Dinner is the appetizer of the evening.
Um. Did you catch that?
Dinner.
Is the appetizer.
Of the evening.
???
When this mind-numbing phrase was uttered by my husband last week, my wheels started turning: Could this be true in America today? Is dinner just supposed to be a quick stop on a Friday night before something else becomes the big event? Dinner is usually my appetizer, meal and dessert, so if dinner is only supposed to be the beginning, what comes to comes next when it comes to fun? Am I super boring or too old school for just wanting to sit and talk instead of dashing off to some activity? And if I am, how did I end up like this? If dinner is the appetizer of the evening, then I had questions…
With a bit of *** DEEP THOUGHT*** I realized that within the confines of that single, clever metaphor is a statement that’s both uniquely personal and overarchingly cultural. How much of what we do for fun is of our own spur-of-the-moment volition, and how much of it is us unwittingly carrying on family or cultural traditions without even realizing it? Are our life-long social scopes actually set in place by- gasp!- our parents?
What IS you doing?
Hang on. Before I ask all those questions, I have other questions: IS dinner really just the appetizer of the American weekend evening? If you go out to dinner is it just the pre-game pitstop, or is dinner your main event? I have opinions on this. (Surprise!) But if they’re way off base, then what DO people do for fun these days and what activities are at the center of it?
I know me really well and no one is quicker to self-analyze their own tendencies than I am, so I gotta admit it, here: I’m a little freaked out by the fact that none of this has never occurred to me. Let me explain how this started.
It was a Saturday night and Husb and I were trying to decide which local restaurant to go to. We both had “had it up to here” with work and desperately needed a little down time. (PS- Being married and deciding on a restaurant is an annoying venture anyway. He only ever wants “meat” or “Mexican” or his all-time favorite food “I don’t care” which, like revenge, is a dish best served cold, in my opinion.) So here we go trying to decide…
Chinese? Always a “yes” from me when it comes to take out, but a resounding “no” anytime we want to sit down, have a drink and eat the yummies on site.
Mexican? A usual “no” from me, but definitely a “no” tonight because Mexican food literally arrives at your table in under 10 minutes. And I just wanted to relax.
“I hate that!” I said. “If you really wanna go get Mexican, we’re ordering one thing at a time.”
“I agree,” said Sean, my husb- scrolling through Twitter as I ranted.
“I mean, you’re out for dinner! The thought of going out on the weekend and having a good time is what gets everyone through the damn work week! Who wants the night to be over in 30 minutes?”
“Right,” he sighed, “but for most people, it isn’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“Most people probably want their food fast because they’re going somewhere afterwards. Movies, sporting events, shopping, bowling…”
“Bowling?”
“I’m just saying. For most people, dinner isn’t the main event. Dinner is the appetizer of the evening,” he said, and turned his eyes back to TweetBot.
I stopped. I put down my wine glass. I stared at him. (It’s been known to happen. Have you seen him? Anyway…)
“Did you just say dinner is the appetizer of the evening?” (He knows I love metaphors.)
“Yeah. You realize three hour dinners aren’t typical. Don’t Italians in Italy do that? Sit around and eat 15 courses of food and drink and talk each other’s ears off? That’s probably why you guys do that. Americans are in a hurry. They make dinner out of a box or order it through a drive thru or make something easy and then get on with their night. Dinner’s an hour. Tops. Then they go do other things.”
But… but… when do they have deep conversations about the meaning of life and hypothesize about the purpose of man’s existence in the universe? (Ok, my Husb would NEVER even entertain 30 seconds of a conversation like that. Sigh.)
But like, when DO they talk about their current projects and goals?
When do they gossip about other family members?
When do they bitch about their bosses?
Surely, not while they’re freakin’ bowling! It can’t be true that dinner is the appetizer of the evening! Dinner is… it’s… it’s everything!
I started to wonder if he was right. Was my social interaction style some dusty, old cultural hold over that I was completely unaware of? To be fair, my grandfather IS 100% Italian. His parents came over on the boat from Sardinia in the 1910s. So really, I suppose we’re not that far removed from the old-world hours-long Sunday suppers that might have unknowingly shaped my entire concept of recreation. Hmm…
I had flashbacks of my mom saying, “Don’t go through life thinking everyone was raised like you, because they weren’t.” I thought that was a warning to avoid the killer or people who wanted to, oh I don’t know, blame me for stuff I didn’t do. I digress.
Really, my ma should have said, “Remember that our family parties like it’s 1492. Gettin’ all medieval and sh*t.”
Crowd surfing. Now there's an idea for Thanksgiving...
What is happening?
Husb was right; my family gathers mainly to eat and drink and… that’s usually it, and that IS an Italian thing. Traditional Italian dinners in Italy, even in modern times, start late, around 8PM, and go on for hours while 3-10 courses are often served. Italians view both cooking and eating as an art, and savor the food and the conversation with relish. We DO do that in my family.
