Table-Talk

These six friends all take their current jobs very seriously, as well they should. Why? Perhaps it's wanting to ensure that something they started when they started their own families continues well. But very likely they simply enjoy their work tremendously. To me, that their kids have kids is amazing. That's probably because I am just an observer, but I think they feel it too.

Anyhow, a few nights ago, our after dinner table-talk meandered from antique guns and bootlegged liquor to longevity of ancestors to winter getaway plans to medical insurance rates to the virtues of downsizing to pros and cons of Facebook friending and blogs.

What became apparent to me was that all politics is local, and varied sensibilities aren't  problematic at the kitchen table. This was just one time around one table that I noticed this, but it was not the first time.  Is it the gathering, the meal sharing, the physical proximity, the personal connections that kept us there? At some point we probably each had a felt need for the cushioned couches that were steps away, but  no one sought them and no one left until the hour was late and  the apple crisp a faint memory. 

It is good to have friends, to have time with them. Conversation is naturally on the larger menu when we gather, but the kitchen-table phenomenon distilled again (for me) the "all politics is local" vintage. The problem, the question, lurks: Why is it that we can't all get along? Having the job means doing the job, unless we play just for fun in the sit-down marching band. 

Half Moon Bay, CA - Michael R Ruhland