Thumper

Thumper

I was a shy, retiring kid who, save for a few childhood friends, didn’t have much outlet for sharing my feelings and frustrations. So, it was of great comfort that our dinner table was a place where we gathered nightly, and on Sunday mornings, to discuss the goings-on at work and school and with friends and family, and just laugh and love and sometimes cry over spilled milk. No, sadly, that was some other kid’s dinner table. Our evening meal was an hour-long interrogation that assiduously avoided any subject involving human emotion, was served with bland and often inedible food, and a place where spilled milk was treated as a felony.