Table + Family

I dreamed the house next to my grandma’s was gone. The lot leveled and growing grass that went uncut around the edges, a smitten wilderness in the blocky shadows of the apartment complex. In the lawn next to the driveway, between the large concrete picnic table and the beiged apartment building where you could read the rain streaks across the brick, was a long table. Long and wooden and lasting, a table large enough for generations of families to sit and eat. When I saw this table in my dream, the place settings were neat, cloth napkins folded at each seat. I hear the squeaking of my Grandma’s screendoor and knew in no way could everyone sharing this table know one another. Then I saw the actual table top, a deep chestnut finish, polished and oiled rich, but refinished decades over. I found the stains through the clear coats, the spilled wine that looks like the wood grain, a gouge from a child unable to use the metal forks. I saw the wear from where we sat on the long benches. My palm down on the table held the stillness but could feel the soft vibration of a glass being set down on the far end.