Despite social media, email, apps, texts, and even old-fashioned phone calls, I am admittedly terrible at keeping in touch with friends and loved ones.
It’s not that I don’t care; I think of them often, wonder how they’re doing, and know we’re long overdue to catch up. But real life often gets in my way.
So I am in awe of the women in the 2014 Chilean documentary La Once (Tea Time) — nine of them, at the beginning of the film — who after graduating together from high school met every single month for tea, conversation and friendship.
They did this for more than 60 years.
I recently watched the film, made by Maite Alberdi (the granddaughter of group member María Teresa), on Netflix; several years’ worth of teas are captured.
The movie is very intimate, with close-ups that make you feel as though you’re seated at the table with the women as they converse, quibble, reminisce, gossip, laugh, debate and, naturally, sample the generous abundance of delicious treats. Their monthly gathering is important enough that they all dress up; good china and proper linens are used, and elaborate tortes, tarts, and other treats worthy of a baking competition are served.
Reminiscent of the classic film My Dinner with Andre, during which lively and thought-provoking conversation while eating is all the excitement and drama that’s needed, this is not an action-packed thriller. But it is poignant and offers a glimpse into the lives of these women over the course of decades that brought college, marriage, children, revolution in their country and in their Roman Catholic Church, employment, heartbreak, social change, loss, joy, and, well, life in all its sometimes mundane and sometimes messy glory.
The women — Alicia, Angélica, Ximena, Juanita, Nina, Manuela, Inés, and Gema, in addition to María Teresa (known as Teri) — remembered that when this monthly tradition first started, they were so young and naive that they’d feared getting pregnant for simply holding hands with their boyfriends. But they evolved into women who have withstood far more than they’d ever imagined possible: widowhood, a family member with special needs, debilitating illness, cataracts, the onset of dementia, and a husband’s infidelity.
La Once is not maudlin or depressing, though. At one of the teas, the women cheer on their beloved Chilean soccer team. They regularly break into song, because “a meeting without singing is very boring.”
In the course of 60-plus years, these friends grew up, grew wiser, but never grew apart, thanks to their monthly teas.
But as their numbers dwindled, it was clear by the end of the movie that the tradition was nearly finished.
Until that time, though, they were grateful for each other.
“We are fewer now, Lord, but we still thank you,” they said during grace at one tea.
“Let’s make a toast to our friendship,” they offered, with raised glasses, at the last one we were invited to share in.
First Published March 6, 2022, 3:00 p.m.
