Their Cup of Tea

My landlady, Merisa, likes to give tea parties reminiscent of a bygone era. The first time she invited me to tea I behaved like a woman of my generation—I said I was busy at the hour she indicated but could come a little later or earlier or on another day. She looked a bit confused, but politely said there would be another time. Daniela later explained to me that when Merisa said “would you like to have a cup of tea with me” she was indicating a formal occasion and an ordeal. Daniela had likewise been invited and Bente and a few other women I barely knew from the community. Sadly, on the day I had declined that first invitation, so had everyone else. Daniela and I were taking the dogs to field trials in Montecarrota that Sunday and she’d extended the apologies and excuses I hadn’t known were required. “Poor Merisa,” we kept saying to each other the long drive, thinking maybe the tea had in fact been more important than letting the dogs chase rabbits and foxes. How was one to know?

Women no longer wear white gloves and hats, but going to tea at Merisa’s one feels like one ought to be wearing white gloves and a hat. As the ladies arrive at the house one by one or in pairs bearing gifts for the hostess, they take calculated places on stiff backed chairs in the foyer. We kiss kiss the cheeks of women we know or shake the finger-tips of women we do not know and say, “piacere.” The friends closest to Merisa inquire who has been invited and who has yet to arrive. One woman stands by the window and makes the announcement: Ecco Lidia! Ecco Mariachiara! Finalmente c’e Luisa!" When everyone is gathered in the foyer--"Eccoci quoi!"-- we can all rise for the journey to the dining room at which point the table will be unveiled. The silver service is gleaming, the Ginori china twinkling. The hand-embroidered table cloth is still pristine after five-generations of use. Chunks of chocolate with hazelnuts, homemade biscotti, little cream puffs with zabaglione centers and slices of Torcolo from the Festa di San Costanza are arranged ever delicately on doilies on silver platters. Each woman takes her place and Merisa lets each sniff the tea bag to make sure the perfumo is not too strong. Sicure/are you sure? Merisa wants to know before she lets it drop into the steaming pot.

This Sunday when Merisa invited me to have a cup of tea with her, I determined that I should let nothing stand in my way. I’d just finished climbing a mountain with students when she buzzed my doorbell saying that the tea would be ready in an hour. She assured me my jeans and trekking shoes, even my sweat and dirty hair, were fine; it was just a cup of tea and a last minute gathering; we would be pochi. She’d been having brutte pensieri/ugly thoughts all day and needed a little divertimento/fun.

At first I felt like the ugly stepsister who crashes the ball, even though I’d traded trekking shoes for loafers, sweaty fleece for a turtle neck. The women were initially so polite, sitting on the edge of the dining room table chairs, pinching the delicate tea-cup handles, blowing at the steam. They made the expected comments about how lovely the table had been arranged, how wondrous the assortment of goodies. They inquired about missing friends and what business on earth—or god forbid, illness—could keep someone away from such a delightful afternoon. But after maybe two sips of the day’s choice in green tea with cinnamon, they began to cuss and giggle.

I love the way even proper Italian ladies cuss in ways American ones of a similar background would never dare doing. Cazzo (“dick,” but used like “fuck” as in “what the fuck are you doing? Che cazzo fai?") and stronzo or turd are expressions so common they infiltrate the language at even the level of tea-party usage. If one is angry, one is “incazzato/a”—dicked/fucked. Rarely does one hear “sono arrabbiata”—the more formal expression “I am angry.” “Stronzate” are turdy-things…an expression that’s used likewise diffusely in response to “What did you do yesterday? What did you write yesterday? What are your kids up to?" If the answer is “nothing worthwhile”(usually the answer among this set)—the reply is “stronzate” and of course anyone who gets on one’s nerves is a stronzo/a.

I don’t know why I found in a table-full of cursing grandmothers such amusement and comfort. There were such things of grand importance to discuss: the death of Gian Carlo Menotti, grand maestro of the Spoleto festival; the masked balls of Carnevale, no longer the grandche’/big deal they were in years of old. The women told me their stories, Merisa climbing on a ladder to pull down books full of pictures and proof. But it wasn’t so much the stories they told as how they told them, hooting, cussing, slapping their thighs until the church bells rang 7:30 p.m.--time to go home and prepare cena for husbands--and they all turned into pumpkin-people again, rising from the table together, stiffening visibly.