I’m not sure how the subject came up, but last Saturday morning my running partner said that if you drink a cup of white tea every day you’ll live forever. He chuckled in that way he has, so I knew it was a little joke. I would have known that anyway.

The tea was organic white ginger pear from Trader Joe’s. That’s where some Saturday afternoons we stock up on wine. We also bought our usual supplies: raw almonds, walnut pieces and pignolias for salads, pasta, maple syrup, a sack of small lemons, a sack of clementine cuties, cans of albacore tuna, coffee decaf and regular, ice cream chocolate and vanilla. When I flipped the box of white tea into our shopping cart, Laura said, “I don’t like white tea.”

“But it’s so good for you,” I told her. “It’s the next best thing to the fountain of youth.”

Laura curled her lips and shrugged her shoulders.

At checkout the friendly clerk asked if we’d found everything.

“Yes, thanks” I said.

“More than we wanted,” Laura said.

Our car was blocked by a delivery truck.

“What do we do now?” I asked.

Laura kissed me. The kissing went on for a while. Then a little more than kissing. Then a little more than a little more. The truck hadn’t moved.

We went back into Trader Joe’s. “There’s a truck blocking us and if we wait any longer my wife’s going to have a baby,” I told the manager.

“I’m sorry,” the manager said, looking at Laura’s flat tummy. “I mean that’s great. I mean...”

“What he means is that our ice cream is melting,” Laura said.

The manager got the truck driver to move his truck and he gave Laura a flower.

“You’re so sweet,” Laura said to him, and she gave him a kiss. “Maybe we’ll put Joe and Josephine on our name the baby list.”

The manager blushed.

At home I told Laura to relax, take a shower, and I would unpack the groceries and make her a cup of the organic ginger pear white tea, next best thing to the fountain of youth. “You’re going to love it,” I said. “I’ll put extra honey in it.”

A few minutes later I brought the hot tea to the living room. She was wrapped in a towel. I handed her the tea then took her towel. “White tea is best enjoyed bare,” I said.

“You’re making that up,” she said.

“Would I do that?” I said.

Laura grinned and shook her head.

“You’re so sweet,” Laura said, holding the steaming cup of white ginger pear tea to her nose. “Oooh, hot. I should let it cool first.”