The table

In good times, I ate dinner on TV trays in front of prime time CBS dramas with my grandma beside me.

And I loved it.

Other times, I ate dinner on my lap with the dog as company.

And I knew no better.

Until I sat here:

This was the first family dinner table I ever knew.  There used to be a bench down one side where I could squeeze into the space I was so generously offered for a few weeks every summer.

And I couldn't believe it.

There was conversation.  And laughter.  And time.

It was foreign and odd.

And, from that first summer visit on, I couldn't sit alone with my dog and my chef boyardee without tasting the silence.

Dinners were supposed to be family and time and love, but I didn't know until I shoe-horned my way in.

Now my people sit here:

And there is conversation (so much conversation).  And laughter (with some tears).  And time (sometimes more than there is space for it).

And they know no better.

Every night I am reminded of that table and that bench - and the family that made room for me.

And I know that I could never know any better.