“What do you have against tea?” I asked my husband many years ago.

“It tastes like hot water and it’s weak,” was his immediate reply.

“You mean it’s not coffee,” I countered, and we both laughed. I found his answer to be analogous to saying, “I don’t like apples because they are not pears.”

But my spouse’s  decades long aversion to tea has one very positive aspect. If I offer him tea when he is sick and it’s accepted, I know it’s time to take him to the emergency room.

I am an ardent lover of good coffee, but also an admirer of tea. Tea soothes, calms and relaxes. A fragrant cup of herbal tea accompanies me to bed every night. And I would never decline an invitation to a tea party.

Tea is steeped in more than tea leaves; it is also steeped in tradition. The Japanese elevated the making of tea to a fine art. Consider this passage from The Book of Tea by Kakuzo Okakura :

The tea ceremony was an improvised drama whose plot was woven about the tea, the flowers and the paintings. Not a color to disturb the tone of the room, not a sound to mar the rhythm of things, not a word to break the unity of the surroundings, all movements to be performed simply and naturally…

The British afternoon tea is another version of ritual. Time is set aside to enjoy the company of friends or family, manners are paramount, lovely dishes are used and a delightful array of small treats are indulged in.

Almost every afternoon my husband and I have “tea time”. Because of my spouse’s tea phobia, coffee fills in for the tea. It’s the quiet break in the day that matters.

The little cat feet came last week. And I’m not referring to the 36 paws that pat around in our house every day. Fall is fog season, and for those of us who live beside a giant lake, the fog is intense.

I frequently will be heading home on the freeway in brilliant sunshine and then turn my gaze toward the lake and see a solid roll of fog. “Socked in” is the local phrase describing this condition.

There is no scientific difference between clouds in the sky and fog formed near the earth’s surface. Consequently, I will frequently be walking around with my head in the clouds this fall.

Lake Michigan produces advection fog when warm, moist air advects, or blows, over the cold water of the lake. Massive billows of fog smother the lake and drift over the land.

The haziness gets compounded by radiation fog when the earth cools down after sunset. “Ground fog” happens on still nights and creates amazing Halloween effects.

One night last week we dined on our front deck and watched the fog envelop our known world…no field, no road, no barns, no mailbox. We were encased in a quiet, white cocoon.

But the flip side of fog is horror. Unsuspecting drivers race seventy-five miles per hour down the freeway that follows our shoreline. When suddenly they are staring at a solid white wall of fog, they slam on the brakes. Despite the fact that this road is the deadliest in the state, no fog warning signs are posted.

Travelers at Milwaukee’s Lake side airport are luckier. Fall flights are frequently grounded by fog. Drinking a latte and waiting for the fog to burn off should definitely be viewed as life enhancing.

When I was three, I decided to be an artist. My beloved Aunt Vi encouraged me in this endeavor. She was the head file clerk for a large company, and when she culled her files, she gave me boxes of discarded paper to draw on. First, I would sort it by usable drawing space (all had type on at least one side) and second by color. I felt rich.

Perhaps this gift explains why I am a one woman crusade to get paper the respect it deserves. Paper is such an ordinary, omnipresent part of our daily lives that many people squander and discard it without a thought.

Every child who has been an art student of mine knows my mantra. “Paper comes from trees, and we don’t throw trees in the garbage.” Invariably, some students will reply that they deserve a second piece because they recycled their first one.

I counter that recycling involves great quantities of energy, and it is more ecological to use the first piece more wisely. “If you mess up, you fix up. If all else fails, turn the paper over and start again.”

A short incident many years ago involving children and paper is etched in my brain. I was at a workshop for children at New Mexico’s Folk Art Museum. A group of Huichol Indian children from Mexico were guests of the museum and joined local children to do an art project. The Indian children did not speak English, but art is a universal language,   and they eagerly worked on their drawings alongside the American kids. Then, all of a sudden, one of the local girls scribbled over her work, balled up the paper in her fist and tossed it in the trash.

The looks on the Indian children’s faces  were of shock, horror and fear. “Is she going mad?” their expressions conveyed. To some of the world’s young people, a beautiful piece of drawing paper is a treasure.

As our American children head back to school, I hope they value all the school supplies in their new backpacks……and, more importantly, their chance to get a good education.

The New York Times recently ran a rosy hued obituary. Don Featherstone, the man who invented the pink flamingo lawn ornament, died this summer at 79.

Mr. Featherstone, who called his creation Phoenicopterus ruber plasticus, was a graduate of the Worcester Art Museum school. Plastic was taking over the world in those days. So immediately after graduation in 1957, he took a job at Union Products, a firm in Leominster, Massachusetts, that made plastic lawn ornaments. He remained there for the next 43 years, eventually becoming president and part owner.

His first assignment was to make a 3D duck. He bought a real duck, named it Charlie, studied it for six weeks and sculpted the product. The duck lawn ornament was a hit, so his bosses suggested another bird assignment……flamingos. This time Mr. Featherstone relied on National Geographic photos for models. The finished product sold in the Sears Catalog for  $2.76 a pair and came with instructions: “Place in garden, lawn, to beautify landscape.” The rest is history.

His iconic birds have won many honors. In 1996, Mr. Featherstone was presented an Ig Noble Award, an annual prize honoring unusual achievements. And in 2009, the Madison, Wisconsin, City Council made the pink plastic flamingo the city’s official bird. ( This action came shortly after 1,ooo of the birds mysteriously appeared on the University’s Bascom Hill one morning.)

Don Featherstone led a happy, humble and zany life. He and his wife, Ruth, kept a flock of 57 plastic flamingos in their yard each summer. For the last 37 years, he and Ruth have worn matching, themed clothes each day, all sewn by Ruth.

On the event of the flamingos’ golden anniversary, Mr Featherstone quipped,”We sold tropical elegance in a box for less than $10. Before that, only the wealthy could afford to have bad taste.”

Our cat, Beatrix, had a ride in a tow truck last week. The main cause of her adventure was my car. It has had three engines in the last three weeks.

Beatrix was also partly responsible for ending up in the wrecker. She had refused to cooperate when my husband tried to give her a booster shot which our vet said could be administered at home. My husband doesn’t give second chances. He put the girl in her carrier and drove 30 miles to the vet clinic where the vet tech showed her who was boss. The deed was done in a second, and cat and husband were heading home when the car’s overheated engine light flashed on.

Three weeks earlier, my car’s original engine had died, apparently wanting to end its life at 200,000 miles. We opted to do the reycle thing and had a used, low mileage engine installed by our local Hyundai dealer. This replacement engine expired a week later, the dealer gave us another loaner car and put in yet another used engine.

My guy didn’t miss a beat when he found himself stalled on the Interstate with a miffed feline. He called the dealer immediately. A tow truck was dispatched, and both cat and husband got to ride up high in the front seat like road warriors. They were given the same loaner car to get home, and I believe we may have squatter’s rights to it.