Family Dinners

Dinner with the family, supposedly one of the mainstays of American life, didn't happen very often in my house when I was little. My father worked nights, ate his main meal at noon and took his lunch to work. When we were in school, we usually ate school lunch and that was considered our main meal. In the evening, we ate a simple meal that my mother always called supper. Dinner was the noon meal. Since my older brother and sister were quite often late getting home, they ate whenever they got there.

On Sunday however, we all ate dinner together. It was usually a special meal for us and we looked forward to it, especially since it followed a long morning at church. We were always served meat along with potatoes and vegetables. The meat was usually beef prepared in different ways to stretch it among eight people. Vegetables were usually cheap so we were given plenty of those, and of course, there was always bread.

Our kitchen was small and even though we had a separate dining room, we always ate our family meals in the kitchen. My father removed the table-and-chairs set-up because we couldn't fit that many chairs in the space alloted. He built an L-shaped bench in the corner and placed the table next to it. I think we had room for three chairs at the table. The kids sat on the bench, my father sat at the head, and my mother sat next to him on the side next to the stove. The youngest sat next to my mother. It was crowded but I remember it with pleasure. The food was always good, the conversation was lively (we were all talkers), and my father often entertained us with stories of his life as a child.

We never had much money but my father had a good union job and he kept us supplied with the basics. I remember growing up knowing that we didn't have money for "extras" but I never felt deprived. It wasn't until I went out on my own that I realized my family was part of the working poor, and my mother had to scrape together enough money each week to pay the bills. There was never anything left over. Yet they encouraged all of us to continue our education after high school and managed to contribute something to what we earned on our own. I think my sense of security and well-being began at those family dinners and gave me the confidence to continue on to my future.