The one page about Tea Mannsfeld.
You probably wondered if my parents actually named me Tea. They didn’t. And thank God. When they picked my actual given name, they tried to rhyme it with anything that sounded crass or rude in their language to make sure I wouldn’t be made fun of for my name.
If only they had figured out a way to prevent all the other things I would be made fun of for the next several decades.
I joke! I kid. I wouldn’t attempt to be funny or crack wise so often if not for all the teasing I grew up with, and then through.
Here’s a few details about me that are not jokes:
I grew up in Texas, lived a middle class life, graduated high school, and went to the only university I applied for during late submissions. After schooling I joined the US Army, served four years mostly in Germany, and then attempted to teach at public schools in Texas. I quickly realized I did not like any of these kids anywhere close as much as my own kids, so I then went to the only graduate school that accepted me out of twelve I applied to, and now work as a professional and technical writer and sometimes orator. (Professional speaker sounds less classy than orator to me.) I’m married and have three kids.
I once ran a marathon because people talked about it as some huge milestone in life when I was convinced it was just running for over four hours. It turned out to be running for over four and a half hours. I finished the Paris marathon and have never wanted to run another marathon.
But writing is a creative outlet I’ve been pursuing for decades, and despite regularly writing enough to fill books, I haven’t ever lost the motivation to write the next story.
Why subscribe, especially now that you know a little about me? Tea sounds insufferable, I know.
Free Subscribers get regular access to this newsletter in your inbox and get a sip of the “most business days” posts containing writing, poems, stories, or conversations I hope to have.
Paid Subscribers get preferential treatment and are my favorites, but also access to “lightly edited normal computer text” transcriptions of the typewritten images, which are easier to read on many devices.
Everyone who is a writer will definitely feel better about their own writing after reading my posts.
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If you’re reading this far down, you either like something I wrote here enough to hope for more, or you enjoy hating it enough to keep coming back and poke fun. Be part of the Tea Samplers, a community of people who share your interest, or intense dislike, of my writing. Participate in the comments section or support my work by subscribing. For a spam-free, ad-free reading experience, get the Substack app. I prefer the app for reading because it has dark mode.
