My kitchen table

N and I are like-minded on most things in life sans a few political and social ideologies and the whole Mac vs. PC debate. We have reached that scary point in our relationship where we often think the same thoughts simultaneously, thus leaving no real reason for us to communicate verbally anymore.

At any rate, we have one long-standing disagreement that neither of us have really been able to compromise on. The problem that's been begging us for a solution for 6 1/2 years of marriage is: "What should we do about our kitchen table?"

It's old. It's showing much wear. We have but three about-to-give-way Samsonite folding chairs to pull up to it -- the seats of which are frightfully bowed and cracked and we say a tiny prayer for protection each time we strap our children's booster seats to them. With Baby C sitting up now and venturing into the world of solid foods, we've had to borrow an extra metal chair from our neighbor just to have enough seating for our entire family. And when it comes to sharing a meal with friends at our home, even if we roll the computer chair and cooler into the dining room, the kiddos are often relegated to a "picnic" on the floor. It's time for change.

Yet, N and I have different ideas about how to replace the piece of furniture that represents everything social in our home. N wants a nice, sturdy, stately dining room set with REAL wooden chairs and some grown-up appeal. I want to keep our sweet old faithful 1950s-era ice-gray Formica and steel dinette table and order some snazzy (and pricey) retro dinette chairs to match. We'll stow those faithful folding chairs for company.

Alas, we've reached a stalemate and so we continue to make our existing arrangement work, however jerry-rigged it may be. I try to squelch my complaints every time I schlep out my pretty table cloths and dinnerware to spruce up our poor, tired table and chairs for a special dinner.

But lately, my attitude has begun to change. I've started to love the simplicity of our dining room in spite of its lack of charm and ambiance. Last month I started to teach our little daughter at home and we've found our combination kitchen/formal dining room table to be the place where we do most of our lessons. In fact, I use a book called: "Kitchen Table Play and Learn" as the backbone of our curriculum. Our table can be an artist's easel when we get out the tempera paints or an architect's drafting board when we construct juice-carton houses and cut shapes out of pizza-box cardboard. It's where our milk cups, coffee mugs, bowls of goldfish crackers and ramekins of pureed fruit land and lift-off from as we snack throughout the day. L hides under the pink cherry-blossom table cloth and pretends she's in a special house, then pops out to surprise her baby brother who has bent his torso far over the side of his feeding tray to greet big sis with smashed bananas coating his eager grin.

And at the end of the day, when we clear the clutter and set forks, plates and candles out for dinner, we don't worry about the paint speckles we forgot to mop up or the flecks of bright orange squash that cling to the chair legs. We just smooth out that cherry-blossom table cloth over the chipped Formica and seat our tired bodies on those battered folding chairs and look at the faces that surround our little miss-matched dinette set. We bow our heads and thank God for all that he gave us that day and then discuss over dinner the day's centerpiece, which is usually constructed of various art projects or a shot glass filled with water and whatever tiny blooms we happened upon while weeding the flowerbeds that day. And that's enough charm and ambiance for the perfect family dinner at our house.

I think about my grandmother -- our table's previous owner -- and how she probably used that table for the very same things I do as a stay-at-home mother. And even though that table was en vogue when she was its caregiver, somehow I doubt she ever fussed over whether the chairs matched or the pureed squash would stain. I don't think she paid much attention to the table itself. She was too busy loving the people who gathered around it.