Boston Market catered my Turkey day this year. Though grateful for the $22.41 needed to purchase this tasty meal, I was saddened that it was not prepared by her hands, served from her dishes….consumed at her table.
In fact, that table is gone…loaded on a truck with careless quickness.
That table used to hold meals prepared in love.
That table used to shelter the dogs from scolding tones.
That table held mail sent to me years after I had moved away.
That table now sits in a Goodwill with unfamiliar pieces of furniture
questioning what it did to deserve this relocation…
this transition from a warm purpose-filled home to a cold warehouse floor.
That table hid my dangling feet during long prayers for traveling mercies before driving back to my college dorm.
That table served as a church and office where sermons were prepared and community prayer meetings were held.
That table endured the pressure of the pen from letters written to local officials, congressmen and other entities of power demanding that a wrong be made right.
That table covered with cloth and plastic upheld hundreds of candles during countless birthday celebrations.
That table hosted a family’s last supper before its matriarch pushed away from it for the last time.
That table absorbed the fragrance of her spirit early that Sunday morning floating from her bedroom to the cumulus clouds of heaven.
That table though nameless held everything in its wooden DNA –resilience, tenacity, dedication, second chances, faith and agape.
That table held me up when my balance was challenged.
That table never changed despite life’s duplicity.
So in whatever bleak warehouse corner that table now stands, the effulgent truth is that its life was well lived.
That table….that table.