I’m not even sure that my family recognizes that we do this. I know we never talked about it. I know this has caused me more than one faux paux.
My family considers the head of the table the center of the table. Then you’re in the middle of everything, people and food. Sitting at the ends of the table was for the children so that we could jump up and get what was needed and so that we would be on the edge of what was happening.
In some instances, this works fine with me. My FIL would probably shoot anyone who sat in his seat, so I take the middle of the table and have all the fun. In other instances, not so much. I’ve sat at the end of a conference table because I was the new person, only to find out I was sharing the end with the chair.
It doesn’t make sense to me to sit at the end of table to be in charge. Anyone else have any ponderings on this?
At our house the head of the table are both ends of the table, which are fitted with arm chairs. That’s where I sit when we have company because I am the head of the household (only a momentary token role). However, for our everyday meals my wife and I sit side-by-side at a small wooden table in the kitchen, where we can look out the windows in three directions and watch the wildlife at the birdbath and feeders.
I have no idea what it is like to be in charge.
Back in Belfast, in our wee brick semi-, I had the seat next the window, with the table flap down. It meant I had to sit sideways. When I was five years old it wasn’t a problem, but when I became a teenager, I felt seriously cramped at table. However, there were no other places to sit. When I returned in my twenties, and pointed out the position, the reaction was “aghast”.
Here in the Hame Cainties, in Buckinghamshire, we have an oblong table that can be made bigger. My wife does the cooking and serving and sits in the seat nearest the kitchen. I won’t argue with the proposition that she is in charge.
At meetings at work I have one rule: try to sit facing the door. I think that was Canada Bill Jones’s rule, and it’s a good one. If someone comes through the door with an urgent fax or something, you can duck under the table. It’s served me well in the past.
That’s a good rule and one I always follow. I was a having breakfast one morning in a restaurant in Prescott, Arizona when a man walked in and shot a young man in the neck in the booth next to me with a .38 revolver. I got to him before he shot again.
My own house is small and the kitchen table is the only table and that is a tight fit. We can fit up to 5 but folks would have to be compatable. Seating is based on comprehensive needs.
At one end of the table is the seat reserved for the most useless person. They don’t have to get up for anyone.
At the other end of the table a grownup can sit but that grownup blocks traffic between the appliances so that person has to be able to stand up.
On one side of the table, two people can fit but one of the people has to be small enough to fit between the table and the china cabinet and the other person has to accept the heating/AC vent blowing directly on them. This is usually my wife’s seat. Both people have to be able to get up as they block traffic to the livingroom room unless a person wants to go out the kitchen door and come back into the house through the livingroom. The other side of the table is my seat. I control access to the fridge because I know where everything is and I’m probably the person who needs all the condiments and stuff anyway.
Having two people who can’t get up and out of the way at our table really just shuts down the whole show. So we go out to dinner when that happens.
For three years I lived in Prescott, Arizona, where it is legal to carry a gun just about anywhere. A moron carrying a gun in the supermarket in the same shopping aisle is not my idea of a relaxing shopping experience. At least in Indiana, if someone carrying a gun comes through the door of a convenience store, you know to duck for cover.
