When I was a child I was quickly pressed into the duty of sharing at the dinner table. The youngest, and therefore most tyrannised in a family of 6 children, one had to eat speedily in order to avoid the inevitable fork of authority from an elder sibling who realised that you had a tasty morsel or two on your plate that they could take advantage of.
Even father’s prayers were not exempt from the errant fork that somehow found it’s way to my precious meal – stealing away the best bits of grub. The irony of ‘stealing’ while thanking God for the goods He’d provided evidently lost on my kin, or perhaps understood more literally than I ever could.

I fought, of course, with words and sometimes deeds. I was a scrappy wretch after all, and goodness knows I love dinner. But after a while, one came to accept that procrastination begot deprivation and either ate hastily or accepted that one would be obliged to ‘share’ their plate with the quicker and hungrier.

When I grew up, to share a meal took on a new meaning. Working for pittance-per-hour garnered a modest wage, and meant that college lunchtimes at the pub would only be affordable if you split the cost and consumption of your fish n’ chips with your English Lit classmate who hopefully wasn’t as peckish as you. But it was these countless hours at the pub that also introduced me to a new avenue of sharing – that of the heart, the mind and soul.

I learned a lot about my fellow classmates at the pub. It wasn’t the pints talking..but rather the psychological comfort that a satisfied stomach and reassuring four walls of a pub offered. I find that often when one refers to food and it’s ‘effects’ on the body, many presume on the powers of Tryptophan and the pleasing response of Serotonin. But there is more to it than just a chemical response. Eating has been a communal activity from primeval times – an inevitable gathering to share in a similar act. Engaging in such an activity with others opens one up to the idea of sharing more than bread. They are after all eyewitnesses to ones consciously ingesting foreign objects of nutritional value { one hopes }, into ones body. An incredibly personal act in a public space if you over think it. It’s only right..that one would then share things that pertain to the more external personal aspects of ones life.

I will never forget the pub lunch when I learned that Xaviera wasn’t a mouthy, back talking, classroom rabble rouser because she was obnoxious, but rather because she was never granted the chance to set roots and establish close friendships because of her father’s frequently relocating career. She was scared, fragile and shy. Her apparent overbearing demeanour her way of protecting herself. An act of self preservation. Her truth she revealed to us as we chomped our way through some sort of pie and pint. I never saw her in the same light again. Her menace diminished. She was…real.

Then I grew some more. Pub lunches were replaced with ‘dinners’ at friends houses or restaurants with cloth for napkins. Pints gave way to wine glasses or sturdy tumblers swishing with old fashioned’s. The sophistication and nutritional value of the meals also improved as did the quality and freeness of conversation. I’ve always been a shy one { much to the shock of those who don’t know me as one of six }, and love to listen, observe, yet only occasionally speak. But over time the willingness to share was indulged. The passing of years had increased the frequency of wounds in ones life and the salve that was granted through honest talk assuaged the sore.

I have fond memories, and lasting friendships from night’s such as this – learning what hurt, healed and may never be gotten over. Sharing the same. Occasionally, out of defiance there would be a refusal to share. A firmly closed lipped act of rebellion. But the allure of a judgement free zone would eventually coax out a sentence or two that would run freely around the room like a caged beast accidentally freed.

I can only wonder how this apportioning of secrets, feelings, words will evolve as I continue to grow and my life changes. Life’s penchant for cyclical behaviour implies that what started as a life literally sharing at the familial dinner table will end the same. But if there is one thing I’ve learned is never to presume to assume, { my life has a rather dark-humoured way of not doing what one would expect }. Scratch that, if there is one thing I’ve learned, it’s to protect one’s plate at all times. Even during father’s prayer.