The Lazy Devil
It’s tough when your twenty-five year old son is hell-bent on becoming a writer. You do wonder where you went wrong as a parent. Persecute yourself for having failed as a mother. Nights are spent...
View ArticleDear Twits
Dear Twits My mother and father couldn’t speak a word of English when they migrated from Holland to Australia in 1951. It was enormous fun to hear them learn to speak English. There is something very...
View ArticleStorm in a Teacup: memoirs of a tea lady
Chapter 1.I was born with a sugar spoon in my mouth and a tea cosy on my head. So it seemed inevitable that my mother, a tea lady herself, should teach me how to be a tea lady from early childhood. I...
View ArticleStorm in a Teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 2.
Chapter 2.My mother taught me how to be a tea lady. With admirable patience she trained me in every aspect. From boiling water to reading tea leaves. I have such fond memories of sitting alone with...
View ArticleStorm in a Teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 3.
Chapter 3.On Sunday mornings, mother and I would go walking in the Jarrah forest which surrounded Wattlebird. As we ambled along a track, mother would often point out a red robin or a family...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 4.
Chapter 4. Despite my mother being a self-proclaimed loner, she managed to get around, and was an active member of the C.W.A., the volunteer fire and ambulance brigade, the hospital and football...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 5
Chapter 5.Friday nights were dedicated to playing poker. Mother said it was essential for anyone working in the hospitality industry to be able at times, to appear poker-faced. So, to that end,...
View ArticleReclusive tea lady wins top literary prize! Silver Tea- Urn award for memoir!
The tea lady who works for an international law firm declined all requests for interviews, saying only that she would save her prize money—one million dollars—for a rainy day.
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 6.
Chapter 6.Mother worked as a tea lady at many of the social and sporting functions in Wattlebird. And she often took me with her so that I could gain invaluable insight into the machinations of being...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup:memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 7
Chapter 7.Mother often worked as a volunteer at the Wattlebird haven, which was a refuge for the broken hearted. Or as mother described it, ‘child, it’s a place for grown-ups who’ve lost their way.’...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 8.
Chapter 8.Mother, never one for sitting around, went hiking when not serving tea or volunteering for the many causes she belonged to. Together we trekked the countless bush-tracks near our small...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 9
Chapter 9On winning the Tour de France, Mother, inexplicably, lost her joie de vivre. Mother was never, ever, quite the same. She refused all interviews and gave her yellow jersey to me, and her...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 10
Chapter 10I was merciless in my attempts to get mother out of her bed, where she’d taken refuge since winning the Tour de France. ‘I’m too young to be a tea lady,’ I argued. ‘Ten is...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 11
Chapter 11.Mother loved to read books and would often ask me to take out books for her from the Wattlebird community library. In particular she loved local authors such as the brilliant Felicity...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup:memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 12
Chapter 12.Although my predicament was frightening, I was determined to prove to the world that despite my tender years, I could be an accomplished tea lady. My first gig was fast approaching...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup:memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 13
Chapter 13.Mother kept to her bed while I continued to work as a tea lady. I was beginning to become quite skilled at serving tea. In each hand, I could now carry three cups of tea on saucers. As a...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 14
I met my future husband-to-be at Royal Perth Hospital where I had already been working for a number of years, pushing my tea- trolley from ward-to-ward, morning, noon and night. Dishing out endless...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady Chapter 15
Our courtship was a brief and happy one. Teddy and I got to know one another extremely well over endless cups of tea. Teddy—still in hospital, and still wearing a full head and body plaster cast—...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 16
Storm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 16It was on a beautiful spring day, when there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the air was filled with birdsong that Teddy and I got married. However...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 17
Teddy and I had only been married a short time, one week, when he confessed with tears in his eyes that he was tired of drinking tea and wanted to installed an electric cappuccino making machine in...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 18
My marriage to Teddy had now turned into the proverbial storm in a teacup. Teddy and I argued day and night as to which was the better brew—tea or coffee. In the end we went and saw Wattlebird’s very...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 19
I was there at Woodstock. And I remember everything. It was in the summer of ’69, and I was busy backstage making cups of tea for Janis,Joni, Jimi and The Grateful Dead. But the absolute highlight...
View ArticleStorm in a teacup: memoirs of a tea lady. Chapter 20
There were times in my long working life as a tea lady when it was financially imperative that I turn my hand to other endeavours, such as in the late spring of 1983. My work as a tea lady had...
View ArticleChapter 21
My dear fellow tea lovers, late last night Buckingham Palace phoned me and asked me ever-so-politely if I would consider being the official tea lady at the marriage of Harry & Meghan. I told...
View ArticleChapter 22
Storm in a teacup: Memoirs of a Tea Lady.Chapter 22 Dear Reader,You may well wonder why you haven’t heard from me for a while. There is no easy way of explaining my absence except to say that I’ve...
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