The Tao of Teapots

I have a fetish, a love? Maybe a minor obsession. I collect teapots. Last time I counted Iwas up to twenty-one. It's more however than simply collecting for the sake of collecting. Idon't just put them on a shelf and look at them, never touching, never using. I put them tothe purpose for which they were meant and that purpose is, I think, the reason I collectthem. There is something profoundly peaceful about the act of brewing tea, pouring it from a well loved teapot and sipping while curled in my favorite chair with an old friend of a book.

It almost feels like a guilty pleasure and is something I rarely do when others are around. Taking one of my teapots down from the shelf and using it has, over the years, become like a retreat. An escape, however brief, from the course of the day. A few have been gifts but most I have found myself. I have a few generic teapots, a sterling silver teapot. One of my sisters gave me one ages back made from fired clay with oriental dragons that my husband once dropped and chipped the spout off. My mother in law gave me another of fired clay that resembles a squat tortoise like dragon. For the days I'm in need of a goofy smile I have one in the shape of a frog. There's a Winnie the Pooh teapot, a couple oriental style pots and one I found in a flea market with stylized Greek figures that I adore and I'm sure is worthless.

Of course it isn't just the teapots themselves. It's the whole of the act. Choosing the tea, brewing it, choosing the pot and filling it, pouring it out. The smell of the tea that fills the kitchen. The little curl of steam from the mouth of the pot. It's an age old ritual that seems to require you take your time. We spend every day counting each minute, marking each hour between work and play, sleep and chores. We demand everything be faster, faster, faster from our internet to our food. Making a pot of tea now and then reminds me that it's alright to slow down and not watch the clock. It gives me precious time to do that most important thing for a little while that we so often forget to do...nothing.

Life these days is fast. I highly recommend to anyone suffering the stress to go out and find a teapot that speaks to you. If tea isn't your thing, a French Press and some good coffee will do just as well...but that's another article.