Ode to a Kitchen Table

A friend of mine who is a priest in Los Angeles posed a question on Facebook the other day.  He asked what object represented intimacy, not sexual intimacy, but the intimacy that comes from being in relationship with someone for a long time.  He was working on a sermon about something that I didn't pay attention to, but the question struck me.

And I immediately knew what my answer was.  The object that represents relational intimacy to me most is a kitchen table.  Certainly some specific kitchen tables, including my own, but also the kitchen table of history and of life.

First night of semester exams

We never hung out at the kitchen table much when I was growing up -- the breakfast room was back in a corner of the house, there wasn't much going on in the kitchen in the first place, and the dining room table was reserved only for holiday dinners, when my grandparents came to town, and the mail.  But in my house, the kitchen table is the center of all things.  It may be because I don't allow food upstairs.  It may be because I don't allow television during the week or the computer is down here or there's a comfy couch nearby for reading.  It may be because our kitchen table is where everybody is together most of the time.  It may be because my children can't go ten feet inside a door without dropping their shit everywhere and that's the closest place.  Who's to say?

But for whatever the reason, everything gets done at the kitchen table.  Eating, talking, crafts, projects, and homework, lots and lots of homework over the years.  And it makes me happy.  G has a desk in her room and does her fair share of cocooning, but usually only on the weekends.  S has never had a desk and when asked if she wanted a cool piece of furniture to use as a pull-down desk, she said she'd never use it because she always does her homework downstairs.

The table is where our family is a family.  And although T is gone most of the week, what I find deeply moving is that his place is always laid with a napkin (when there are any) and his place is always cleared.  The kids usually don't dump their books and papers there.  They'll dump their stuff on my place, but I'm around to clean it up.  Daddy's place is sacred.  I love that.  It's like the empty chair for Elijah at a Jewish Seder.  Keeping his place means he's always with us, even when he's away.

And I deeply love this table, too.  I especially love it when no one is here.  It's cleaned off and the napkins (when there are any) are folded.  And there are several more hours that it will stay that way because no one is here.  It is a place of infinite possibility:  newspaper reading, emailing, writing, reading, coffee drinking making to-do lists and including things you've already done so you can cross them off.  Wait.  What?

Kids' first day back to school a/k/a hooray!

And I love other people's kitchen tables, too.  My stuffy Florida grandmother's kitchen table had a butter dish that you were forbidden to get crumbs into - hello, butter knife!  But I can still smell the heavy scent of my grandfather's dark rye bread on all those summer mornings.  My mother-in-law's kitchen table has seen any number of looooong family gatherings - we are outgrowing her small apartment now that our kids have become adult-sized, but that table carries so many wonderful memories.  And it will continue to.

My best friend's kitchen table is a huge round, but we always sat right next to each other and drank coffee on those endless mornings when our kids were little and sucking the souls out of us.  We drank coffee and talked about what we would do and where we would go when we didn't have toddlers.  New York!  Paris!  New Orleans!  Who cares?!  And now, we don't have toddlers anymore.  And our oldest ones are starting to figure out their college choices.  But the table that was once a life raft may well be again, for a different reason.

And that's okay.

I think.

A Snapshot

So, I'm giving the vegetables about five more minutes to roast.  The kids are at the kitchen table with their homework.  I'm at the stove with my wine.  All is as it should be.

S:  Mom, want to hear a chemistry joke?
Me:  Sure.
S: I would tell you a good chemistry joke, but all the good ones are gone.

Wait for it.  Argon?

And she gets offended when we tease her about band.

Wow.

Reality Check

G has been hit with the reality that is junior year.  She was really freaked out over the summer about the  number of AP and preAP classes (5).  She was really freaked out about AP Spanish IV because she's "luckily" scored the two easiest Spanish teachers for Spanish II and III, which is great when you're in it.  It's not so great when you hit Spanish IV with the rest of the kids who are actually ready for Spanish IV.  Surprisingly, though, this year has been pretty easy for her.  She's had homework, sure.  Some late-ish nights.  But all-in-all, she's had time to watch a little TV, hang with friends, compulsively clean her room.  All the usual things.

