It’s the week after Thanksgiving and my friend Muriel decides that she’s not had enough cooking and hostessing. So she plans an elaborate Ladies’ Tea Party. Actually, I am severely mis-reporting the situation: she’s been planning this party for MONTHS. I am one of her few friends who have been in on the secret. The rest only hear about it when they get her invitation, complete with RSVP card, in the mail 10 days in advance of the date.

Muriel has painstakingly created her invites on good card-stock, then added individual collages of pictures from the internet, which she printed and cut out. The pictures are of women wearing 1950’s fashions. The reason? “Fifties Fashions” is the theme of the party, to be worn with hat and gloves. Bins is so excited at the prospect of attending a party surrounded by ladies in fancy dress that he’s truly outraged to hear that his male presence is not welcome! “It’s so unfair!” he whines to me, “so SEXIST!” I nod and grin, wholly unsympathetic!

The day chosen for the party is a Sunday, at 2.30 in the afternoon. I don’t ever wear dresses, so Muriel allows me to be the exotic foreign guest, wearing a kaftan. Of course, I don’t have a real kaftan EITHER, but I do my best, using my longest and most floaty outfit, plus a blue wig. Yes. Blue. Because I don’t have a fancy hat nor am I going to buy one just for the party. So a cheap Halloween wig, it seems to me, is a crazy enough compromise.

Of course, I have discussed all of this with Muriel in advance and I go to her house ahead of schedule so that I don’t have to wander the streets of Elsewhere looking like a blue-haired ghoul who lost her way back to the Underworld. When I enter the party-venue, I am completely blown away by Muriel’s preparations! Within the space of her dining room, she has set up a pink-and-white wonderland of tables decorated with place-settings, cake-stands and tea-related crockery.

Giant pink-paper chrysanthemums and stars hang from the ceiling. The cake-stands are groaning with cookies, cakes and sandwiches. Each of the 14 guests has her own place setting, with a cut-out of a ’50s style lady holding the beautifully calligraphed name-card. There are jars of candy, lacy white doilies, porcelain cups and fancy tea-pots. When the ladies start to arrive they respond with loud whoops of appreciation. The average age is 60, with 85 at one end of the spectrum and 41 at the other. But we’re like a bunch of shrieking schoolgirls, hatted, gloved and talking loudly while diving into the goodies.

Muriel has even provided entertainment of sorts with riddles, funny facts and interesting conundrums to read out loud. But the group’s high spirits are soon augmented with home-made Limoncello and the walls shake with high-pitched chatter and raucous laughter. My cheeks are creaking with smiles by the time I leave, carrying a “wapsi” bag full of home-made candy.

Manjula Padmanabhan, author and artist, writes of her life in the fictional town of Elsewhere, US, in this weekly column

Last Episode: Meaty treat

Next Episode: Twilight zone

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW