I served the book club ladies lunch on my fancy china.
I love my china. It makes me happy. My Mama bought it for me at an antique shop.
We discussed East of Eden by John Steinbeck.
They hated the book.
"Why would you choose such a dark and awful book?" they asked.
I don't know what they expected me to say. Surely not what I said.
"Because it reminded me of myself," I said. "I tend toward darkness...
I constantly fight for the light it seems some are just born with. I struggle with depression and anxiety, as do all the hispanic women in my family. Steinbeck understands a person like me."
"I would have never guessed that about you," said a book clubber, clearly uncomfortable.
I didn't feel like letting the subject die just yet. They had cornered me with the question. I would answer it.
"I watch women in the church and I just don't understand them. They are constantly smiling and serving and singing, "I am a child of God". They follow all the rules without question. They never let up. I don't know how to be that person... I try. But I feel it's painfully obvious I'm trying...
Steinbeck wrote a character that was born awful. A Whore. A Murderer. And people like that exist. Sociopaths. But he also wrote about good men who did bad things. And supposed bad men that did good things.
I like the concept that we are born with varying degrees of light but we can choose to be better. Not perfect. But better. The Hebrew, Timshel... Thou mayest... may be the most important concept we can grasp as the human race."
"Well, perhaps I will view the book differently from now on," said another book clubber.
The subject was quickly changed to chicken salad recipes and the weather.
I suppose I was askin' for it choosing a book about whore houses, murder, and adultery for a group of retired Mormon ladies.
Ah well.
One day I will learn to behave myself. Maybe.
Vintage Magic Story:
Old Country Roses
Royal Albert Bone China
England
1962 Royal Albert LTD
My china whispered to me the fate of it's previous owner.
Lilly Charlotte was a Southern Belle who had grown tired of her husband.
She found it surreal to wake next to the same man every single day.
Day in and day out. There he was.
She longed for the days of yore when she had been single and carefree.
But there he always was.
Kissing her "hello". Kissing her "goodbye". One would think he was off to war every morning the way he fussed over her.
His very presence caused her anxiety.
He snored.
He slurped his soup in front of her mother.
He sang the same insipid song in the shower every morning. I'm a little teapot. Short and stout...
He was short.
And stout.
It was 1962. The Beatles "Love me Do" was a hit. Marilyn Monroe had overdosed. Big things were happening in the world and Lilly Charlotte wanted to be a part of it.
That year Benjamin bought Lilly Charlotte the Old Country Rose china she had begged for.
"No decent married person can show her face in town without a set of good china!" she had pouted. "If you don't buy me that china I'll be miserable! Just miserable. I'll never come out of my room again! You promised you'd take care of me when you married me. You promised!"
She poisoned him slowly. Such a lovely weapon of choice, the teacup.
"One lump or two, dahhhlin'?" she would ask.
He had always enjoyed their Tea Time. It was the only time of day Benjamin enjoyed Lilly Charlotte's undivided attention.
Benjamin never dared complain of the bitterness of the tea. He just drank it happily.
One day Benjamin woke up dead.
Lilly Charlotte was lonely once the excitement of the funeral parties had worn off.
She found she could not sleep without the comforting snore of her husband. She missed his short, stout, furry body next to her in bed. She missed his face in the morning. She missed the "hello" and "goodbye" kisses.
Most of all she missed the singing.
Lilly Charlotte lived a sad, uneventful life until the day she decided to poison herself via pretty teacup.
One day she woke up dead.
Lilly Charlotte hoped Benjamin would forgive her for killing him.
Benjamin had already re-married a Yankee up in Heaven.
The End.
