Gather Round the Table

good things will come of it

Between my salty missives on not entertaining other people's demons and my urgings to invite your friends over for cake, I've been puzzling over how we counteract the divide that is being purposefully hoisted on our country. My conclusion, we eat dinner together.

The slow pace of sitting down to break bread together (literally or figuratively) and look someone in the eye innately brings down barriers. By no means is it a surefire way to ensure that all parties will acknowledge the perspective of the others, but it's far easier to dismiss someone from afar than it is sitting across from him.

There's a reason they stripped this from us during COVID. There's a power in gathering, and I'm not simply referring to the energetic amplification that occurs when people embodied in their own energy are in the same room. It's more human than that. When we're together, we listen — at least that's my sincere hope.

Todd Rose, the author of the timely book Collective Illusions, made an astute observation during a conversation with Mike Rowe on how we accelerate the healing of our country —

All it takes, as simple as this sounds, is for everyone listening not to write their Congress person, not to protest, but to speak up — in their neighborhoods, with their families, in their churches. Respectfully. Humbly. You might not be right. Just because you have an opinion doesn’t mean you’re right, but you owe it to your fellow citizens to respectfully give your opinion.

If you do that, if you have taken that small act of courage, you will be part of something that history will look back on as ushering in an incredible new era of American prosperity — not just materially, but psychologically. That’s what’s available to us right now. It feels like the days are dark. They’re not. They’re not. And we have a role to play.

— Todd Rose on The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe | March 5, 2025

Have we forgotten the value of talking around the table about anything and everything? Have we come to dodge the accountability and compassion of meeting face to face? Do we no longer want to find the commonalities that we readily share? Has rigidity crept in prohibiting us from entertaining opinions that are not our own? I hope not.

Nuance lives in conversations that stretch for hours, not 90 second videos devoid of context. I want to hear your stories and how you arrived at your conclusions. I want to ask follow up questions and nudge you a little harder when your logic is murky. I want to end the evening understanding each other better, even if we disagree. It's time we rekindle connection.

It's decided. My act of rebellion (not that I needed one) will be to host dinner parties. As long as you're not trailing demons, you're invited to my table. The door is open.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (2018)

for more thoughts that come to me while I’m cutting carrots…