The Supper Table

Often, I get emails from people who have attended one of my presentations. 

I love hearing about how my message works for them; it’s a 90% for me!  It’s inspiring.  So today, I’m sharing one of the emails I recently received in the hope that you will be as touched as I am. The message below relates to my strong belief in the importance of the supper table I share during some of my presentations.

“I am lucky enough to be in the group you describe as “sitting at the supper table”.  This has stuck in my mind and has made a difference in my home.  My parents, a farmer and his wife, were lucky enough to have time to sit at the supper table with their four daughters. The supper table was not always a conventional one; sometimes it was the back of the truck with the end gate down, sometimes a blanket in the field, or another makeshift eating place to accommodate Dad’s work, but we always ate together, even during harvest, when Dad was stressed about getting the crops in.  He always stopped for a break and took the time to chat.

My husband and I have one beautiful, incredible, intelligent, and sensitive 6 1/2-year-old son with the greatest little smile and the biggest hugs ever!  We continued the supper tradition with our son, talking about all sorts of things.  I truly believe God sent him to us to make us better people.

My son taught me one great 90% lesson that I would love to share with you.  At age 4, he was in daycare and had brought a favourite truck to show-and-tell. He was so excited to show his truck to his teacher and friends.  When I picked him up from daycare after his show-and-tell, the daycare director explained that my son had proudly shown his truck, chatted about what it could do, and then shared it by passing it around the class.  When it came time for the last little boy to see it and pass it back, he was upset and threw the truck, breaking it into several pieces.

Tears welled up in my son’s eyes as his pride and joy was destroyed!  I almost cried while she was relaying the story.  She explained that my son was still pretty upset about the truck.

Seeing me, he ran to the safety of my arms with tears flowing. Through those tears, he did his best to explain what happened: he tried to be brave and forgive the other little boy, but he wasn’t ready.  I took his little hands in mine and asked him if he was ready now? He said yes, but he was still really sad cause it was his best truck.

We chatted, and I explained that maybe his friend was mad at something else, not him or his truck.  I asked him if he thought that this friend was more important than his favourite truck.  He replied, “Well, right now it's kinda hard to think that, but ya, I don’t think he was mad at me or my truck, just something else.”  I was very proud that, through his sadness, and at that moment, even though he didn’t 100% believe it, he knew that his friends were more important and that sometimes we are the targets for anger from others because we are there, not because they are angry at us.

He provided me with the same kind of lesson the other day.  I was on the phone, upset at a large corporation, not being able to reach someone to talk about something, you know, going through the “press 1 for xxxx, press 2 for zzz thing.  So, when I finally reached someone, I was not as pleasant as I should have been.  I had raised my voice to the person on the other line a couple of times, when my son came over and tapped me on the arm,

“Excuse me, Mom, why are you mad at that person?”   

My initial thought was to tell my son to go back and play, that Mommy was talking, but I quickly realized that wasn’t the right thing to do and that this little boy was trying to tell me that I wasn’t mad at the person, just the situation.  So, I took a breath and rephrased my point of view. After I finished the conversation, I went over, hugged my son and thanked him for helping me out.  He smiled at me and said, “That’s okay, Mom. You weren’t mad at that person, just something else, right? Did I help you, Mom?”  I smiled and said, “Yes, yes, you did.”

I am glad I have a supper table family to give us time to talk and learn, no matter what the supper table looks like.

Wow… out of the mouths of babes, right!