What can happen when sitting at the table...

This again from

the Writer's Almanac today;

Perhaps the World Ends Here by Joy Harjo The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live. The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table so it has been since creation, and it will go on. We chase chickens or dogs away from it. Babies teethe at the corners. They scrape their knees under it. It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women. At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers. Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table. This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun. Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory. We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here. At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks. Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite. "Perhaps the World Ends Here" by Joy Harjo, from Reinventing the Enemy's Language. © W.W. Norton and Co., 1998. Reprinted with permission Being human does begin at the kitchen table it is where, the what and how we talk and listen and be with each other everyday happens. It is true that all of life can and does happen at the tables we sit at everyday with the people who we see every day of our lives