The Old Dining Room Table

The table, solid walnut, is in pieces. It waits for me to have time to assemble it, place it in its new home, settle it in.

It has a long history, beginning perhaps at the end of the 19th century. It's difficult to tell its age, except that it is beautifully and massively made, with heavy carved legs and feet, and leaves that extend its length to eight feet or better. Even though it has been in my family for almost 50 years, I will have to search books to identify its style and age.

Probably it started life in a fine house, with twelve or more matching chairs surrounding it as it sat in state in a large dining room. How it ended up in an antique store called Grandma's Attic in Independent Hill, Virginia, in the late 1950's is anyone's guess. Mine is that it was part of an estate and it was just too big for most homes being built in that time period. So it was sold at an estate auction and landed in the yard of the antique store, where my father found it.

That day was dark and rainy, and a storm was brewing when my parents stopped by Grandma's Attic. The table was outside, and the owner was muttering about where in the world he would store it before it rained. Dad asked, "How much?" The owner said, "Take it now for $40." Dad said, "Sold!" and the table was loaded into his car and taken home.

We needed that table. By then our family had grown to ten children, and we needed a big table. We used a small card table (called the "little kids table") for the children out of high chairs but still too small for the big table. If we had guests, a common occurrence in my memory, we squeezed into our places.

The new table gave us a luxury of space. My parents even bought twelve new chairs for it. We were living in style then! I remember one Thanksgiving when 27 people gathered at that table to celebrate a meal together. Birthdays, holidays, and finally weddings as we all grew up and moved out--all were celebrated at that long table.

Time passed, children left, and slowly the leaves were removed, one at a time, until the table was only a five-foot square. My parents sold the old four-square house and moved into a small ranch style house better suited to their aging needs. The table went with them, but instead of being used daily for meals, it was often covered with craft materials as my parents pursued retirement hobbies.

After my mother passed away the table was taken down and stored in the basement--no one had a house big enough to hold it. My husband and I added a room to our home, a room built of 150-year-old logs. That room would hold the table, and so it was given to me.

A 300-mile journey later, the table is here, still in pieces but ready to be put back into service. It will be in front of a window that looks over mountains, surrounded by more plebeian pieces and tools from years past. Will it feel it has come down in the world from its beginnings in a fine estate? I don't know, but it will be loved and cherished, and put into regular use when all our sons and their families come home to visit.

And I will remember, each time I look at it, those times when 13 little faces gathered around for dinner at 6pm in an old house in the middle of Manassas, Virginia, and I will be very glad it found a home with me.