A Teacup of Hope?
by
Anna McDonald
How we looked forward to Saturday evenings in 1936! Six young girls in their mid-teens would meet in one another's homes after a week of trying to earn some money to help our families. The two youngest, age 15, worked a forty-four hour week in the steaming hot 'modern' laundry. It did bring in a regular pay of twelve dollars a week. Two girls, age 16, worked in their parents' businesses, at no pay, of course. Everyone must contribute to the family. The fifth girl and I worked in the garment industry - the sweat shops - sewing shirts. Of the six, I was the oldest. I had the lowest paying job. I walked five miles to work and five miles back. At the end of a week, if I received five dollars I had done well in this piece-work system. It was something. Better than nothing. Oh how depressing and hopeless it all seemed! Is it any wonder then, that at the end of a week of drudgery, we all looked forward to the time when we could, for a few hours, cast our cares aside and enjoy each other's company. The Saturday nights that were spent in my home stand out vividly in my memory.
We played board games such as 'checkers' or 'snakes and ladders' (cards were not permitted in our home). We didn't even have a radio. We had, however, a piano. Invariably we would gather around our Mason and Risch piano with its rich base tone. Mary was the pianist. Mary with the blond hair and pale blue eyes had slim fingers that just went up and down that keyboard never hitting a wrong key as mine so often did. Mary's range of music included not only hymns, but the classical and everything in between. She didn't always have printed music. However, her fingers always found the right keys because she could 'play by ear'. How we loved to listen! How we loved to sing!
In no time, nine o'clock had rolled around_refreshment time. On the wood stove in the kitchen, the kettle had been kept hot, ready for making a big pot of tea. No tea bags, but loose tea leaves, for now it would be tea-cup reading time.
On the homemade kitchen table covered with its blue flowered oilcloth, we set out six cups and saucers. In the centre of the table, I served my mother's homemade "more delicious than McCain's" chocolate cake. Before pouring tea, I stirred up all the tea leaves in the pot to make certain everyone received their share.
I do not remember what we talked about. Talk we did! How we enjoyed our refreshments. I do remember it was a fun time, a time of anticipation. What was our imaginative, talkative Mary going to find in our teacups tonight that would help us face the coming week?
The tea was good to the last drop. If drops were found in the cup, perhaps our reader would find some sorrow. The empty cup was turned upside down onto the saucer and turned around three times. After making a wish, the cup was handed to Mary. Our moment of truth had come.
What a spell our 16-year old put us under. Never at a loss for words, she took us along paths we dreamed about: a handsome young man, a new job, perhaps a dress, a special gift ... and always good health.
We all had known each other since the age of seven, had gone to the same public school, the same church school, and church, so we helped her along in her pronouncements of future happenings in our lives. She helped us see hope when we thought everything was hopeless. She brought laughter to our hearts when we were depressed. She restored faith in ourselves and in others.
Our teacup reading did not end there. In walked my parents from their Prayer Meeting. My father, a short stocky man, quickly hung up his coat. Seating himself at the table, he asked for a cup of tea "with lots of leaves". That's right. This old man of fifty years, with curly hair and sky-blue eyes, this hard-working labourer became a man young in heart again. Eagerly he waited to hear what Mary, the fortune-teller, had in store for him. How he would laugh! How his eyes sparkled!
I raise my teacup to Mary, our teacup reader, who in friendship, brought laughter, joy and hope when there was so little of it in our everyday work-a-day world of 1936.