We love these tables. Perhaps we are just a nutty family, but the tables themselves are important. So, here is a short synopsis of our table life (with and implicit recommendations that you should carefully choose and love your tables):

1. Our kitchen table. This is the center of our family life in the winter. (We eat outside in the spring, summer and fall.) We got this table for Christmas. Emily’s father, Glenn, made the table from cherry wood that he harvested from the land where Emily grew up. It is a beautiful table made to the exact specifications of our particular kitchen and family. Clear in its lines. Emily and I love to just sit and look at it.
2. Our outside table. This is the table at which we take most of our family meals—assuming good weather—from April to October. I put it out last weekend. I could not wait any longer. Again, this was made by Emily’s father. It is an incredible table. He constructed it so wisely. The benches are reinforced, without being bulky. Four large men can sit on them without a noticeable bend. The table itself is sturdy but it, to me, has an extraordinary elegance. It is built to last. I know this because my father, George, values it. Just after Emily’s father gave us the table (he made one for all of his children, I believe). My father visited from Indiana. We were sitting at the table waiting for a meal watching my girls play. Almost immediately, after sitting down at the table, my father began his commentary. “My, this is a fine table.” Soon he was feeling the wood, looking under the table, examining how the benches were constructed. He was even more impressed. I did not know how impressed he was until a few weeks later he called me from Indiana. He told me to take the cordless phone outside along with a tape measure. He wanted exact measurements of the table because he was constructing a twin in Indiana. To be fair it is not a twin. My father also constructed small end benches. I chuckled to myself as I called out the measurements. This was one of the highest complements my father could give to my father-in-law.
3. Our third table is our dining room table. It has less of the familial meaning than the others. It represents this fine County. My mother and father-in-law found it and its china cabinet at a sale for $200. We snapped it up. Frugality rules. It can expand to seat twelve. It also seats as few as six without seeming too spread out. At this table we feast. Being part of a church and community that is trying to renew the feasting habits of Christians is a pleasure. Most of my friends throw their feasts on Saturday night. We feast on Sunday afternoon. Not because we are standoffish (sometimes we cheat by feasting twice), but because we come out of family traditions that feasted on Sunday afternoons after church. Our girls love the feast. They cook. They make hors devours. They light the candles. Emily (and increasingly Maddy) are extraordinary cooks. We feast with good food, good drink and joyful reverie. We have fun traditions. At Epiphany we start two new white candles. One is the Jews and the other the Gentiles. These candles remind the girls of our Jewish foundation and of the Gentile inclusion. We light these candles for every Sabbath feast over the winter. They race to see which will get to the bottom first. (The Jews are in first place right now.) We know that when they are done. Spring will be here. This feasting is the center of our family life and the heart of our joy.
4. The “eschatological” table. There is some talk of a table from Indiana making a move to Pennsylvania. Right now it is the table in my parents’ kitchen. The table belonged originally to my great-grandfather Fischer. It could seat 20 (and needed to because he had 15 children). My great-grandfather Ranes also dined often around that table being the family doctor for the Fischers. He delivered most of the 15 children (for around $4.25 a piece). He even had one of the children placed in the warm oven because it was sickly—I think that that was my grandfather. Little did he know! The story goes that Doctor Ranes was always careful to arrive for his numerous house calls at meal time—great-grandmother Fischer was reputed to be a fabulous cook. The story comes down to me from both sides of the family. That I and my children could dine at that table thrills me to no end. We are in the market for chairs.