What I know about tea...

Tea, for me, started off as a thing I did for an ex-boyfriend. I'm a coffee drinker by nature but because it was a tradition for his family, I tried it. At first I was hesitant, fearful that I would somehow like it more than coffee, which was an unfathomable concept since coffee and I have a tight relationship.

I started by drinking PG Tips, a British black tea which was served as a common afternoon treat with crumpets or like-wise cracker type nibblets. My first cup was successfully poured down the drain after I let it sit too long and cool. It became too bitter for me to even finish. My second cup complete with milk and sugar was finished but not necessarily enjoyed. I think I was still having coffee-replacement fears but I began to understand that it was less about the actual drinking of the tea that was important, rather the company and social aspect of it. Like the hookah of the hot drinks family.

Overtime I developed a taste for the black tea and ventured out to discover what other flavors I could find. Mint green tea proved to be a winner almost from the get-go and continues to be a staple in my kitchen. Some flavors failed, mostly in the red tea department, but recently I discovered a red tea that has me hooked. Celestial Seasonings Red Safari Spice.

Discovered at the urging of an aunt of mine while recovering from a two week-long cold, this tea has amazing powers. Really. Think of a winter, Christmasy flavor of cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, piquante peppers, blackberry, cloves and bananas (I know!)....with the aftertaste of freshly hot apple cider. Sometimes my teas require a bit of sweetening but this one is perfect as is. I like it not only for it's colorful mural on the box of safari animals on safari (so fitting) but because it reminds me of the holidays at at time in the season when it is still 4 months out (despite Target's push to get the decorations up way early this year).

After years of drinking tea, I can safely say that my relationship with coffee is still going strong. What tea provides for me is a hot drink alternative when I don't really need the jolt of caffeine that coffee provides. It comforts me, soothes me...relaxes me. At this point in my life, tea is my elixor for when my nerves are shot and I need an escape.

So while I don't know everything about tea, I do know this: it makes me happy.

What I know about running.

I do not run as a physical exercise; I do, however, often use the word "run" when referring to relationships.  It seems to fit better than any other descriptive I've come across.  Relationships are not things that happen to us, rather they are entities that we are a part of in some way. Even with people we haven't met, a relationship still stands; your relationship to that person is as "strangers" and there are meanings and connotations that go with the name.  So even at the most remotely connected level, there is still a connection.  Running a relationship, though, comes with time. It's the movements, emotions, actions, reactions that come with knowing someone over time and becoming familiar with their patterns and them with yours.  In relationships, you cannot hit the ground "running" (with one exception that I will discuss later).  From my friends who are runners, they say it's a gradual buildup when you start a running program if you want to succeed.  You never want to start off at full pace, for you will find yourself tired very soon and risk hurting yourself if you haven't stretched and prepared.  But, after you get started, you start to experience a "runner's high", a feeling of euphoria that makes the run easier.  

There are a lot of relationships I don't know how to run.  Siblings, father-daughter, orphan.  My longest running relationship to date is as the only child of a single mother who spent my childhood making sure I never questioned her dedication or love for me.  That's an extremely high mark to live up to if you're a new person coming into my life.  I guess we're all only really able to "run" in whatever relationships we've come in contact with and the ones we've been the closest too seem to the ones we often carry on into our later life.  I've had the pleasure of running in relationships that flow with ease, gradually morphing into some of the best relationships of my life.  I've also had the discomfort of entering late in the race into a very destructive relationship run that spun a web of lies, hurt feelings and ultimately a very untimely and sad ending.  Not all runs are clean cut.  Sometimes the race stops and starts many times, taking twists and turns with no real end in site.  No two runs are the same.  

The biggest mistake is assuming that once you run one race, you know how to do it perfectly.  While we're all running, we're not all at the same pace, we're not all heading in the same direction and we're not all on the same course.  Let's bring it back to relationships.

The one exception to the rule of not hitting the ground running in relationships is the relationship you have with yourself.  No one knows you better than yourself, but we're never given a manual on how to run that relationship.  Everyone grows, changes, evolves.  And it's those everyones that make relationships possible. 

With other sorts of relationships (friends, romantic, professional), we start off for the most part on equal ground.  Neither party really knows what to expect outside of the general nature of each relationship.  Friends have the expectation of a mutual respect and admiration for each other.  Business partners have the expectation that you're working together toward a common goal.  Romantic joinings are the messiest of the sort, as they sort of intermingle friendship, business and romantic into one and sometimes expectations can get muddled.  This is why you can't hit the ground running in a romantic relationship.  There are really three heats to this race.

Heat one of the race is really just that: heat.  It's when you find something attractive in them that piques your sexual and sensual interest and you start thinking you could "really see myself this this person".  This is the part of the run that should be taken slow and steady.  Think of it as lap one.  You'd never start off a romantic race at a dead sprint because by lap two, you're completely spent and eventually at that pace will have to stop cold or keel over.  Second lap of the race is the most crucial.  You're still in the race of romance but now you're past the initial lust factor and really getting to know the person.  Sometimes there really is only lap one of the race and then you start over.  But if you can get to lap two, you find yourself being tested, your endurance is put into play and you really see where the race could go.  With the romance already in play, the friendship piece is introduced.  You start to make a daily conscious choice to be with this person, despite their annoying habits and faults.  This is also the point where the race becomes steady.  This phase could last anywhere from 3-50 laps, give or take a few.  When you've run together for a while, you start to realize that you're running on the same course and that you want to continue running together.  That's when the business part of the deal comes it.  By business I don't mean a cold, calculated type of exchange, rather it's the final "deal" that you make with this person that you plan to run this race, with all it's hills and valleys, with them for life.  We'd all like to believe that we make this deal once in our life, some do, some don't.  For those who make this deal for life, they have chosen to run next to someone who cherishes them as a whole person.  Feeling this type of love is an amazing thing, almost impossible to describe to someone who's not experienced it.  

I will never take up running as a sport, it's not in my nature.  But I do choose every day to take up running relationships with people I encounter.  If you realize that the runnings of life eb and flow like running rivers, you can take more of life's bumps in stride.  People will run in and out of your life, relationships will run their course.  But the one person who will never run out on you is yourself.  This is the most important relationship to know how to run.  Like people always say, "you can't love someone till you love yourself" which is a romanticized version of "get the running of yourself in order and running a relationship with someone will be a hell of a lot easier".