Two of the tables in our house have history. One is in the dining room, and has the capacity to expand to Thanksgiving largess. There are only three kids at home these days, so we keep it at a modest length: not so spacious as to restrict access to the far side but neither too skimpy to accommodate John's collection of papers. Since it is his home work space. 

 

We were given it by John's parents, who had their own brood of five sons and two daughters. They inherited it from his grandparents who hosted family meals with eleven children. As chance would have it they bought it from my grandparents, whose dozen offspring laughed and passed the potatoes across it for a generation. Including my mother.

 

Now it is ours. I love imagining the frivolity and banter that has soaked into the oak boards over a hundred years. My grandfather was a writer, and encouraged both humor and pithy conversation from his progeny. John's grandfather was a theologian, and his expectation was one of lofty discourse. Our grandmothers kept the food coming. 

 

The second table is in the living room. It has been adopted by Benjamin, for his collection of snacks, the remote, and the current game. It belonged to my mom in her later years, and when she died it migrated the short distance from her apartment. 

 

Although he was only eight when she passed away, there is a resilient cord between them. They were both quirky, grappling with the emotions that surged through their bodies, and the thoughts that invaded their thinking. I picture her smiling down as he fits pieces together, perhaps whispering in his ear about what might work. Mom loved vocabulary and is probably responsible for some of his best plays in Scrabble.

 

The last time we committed her to a mental ward, there was an awkward gap of a few hours between announcing the plan and completing the paperwork in order for the psych staff to show up. Benjamin was the only person she would tolerate to wait with her. He who had no judgments of her, nor she of him. 

 

One of the table legs was broken in a thrashing fit, before his meds found their groove. But it is mended neatly enough to be undetectable. It has become the platform for thousands of small cardboard shapes to find their home, in the completion of a landscape. 

 

I wonder about the future for my son, and curiously of this table. Will there come a day when the later is turned, and it is Benjamin who brings a cup of tea to his aging mother? Are there broken places in our relationship that are so well pieced that it is inconspicuous?