In my last article, I wrote about the opportunity we tea educators have to use storytelling in our work. The 5000 year history, the international cultural dynamic and the intimacy of personal experience provide more opportunity than any one of us could exhaust. What I think we sometimes might forget is that we are creating tea stories every day. And these are stories that bring people of all ages to tea.

As an example, I’ll share one of my favorite new tea stories.

The Puppy Dog Tea

      I was invited to attend a graduation tea for 1st grade. The children, with the careful guidance of their teacher, prepared hand-illustrated invitations, created a menu, prepared the food and decorated the tables with fresh flowers. As we adult guests arrived, they escorted us to our places. (Yes, those little chairs.) Before tea was served, I shared some of the legends of tea. The children and adults listened attentively and politely.

     Except for one younger 4-year-old brother. He was adorable but couldn’t sit still. He politely raised his hand for each interruption but he was bursting with his own need to tell a story, “We have puppies.” And he was relentless. The teacher tried to help. But his hand kept popping up and it looked like he was sitting on bouncy springs. “We have puppies,” he continued to interrupt.

     The teacher finally explained, “We’re talking about tea today. We’ll talk about puppies later.”

     I answered two more questions about tea and his hands shot up again - both hands - and the excitement in his bounce doubled as well. The teacher asked, “Is this about tea?”

     “Oh yes,” he said. “We have puppies. . .”

     “No,” the teacher scolded, ” we’ll talk about your puppies later.”

     Fortunately, his mother came to the rescue. “Actually, I think he does have something to share about tea.”

     “We gave the puppies tea,” he finally burst out with delight.

     With help from Mom he told the story about how they had given a bridal shower for his older cousin. It was a very formal garden tea. The Duchess of Bedford would have delighted in his description of the flowers, the music, the table settings and the food. “It was real tea in real teacups!” the little boy repeated every second sentence. “Real tea. Real teacups.” His delight was infectious. I could hear other children whisper like a chant, “Real tea in real tea cups.”

     He became so engrossed in describing the adult tea party that I had to ask, “What about the puppies?”

     Well, the puppies had been kept in the laundry room with their mother for the afternoon. But when the party was over, they spread one of the tablecloths on the ground. They decorated with the flowers and some of the less fragile dishes and filled the plates with puppy treats and the cups with tea. Unfortunately there wasn’t video of the puppies so this young storyteller acted out the way they pounced on the plates and devoured the food.

     And I’m assured that the puppies loved the tea. Green tea.

     Why is this particular story important to me? It’s a simple little tale. But it made tea real and relevant to everyone in the classroom. The tea party was fun. We all laughed until our sides hurt to hear how the baby dogs demolished their tea table and lapped the teacups dry.

Prior to the puppy story, there had been some ambivalence from the children about drinking the real tea. They were concerned that it would taste too strong. Mothers were concerned about the caffeine. There were jugs of lemonade on hand for the squeamish. Prior to the little boy’s story, I’m sure there would have been several lemonade drinkers. But after the story, we were 100% for tea. I know that the story went home and was retold in every household. Boxes of tea were added to shopping carts and reservations were made in local tearooms (without the puppies).

So, as I continue to ask — What is it about tea that inspires great art? . . . and little 4 year old boys?

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