When we had been married only a few years, I saw the most
beautiful walnut dining room table that,
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| Our dining room table |
A number of months later, in January of 1966, my husband got
notification to come in for an exam to see if he was healthy enough to be
drafted. These was during the Vietnam War Era, and if you were going to school
full time, you could get an education exemption. Since our marriage, Ed had
been taking classes at the University of Utah, and working, so he was exempt.
However, that semester he’d dropped a class and since he was then not a
full-time student, he suddenly became eligible to be drafted into the war. Of
course, he was healthy enough, and his draft board said he’d receive a draft
notice within two weeks.
Ed was determined not to be in the infantry, so he looked at
all of the programs available for those joining the Army. He found one that he
could get flight training in helicopters, and become an officer, so that’s what
he signed up for, and within a month he was gone.
We lost our house, and I
moved back home with my Dad and younger siblings. We sold a lot of things, but
Dad stored my precious table in his garage. Ed went through basic training and
the first part of his flight training in Texas, while I continued to work to
earn money. By Summer, Ed was advanced enough in his training, that we decided
I would join him. My Dad drove my car, and my uncle drove Dad’s car down to
Weatherford, Texas (West of Ft. Worth) and dropped me off before they went home
in Dad’s car.
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| Ed's graduation from flight school |
Ed orders stated, “no personal vehicles or dependents
authorized during flight school,” but I found a furnished apartment close to
the base and joined the brave wives who did not want to be left behind. The
flight students had to live in the barracks, and we could visit them from 7:00
P.M. to 9:00 P.M. most
evenings and they had from noon Saturday until Sunday night at home with us
before returning to the barracks. It wasn’t ideal, but we were with them.
It was right before Ed was transferred to Enterprise,
Alabama for his final part of his training, that I miscarried for the second
time. I wondered if we’d ever have children to go around the table.
When Ed finished flight school and was awarded his wings,
his officer rank, and his orders to Vietnam, we had a month in Utah before he
left. I was blessed to get pregnant during that month and moved into a tiny
apartment in Bountiful while Ed left for war. There wasn’t a lot of room for my
table, but it fit into the apartment. In December my first son was born while
Ed was flying near Saigon. My dreams were still alive.
While Ed was in
Vietnam, he sent me a 12-piece set of china and silverware to go with the
table. That table went all over the world with us, including back to Bountiful
when I had two little ones and expecting my third and Ed went back to Vietnam
to war again. Most of the time it was used as a kitchen table and I put
oilcloth tablecloths on it to protect it from the little kids eating at it. I
began to see my dream come to fruition. We ate on it; we played games on it; we
did puzzles on it; we did crafts on it, we celebrated birthdays on it. It was truly a family
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| Athena's birthday party |
It went to the Big
Island of Hawaii with us, where we had a dining room. It went to northern Italy
with us, where again we had room for it to serve as a formal dining room table.
It went to three stations in Texas, Alabama (twice), Nebraska, Chicago and
Sacramento with us. I remember in Hawaii, when our stuff arrived in the dock, a
forklift had smashed through the corner of the container. Luckily it destroyed
a desk and lots of other stuff but missed our table.
It was used more as a kitchen table than a dining room table
during most of those years, and since Ed was an officer, we entertained a lot on
it. It looked beautiful, and I loved it. But it still hosted a lot of kids
doing homework and games, and I even used it to sew on. We went through a lot
of dining room chairs during those years, but the table kept going.
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| Family dinner |
In February 1990, we moved to our house in Centerville,
where the table served another purpose. It served extended family, my parents,
siblings and their families, friends and my children’s friends. When we first
moved in after Ed’s retirement, he refinished the tabletop and gave it new life.
It was here in Centerville that it realized its purpose as our
children married and had children, and it hosted many a family dinner,
including Sunday dinners throughout the years. The dream I’d imagined those
many years ago became fulfilled as we often added the extensions and we did
games on it after dinner.
50 years after we purchased the table, Ed decided our table
had outlived its life. We ordered a new solid-walnut dining room table (with
extensions to hold 12 people) for Christmas in 2014. However, Ed passed away
before the new table arrived.
Our treasured old dining room table went to my daughter,
where it could continue to serve her family.
It is a silly thing to treasure a piece of furniture as I
did for so many years. But it wasn’t the wooden reality of it that was so
important to me, but the symbol that it stood for—loved ones of several
generations gathered around it, eating, playing, talking, being family. It
realized its purpose.
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