You know how life doesn't always space things out for you?  T had the worst June I've ever seen when he had two several hundred-page documents due for work.  Any week that grades were due were inevitably paired with multiple roadblocks, development days, and computer snafus.  It just happens.  And you have to take those weeks as they come, do your best, and move on.

This year, I've been very intentional about how I parent my older child.  I am trying very hard to pull back and let her make her own decisions.  For those of you who know me, you can stop laughing now.  I really am succeeding fairly well with this.  Because I have to.  Because in two years, she'll be gone.  She'll be at a wonderful school, having wonderful experiences, but she'll still be gone.  So she's got to learn to self-direct, self-manage, and self-soothe.  And she's done quite well with that so far.  She has really supportive teachers, and the things that she really feared have not come to pass.

Until now.   And her luck ran out in Spanish IV.  They had a quiz this week.  She stayed up until 12:30 studying for the quiz.  She made a 0.  As in ZERO.  Nada.  Nadie.  Zilch.  I don't even know how to process that.  She said that most of the non-native speakers made 0s, 5s, and 15s.  The native speakers made 25s.  Putting aside the argument that if scores are that low, it might be a teacher issue rather than a student issue, but still.  It's demoralizing.  And scary.  And I hurt for her.  And no matter how much I tell her that I know that she is working hard, she frets.  It makes the next assignment that much more important.  And it's due tomorrow.  And that doesn't include the pre-Cal test.  Or the AP History test.  Both of which are also tomorrow.

And as much as I want to run in and call the teacher and schedule the tutoring for her, that's not what will help her in the long run.  She will get there.  She will be okay.  She will leave me to make her own way in the world.  And sometimes it will be hard.  Failure and struggle are often much more educational than success.  And that's a lesson that I have no control over.

But it still sucks.

Fly! Be Free!

We are very proud to say that she passed her driver's test on the first go round, which is more than she can say for her mother (did you know that you don't have to pass parallel parking anymore?).  She has picked me up a diet Coke and bought gas.  She has a key chain that is bigger than my whole head.  And most importantly, she has already erased every bad moment of her childhood by taking her sister to a sleepover and the dog to the vet.

I know there are moms out there who fret every time their teenager is on the road alone in the car.  Who worry every time they leave the house.  Who faithfully track their child on GPS.  I'm not one of those.


Can I get a hallelujah?

Sins Revisited

My kid is learning to drive.  Now, I don't look like I could possibly have a child getting ready to be a licensed driver, what with my perfectly unblemished skin and girlish figure, but I do.  And it's been much easier than I thought it would be.

For me, I mean.  There is nothing better than letting your kid drive you around.  I can text with impunity, eat my breakfast on the way to school, read the newspaper, and (you people who have younger kids might want to sit down for this) drink beer when I'm at friend's house.  Or my mother-in-law's house.  Or really anywhere I damn well please because I HAVE A DESIGNATED DRIVER.  I keep hearing these parents whine and lament about being sad about having a driver, fearful that they'll be in an accident, bereft at the thought of their babies growing up.

Fuck that.  Here are the keys.  Be careful.  Your car payment is to take your sister anywhere she wants to go.  Your insurance is taking the dogs to the vet.  Your gas money is running any paltry errand I can think of.  Godspeed.  Fly, be free.

I'm not sure that it's been quite as easy for her.  You see, I tend to be just a teeny bit controlling.  I'm sure you can't tell.  And I tend to handle that by yelling "STOP!STOP!STOP!" over and over whether it's an emergency or not.  I'm trying really hard not to, but,  I'm not going to lie, I'm struggling.  And some of my passenger-seat psycho behavior I don't even know I'm doing.  For example, when she first started driving, she claimed that I do a hissing inhale every time she takes a curve too fast (or maybe not even too fast, maybe any curve, who's to say?).  Now, most of the time, I'm not even aware that I'm making this sound.  And up until about three weeks ago, I would have denied that I was doing it.

