The Dining Ritual
With Thanksgiving tomorrow, the holiday season is officially upon us, even though a plethora of pumpkin spice things sprouted overnight in Albertson’s at the end of August with gigantic Christmas bric-a-brac appearing in Costco around the same time. Otherwise, this post is from my first book, Message in the Bottle: A Guide to Tasting Wine (timgaiser.com/tastingguide). In it, I wax poetic about my personal history of dining, and how gathering with one’s tribe for a meal is arguably one of the most important things we can do.
One of my core beliefs about wine is that it connects us to each other in ways that no other thing, substance, or small household appliance does. Also, that for thousands of years since the time primitive man first started decanting wine for aeration purposes, we humans have shared meals with members of our clan. Nothing could be truer for me.
I grew up in a household with six kids in the 1960s. Dinner time could only be described as loosely structured chaos. With four boys swimming in a morass of testosterone, it was not uncommon to have a dinner roll ka-tonked off the side of your head when you requested bread from the other end of the table. Asking for butter, which was actually margarine, was likewise risky business.
In short, dinner was a Darwinian affair requiring cunning and dexterity. Any and everything was passed around the table only once. If you didn’t get enough on that first shot, you weren’t getting more. A gallon of milk barely made it around the table. The oldest three of us quickly figured out that the only way to get more was to pour your glass full, drink half of it, and then refill before passing it on, causing an immediate firestorm of protest from my younger brothers and sister. It was also imperative that you quickly identify and skewer the biggest-ass pork chop-ham slice-slice of meatloaf on the platter when it came your way because it was your one and only shot at sustenance for the evening.
When my school mates joined for dinner, they were always shaken by the carnal frenzy that defined our family meals. But they soon learned to adapt or went home hungry. It’s also worth noting that my then future brother-in-law did not return to our house for over six months after his first Easter dinner at the Gaiser table.
Eventually, with the patience of a saint and the aid of blunt instruments, my Mom managed to instill some semblance of table manners in the six of us. That in itself is a minor miracle. Beyond that, she also managed in a very sly way to instill the dining ritual in us as a family. And not because she and my Dad were raised in the European tradition of fine dining with candle lit extravaganzas and lengthy erudite conversations. That was as remote as the Dog Star. Instead, it was the mere act of gathering the entire herd once a day so we could sit down and have dinner. Even if all hell had broken loose during the previous 12 hours—and it often did—we had the certainty of knowing that we as a family would share a meal.
Years later, the dining ritual continued after Carla and I moved to the City and were both bartending. On our rare nights off together, we either went out or stayed in and cooked dinner for one another. Explorations into the Byzantine menus of the now sadly long-gone Gourmet Magazine often ensued with the kitchen getting completely trashed, and us limping to the dinner table like stunned livestock after vigorous and sometimes pyrotechnic experiments in the kitchen.
The dining ritual continued unabated after our lives went from “man on man” to “zone” in terms of having kids. Looking back on those years, I’ve come to believe that one of the greatest things Carla and I have given our kids is the many years of the dining ritual. When it was dinnertime, life came to a screeching halt. Once dinner was plated and hit the table, everyone gathered regardless of whatever else on the planet was going on. My daughter Maria, newly married and working for the School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina, has told me many times that the thing she misses most about home life is sharing dinner. Especially the hours of hanging out at the table after dinner was over, finishing a bottle of wine and chatting about everything under the sun.
Does the dining ritual guarantee one a happy family or a long relationship/marriage? No promises, but it’s a primo opportunity to spend time with your partner and family. And that’s not a bad thing. It’s worked for Carla and me for over 40 years. It might just work for you.
Happy Thanksgiving to all!
Thanks Tim! So true!-) Happy Solstice-related Holidaze of your choice! All the best to you and your family!