In fact, we very occasionally play games, but we almost never watch movies or sports and we certainly don’t go DO anything after the meal. Is that weird? That stuff’s just not the kind of entertainment we were ever interested in. I remember one time in my entire life that I went to the movies with my parents; I think I was four years old. Neither one of them cared a lick about sports the entire time we were growing up, so they didn’t have “a team.” And they would both rather have jumped off a bridge than go bowling or to play mini-golf or something. It just didn’t happen. Did we miss the boat some how on how to properly be social?
It's not always this cute when I do it....
The MEAL is the social event in my family, so we make it special. Everyone cooks like a pro, everyone brings their best old or new dish and we put on good music and eat and drink and talk for hours. In some people’s family, that probably seems boring, but with a family as animated and outgoing as mine, there’s never a dull moment and before we know it, the clock is striking midnight and someone’s singing, making the cat dance and busting out the limoncello or another bottle of red. It had never occurred to me that this was an “Italian thing;” I thought it was just what all families do. Is that wrong? Limiting? Lame?
I always thought I was really well-rounded, with lots of broad interests and myriad life experiences going for me. In this whole “dinner is the appetizer” situation, I wondered if Sean Spouser was saying the only thing I like to do socially is eat and drink? Because that’s not the case!
I’m always… uh… I also like to… sometimes I… that one time we… damn. I started thinking: Surely, the nucleus of my entertainment scope is larger than cooking, eating, drinking and talking!
My friends. My BEST friends! They can vouch for my other interests! In fact, I had a dinner date this week with two of my best friends! We went to dinner at our favorite Italian place that has a nice Chianti and awesome classic rock and chocolate-cello shots in a mini-wine glass and we always end up sitting there for hours talking about all the things about ourselves no one else understands!
Crap, that sounds the same, doesn’t it? Now that I think of it, they’re both also Italians.
Fine. I admit it. I write, I cook, I eat, I drink, I gab, I listen to good music. Maybe that makes me a person of limited interests. And if it does, um, I don’t think I care.
I might be a person who’s short on interests, but I’m definitely one who’s BIG on quality time. That time around the dinner table, in my opinion, is ground zero for honing relationships and communication with friends and family.
So should I be more American and run off to a movie while wolfing a burger and chugging a milkshake in the car? Is that what people do? Cuz… I don’t wanna do that.
No. Supersize ya own damn self.
Maybe I don’t get it. If dinner is the appetizer of the evening and we hurry up and eat and then go sit at a baseball game, that’s fun (for you, LOL); but we can’t do much talking about how, say, your job is going.
If we’re bowling (bless our lame little hearts) I’m sure we’re being competitive and, like, lively or something. But we aren’t probably getting to the heart of how you feel about the situation in your family that’s been bothering you.
I can’t lend an ear to your relationship triumphs or troubles if we’re power-shopping through the discount racks at the mall.
NO! I want to sit down, look into your eyes, break bread with you and give you my undivided attention while you talk about all of the things in your life that truly matter to you. Because you matter to me. I want to help talk you through anything that upsets you, congratulate you and celebrate you on all the good you’ve got going on and hatch a plan with you that will get you one step closer to making your next dream come true. That’s what I do. It’s who I am and what I live for.
I spend all my time rushing. Rushing and working. Working and rushing. When it comes to being social, I want to slow down, taste, sip and savor. I want to talk. Talk for real. I hate questions that start with “How’s… fill-in-the-blank?” It’s probably fine, or it sucks, I don’t know. But let’s skip the small talk. Let’s skip having to order our food within the first 20 minutes of sitting down. I don’t want to do that. It’s not a race. It’s my life.
I feel like I should feel boring or lame for the way I like to hang out. Maybe it’s antiquated and outdated. Maybe I’m not cool. But you should know something. If I invite you for dinner, it’s not going to be the appetizer. It’s going to be a full, five-course, old school event. And when you leave, I hope your stomach and your heart are full, your mind is light and you have a happy buzz of good wine and friendship. THAT is what relaxes me. That’s what recharges my batteries. And maybe it’s not the American way, but I suppose that can be a good thing sometimes.
So cheers to that sweet, slow lifestyle that I now realize is not my personal choice so much as it’s a passed down way of living prized by a culture of people known for their art, their incredible food, their health and a life expectancy that we should all strive for. In my big Italian family, dinner might be a production, but it’s a production that’s going to lead us to a better, more fulfilled life. Have I convinced you to stop rushing yet?
In my world, dinner is not (and never will be) the appetizer of the evening. The fun starts when I walk through the door, put on my leggings, pour a glass of white wine, ask Alexa to put some real good classic rock on (and I have to do this about 14 times because she sucks) and begin to cook a meal for my family. By the conclusion of that meal- and yes, I secretly hope that is a few hours from when I set it on the table- it is my intention that our bodies, minds and souls are a little bit stronger for my efforts. Dinner isn’t the appetizer of my evening, dinner is the dessert of my day, and a that’s pretty sweet way to live if you ask me. -Kelly