Cream Tea

My fourteen year old brain had yet to comprehend the idea that I should think things through before I did them.  Take, for example, my wardrobe on a fateful July day in Arundel, England.  It seemed to me a good idea to wear black tennis shoes with tall white tube socks enveloping my skinny legs.  Suspended only a few inches above the socks were a pair of blue basketball shorts and, in an odd attempt to make the outfit a bit more sophisticated, I had on a baby blue shirt with a screen print of teddy bears lounging about on a lawn.  Had I thought through the fact that Dad would take pictures which would forever immortalize my fashion, I wouldn’t have worn it. 

            The teddy bear t-shirt was the first in a series of missteps that day.  My family was visiting my mom’s cousin Steve, his British wife, Patricia, and their son, Lucas, who lived in Chichester, England, a small university town relatively near the coast.  Patricia worked at the university using her delicate touch, precision and artistic skills to restore old pottery and paintings.  She favored casual business clothes over her slender figure and always has every strand of her red hair in place.  She was the image of respectability and refinement. 

We were on our way to beach to experience the Atlantic Ocean when Patricia asked, “Steve, could you deposit the girls and me in Arundel?  You and the boys could toole off to that nature preserve.”  So it was that I ended up standing on a sidewalk dubiously looking at a row of stores.  Mom was more excited about the prospect of shopping so we entered shops at random until Patricia’s real motive for the stop was made clear.  She wanted to take us to a traditional British tea. 

            The tea shop looked like it had been decanted into the only small space available on the street.  Like so much of England, the buildings here nestled almost on top of one another, vying for the minimal space left on the cobblestone streets. 

“Ah, here we are,” Patricia said.  If she wasn’t so proper, I would have said she almost skipped in the door.  She hailed the waiter in a quiet, excited voice, “Three for tea please.” 

“Very good, Madame,” he said with a slight bow. 

The interior was diminutive, much of it taken up by a glass display case that exhibited the various delicacies the many regulars and any new comers could have with tea.  Patricia requested a table out back on the quaint patio area because it was such a charming day.   Potted plants adorned the small, enclosed space that held a few wrought iron tables and chairs.  Ladies in hats and dresses as striking as the flowers around them savored their tea, pinkies up, speaking softly to one another. 

Into this haven I tromped like a barbarian from the colonies, with Mom and Patricia floating behind me.  Mom was always after me to act more like a lady.  No dragging my feet,  no chewing gum with my mouth open, no sauntering about like a jock (which I was), no touching and breaking things that didn’t belong to me, for that matter, no touching and breaking anything.  I was not the most poised or gentle of teenagers and it surprised me that Patricia was willing to risk taking me to a fancy place for tea.  She didn’t know me very well, yet.  

We let Patricia order for us.  She settled on cream tea. 

“It’s called cream tea because it comes with scones which you put jam and cream on top of.  It’s really quite delicious,” Patricia said.  She was reassuring us because we weren’t fond of tea.  But we were willing to try it if it would make Patricia happy.  Our “scones” came first.  They were actually biscuits, but the British persist in calling them scones.   

I was so ravenous that I tore open my light brown scone right away, not thinking to follow Patricia’s example and wait for the knives, which turned up not thirty seconds later along with the butter.   I glanced at Patricia who had cut her scone with practiced expertise and spread a smidgen of butter over both surfaces.  Mom followed suit.

The butter was fresh out of the refrigerator and it baffled me that Mom and Patricia were able to spread it on their scones at all.  In my attempt, I was only amassing a colony of crumbs on the frigid chunk of butter that adhered to my knife. 

The raspberry jam and cream materialized while I was still baffled by the butter.  In the end, I used my finger to shove the spread off of my knife and did my best to distribute it evenly.  I ended up with two lumps of it in the middle of each half of my scone. 

Reasoning with myself that it really couldn’t taste that bad if I covered it in jam and cream, I slathered on a far too generous helping of the raspberry concoction.  Then, in a further misguided effort to make my scone better, I plopped two large spoonfuls of cream on top. 

“I should warn you, Jana, that the cream isn’t like what you have in the States,” Patricia said.  She eyed the mounds of cream on my scone.  “It’s not got sugar in it.” 

“Oh.  I’m sure it will still be tasty,” I said.  I’d said that about a chunk of bleu cheese once, right before I spit it all out. 

My erroneous reply stemmed from the fact that I thought that all cows produced sweet milk and sweet cream.  It seemed irrational to think that something that fluffy and appetizing could taste bitter.  I was about to take a bite when our tea arrived in a quaint teapot accompanied by a saucer of cream and a cup of sugar cubes.   Patricia poured the drinks for us, without spilling a drop.  I dripped the cream on my saucer and splattered my tea on the table when I tossed in a few sugar cubes. 

Before Patricia could set the teapot down, I picked up half of my scone to eat it.  It only made it halfway to my mouth before gravity overcame the compromised bread structure.  In less time than it took me to make it, my scone lay in pieces on my lap and my plate.  Patricia gasped, brought her napkin to her mouth and put her other hand to her red hair.  Mom laughed, her blue eyes creased at the corners, and handed me the white napkin she’d recommended I place on my lap earlier.

I scooped up the errant pieces of scone and tried to cleanse my shorts by wetting my napkin in my water glass and scrubbing the red and white stains.  My efforts were half successful.  Patricia shook her head.  If she hadn’t been mortified before, she was now. 

Now even hungrier, I picked up a piece of my ruined scone and popped it in my mouth.  This was the biggest disappointment of the day.  Contrary to my hope, the cream was not tasty, nor was the slick pat of butter.  Not even the jam could remedy such a calamity of flavors, nor could the tea.  Black tea taken just after consuming such a thing is not to be recommended.  Nor is it a good idea to put three lumps of sugar in such a small cup.  I almost gagged and spit everything out, but I couldn’t do that to Patricia.  Instead, I swallowed and chugged my glass of water. 

My next few bites of scone, using my fork like Mom and Patricia had been doing all along, were equally sickening.  I finally gave up and left the mess on my plate.  Unlike Mom, I did finish my tea, only through sheer force of will and as an effort to appease a frazzled Patricia. 

“This tea is, um, delicious.  Thank you,” I said with as much feeling as I could muster. 

I didn’t feel embarrassed that I’d made such a mess, I felt embarrassed because I’d ruined Patricia’s hopes for a nice quiet tea with her American family.  I could just imagine Patricia calling up all of her nearest friends, and even mere acquaintances, and telling about what a horrid mess her America guest made of something as simple and routine as cream tea.  There would be gasps and words of comfort from her friends.  They might even send flowers to brighten her day.

After we paid and exited the shop, we found the boys waiting for us in the van. 

“How was tea, ladies?”  Steve asked. 

“Oh, I could have just died!” Patricia said.  She slumped into the passenger seat with the weight of mortification on her shoulders.  I pulled up my socks and slunk to the back of the van.