draw some and there is a little painting and so the days go by."
In a letter from Georgia O'Keefe to her friend Anita Politzer, 1929
The last few weeks have been something out of the ordinary for me, pleasurable and unsettling all at the same time. People come and go in your life and life goes on. What this has meant for me is a clearer vision of who I am and what my life really is. And so when I read the above quote by Georgia O'Keefe, one of my favorite painters, I sighed, and relaxed and realized that yes, we live our little lives and the days go by and they are filled with shining moments.
I believe Georgia would have understood my life, a life some feel peculiar at best. Coming close to living the life of an anchorite, my life is for the most part homebound, and made up of contemplation, nature, animals, the sacred, prayer. As a writer and a fiber artist, living in a small cottage of a place with parrots and finches and doves, 3 beautiful beta fish and my sweet dog Moe, I spend whole days in silence, days when there is no tv, no music, no phone, just the chattering of the birds.
I fill the feeders outside all around with seed for the wild birds and the occasional squirrel, stray cat and whomever else comes around gets fed as well. My outings are in my own garden, and at midnight to look at the full moon, or gaze at the stars. The few times I go out into the real world are for necessities or to babysit my precious grandbaby, but mostly, here, I live quietly alone among my hundreds of books, and fiber everywhere, and now a cottage full of plants brought in just in time before winter frost, and my tiny galley sized kitchen looks more like a potting shed than a kitchen these days as I clean up, repot and feed all of the plants just brought back indoors, as well as repot the African Violets, my loves, growing like topsy and blooming again.
Comes that special time of day when the light is slanting on the horizon and a little chime goes off in my head, "It's tea time." And so the kettle goes on and I begin to search through my many teas to see what tea best suits the day, the time, the mood. This has been a hard week and I needed something soothing. I find rooibos teas one of the most soothing teas and often have a cup of rooibos at bedtime. The other evening as I sifted through bags of teas in my tea cabinet, I came across one I had not tried yet, the Rooibos Pear and Honey, and simply opening the bag I let out a deep sigh and felt tension melting out of my body. Succulent sweet pear redolent of honey, so strong that the next morning, with a bit of tea left in my cup from the night before, the whole room smelled of honey and pears. This is one of the most flavorful teas I have ever had.
And so I sat here having brewed my tea, and watched the sky turn it's eventide colors, mesmerized, breathing in the silence deeply as the birds inside began to quiet down and the wildlings were gone for the night. Moe was asleep belly and paws up on the couch and I was surrounded by stacks of books and fiber projects all around me. I held the oversized vintage Stangl mug with a pale pink tulip and scalloped green leaves up to my nose and just breathed in the lovely, fragrant tea, and the first sip came almost as a shock it was so full of flavor, my tastebuds exploded delightedly and I sank deeply into my chair with a smile. Finally, settling in with tea, and the silence, and letting even my own thoughts fade away, I had a contemplative time with my tea, a tea meditation as I do most early evenings, and I let the cares and worries and pain and frustrations of the weeks pass from my body and I looked silently around my little room to all that is here.
Amidst too much of everything, books and fiber everywhere, and looms and knitting needles, and my precious spoolknitters in every shape and size and spindles with their fiber attached as I spin my yarns, and yarns in baskets nearby as I make a hat, jars full of colored pencils, paintbrushes, sketchbook on the arm of my oversized chair filled with too many pillows that are just right, and the old rattan chair with frazzled places where Henry, my grey parrot, likes to sit and unravel pieces for that brief moment before I catch him doing it, and tossled vintage quilts here and there, a bright fuschia Christmas Cactus blooming madly, and knowing that there are paperwhites to be potted for inside and bulbs to be planted outside, I felt a deep sense of fulfilment as I sipped this delectable tea. What more could a person want? And the tea made the moment perfect.
And so as with O'Keefe I make my daily rounds, I drink in the fragrance of flowers blooming and tea perfuming the air, and now, as I write this, Henry sits on my shoulder and Moe sits by my side, his velvet soft nose brushing against my knee to make certain that all is well before he goes to his favorite spot on the couch, and Henry and I will carry on here, as I nuzzle his grey feathers and kiss his beak, and reach, once more, for yet another sip of this wonderful tea as the dove coos to his mate and silence falls upon the room once again, and I feel peace return as the last curtain of night falls...
Maitri