Until. . . .

Until three weeks ago, when my mom came to town.  Now, I'm 44 years old.  I got a hardship license at 15 and have been driving a car since I was 13.  I haven't had a wreck since I was in my mid-20's and in that one I was a passenger.  I haven't had a ticket since my mid-30's.  I don't reverse well.  I am an excellent parallel parker.  I think speed limits are more guidelines than hard and fast rules, and my neighbor just told me last night that he "knows who stops at the neighborhood four-way stop and who doesn't."  But all in all, I'm a pretty safe driver.

So, my mom and S and I were in the car, headed to pick up G from school.  On our route was a 90-degree left curve in a 50 mph zone.  I took that curve at a relatively judicious 35-40 mph and smoothly entered the curve, accelerating at the apex of the curve, just like my daddy taught me.  And at the moment I was executing this epic driving maneuver, my mom grabbed the "oh shit" handle and made this hissing inhale noise.

Busted.  And the worst part was that G wasn't even in the car at the time, so I could show her that it wasn't my fault.

I can't help it.  It's genetic.

Mutiny

G this morning had a total meltdown when she asked when the project was over.  For whatever reason (a/k/a I didn't tell them because it would cause unnecessary pain), she wasn't aware that the project is intended to be 11 months long.  She asked how long we've been on it.  I said 95 days.  She said it seems like much longer, and I told her that it just seems like it (a/k/a I wasn't going to count the 3 month trial we did last fall).  But then T reminded her that we had done the trial last fall (thanks) to which I replied, "we sure did the trial last fall and then for the next 40 days, we ate out about 30 times."  And I'm not exaggerating.  Clearly, we didn't stay on the project long enough to change our bad habits.  Hence, the almost-a-year without unnecessary restaurant eating.

And hence the meltdown.  G said that she thinks about restaurant food all time, and she gets jealous of all her friends who get to eat fast food all the time.  I am so very proud of myself that I chose not to point out that that wasn't really something to be jealous about and that it's a pretty first-world problem to have.  Golf clap.  I am an excellent mother and not just because I chose not to pick an even bigger fight.  And then I said that in two months, when she can drive, she can go buy an over-priced, unhealthy meal everyday if she wanted to.  In a loud, judge-y, shrew-like voice, dripping with irony and filled with disappointment at her failing me.  In short, exactly what works with almost-16-year-olds.  Um, you can cancel that Best Mom Ever plaque.


Once she had left for school, T and I discussed the meltdown, and he, very astutely, said that it's about control.  And isn't it always?  Being about the most controlling person IN THE WORLD, I should have seen that coming.  And yes, this project is about controlling what we eat and how much we spend.  And yes, as the only cook in the family, I am pretty much the Idi Amin of our kitchen (although I do take requests).  But it's still control that I have and she doesn't.  Lifestyle change clearly doesn't come easy.  In fact, it sucks.


So then, I began to ask myself, am I really doing the right thing by legislating everything they are eating for an entire year?  Or am I creating food issues that didn't exist before?  As a kid with weight issues who grew up into an adult with weight issues, it's hard to find the line between educating your kids about diet and exercise and just pissing them off, pushing them to eat just to get back at you.  And I still don't know where that line is.   


But I do know this.  When I picked G up from school today, I offered to take her to the new (okay, now, not so new) Schlotzsky's that all the kids were talking about and making her jealous.  And I was seriously okay for her to go, even if it meant having to own up to it here.  I almost wanted her to say yes because I wondered if the sandwich in her head really would match the reality.  But she turned me down.  She said she really didn't want it now.  She just wants to be off the project.  She wants to be able to have fast food once in a while.  But she also said that we aren't very good at once in a while.  So, she thinks she can wait.  She's very focused on our beach trip.  Only 30 more days.  And I may let her choose where we go for Mother's Day.


I love that kid.