A few days ago I came back from Christmas break to find out my favorite tea store since I’ve lived here, went out of business. In an effort to track down the tea, I was determined to go to their other stores in Munich. Today I went to one.
It was magical and all I ever hoped for. The service was lovely and they had all the teas I wanted. It was truly awesome. Except for when we asked if they would have this seasonal tea next year, to which they replied they didn’t know if they would be there next year, but they could guarantee next month.
This threw me into a deep fit of sadness. I drink tea everyday, multiple pots a day. It makes me so happy to have tea and different kinds to experiment with. These weren’t just normal teas, they were special teas from a local retailer with wonderful service. I know it’s a reality that more businesses like these will go out of business, but the reality of it left me cold.
it left me sad and hopeless, wondering what I was going to do next Christmas, where I would get my next tea advent calender, my next special winter tea blend.
They made me feel at home, when nothing else could. A warm cup of tea was the brightest point of my day, the thing I looked forward to after a long day.
It left me wanting to not want anything. It left me thinking, why want things? The disappointment of not being able to have what I wanted seemed crushing. I just didn’t want it anymore. I didn’t want the lovely tea, I didn’t want to go to the beautiful tea store, because wanting was just too painful (isn’t that the case?).
Wanting was just too painful. Wanting and knowing it would end, knowing there would be a day I couldn’t get what I wanted, that it would be taken away from me one random day without anything I could do. It was a profound sense of sadness and lack of control.
I let that feeling control me for a while, feeling really sad and hopeless. I can totally understand how some people can feel this about other things larger than my tea store. Because people should be able to want things, to strive, but what happens if wanting really is too painful? If you’ve experienced let down so much that you don’t want to want. It reminds me of a story I read last year about a servant who was a hardworker, but once she is offered a sweet, she suffers a break that night and ends up killing her employer. In the class I had, it was explained that before she could never allow herself to want, to want to move up in life, to want things like sweets, but after she is permitted one, it opens up a flood gate for her and the wanting is just too consuming and causes those drastic actions.
While I don’t feel like I’ll go killing my employer (the primary reason being that I’m jobless…mostly), I can begin to understand a glimpse of that mindset.
While I didn’t let the feeling rule me (I have decided to stock up on all my favorite teas from there next month) it did teach me an important thing about the danger of desire.
(((On a side note, what if I buy all the teas I want, and it lets them survive another month? But then I don’t need anymore teas, and then they go out of business? Hardly likely, but maybe)))