One Bagatelle, and I’ll raise you a novel,” Megan had tweeted back.

“Writing for tea? Now that would have been a solution for the British empire,” Laura returned.

“Writing for me,” Megan had typed.

“I’ll write you a tea fortune.”

“No deal. I want a novel. September sounds good.

Have tea, might write,” Laura returned.

Her tea basket was still lost, but that didn’t seem to matter now. People used to eat loose tea on long journeys. They’d pack it into hard little cakes they’d pull out later, to gnaw on while they warmed their hands by a fire. The tea provided physical sustenance, but it was also considered good for the soul.

Tea was more than boiling water. There were decisions to be made and a frame of mind to develop, no matter how imperceptible.

The fact is that if the writer's attention is on producing a work of art, a work that is good in itself, he is going to take great pains to control every excess, everything that does not contribute to this central meaning and design. He cannot indulge in sentimentality, in propagandizing, or in pornography and create a work of art, for all these things are excesses. They call attention to themselves and distract from the work as a whole.

Writing starts with living.