A FEW GOOD …MEALS
5/29/20
I’m guessing the Halls are not the only ones to be having this pandemic experience. You know…the one where you find your family actually sitting in and having dinner in of all places….The Dining Room. Those of you with newer designed homes may not be having this experience as dining rooms have become “wasted space” in newer home designs, and therefore, not included. For those of us who have a dining room, are you like the Halls..? We rarely if ever use it. Routinely, we find ourselves using the island stools and/or the hearth room (which is basically part of the kitchen area) for our daily dining location options. On occasion, mind you very rare occasions, when we have a larger gathering, people seem to spill-over to the dining room in order to find an empty seat.
During this pandemic, we have managed to have several dinners, all together, IN THE DINING ROOM. It has been part of our overall strategy to take advantage of the times we are in and do something new to spice up life and avoid the boredom setting in. As you might imagine, it has been really nice. It has a nostalgic, old-time feel, and reminds me of my years of growing up in Anderson, IN. My parents raised us much like many of you from my generation….with routine meals in …yes…the dining room, or a similar space, with all present ……AND, no distractions. No TV, no radio, no phones….just food, each other, and conversation. It was nice then….and it was really, really nice now. It has left me with three thoughts.
- Why have we not been doing this all along…?
- Let’s continue to do this post-pandemic.
- So this is what the dining room looks like. I felt like Tom Cruise in the final scene of, “A Few Good Men”. You may recall. In the movie, Tom plays a military lawyer who has never had a case go to trial. Always settling cases out of court. At the end of the long trial at the end of the move…after Jack Nicholson screams, “….You can’t handle the truth”…and then soon after gets cuffed and taken to jail….Tom is walking out of the courtroom and says, “So THIS is what a courtroom looks like”. So it has been, I have been experiencing the thought, “So this is what the dining room looks like”.
If you have a dining room, and you are like us and have not used it over the years very much. Try it out, once or more a week, and enjoy the time and conversation….old-time feel….with your loved ones.