Dinner, Elbows, and other Grievances of Parenthood

So many completely ridiculous moments have happened in our family in the last week, I feel like I have a month's worth of blog fodder. Alas, I have promised myself that I will do nothing/as little as possible to humiliate my children online.

So I'll just share one of today's golden moments, which is more about me than him.

You see, I'm my mother's daughter. (I think I start a lot of posts this way?)

And regularly, I open my mouth and her voice comes out.

And table manners are one of my pet peeves, because they were so emphasized when I was a kid.

Today at the dinner table, I noticed Boy leaning on his elbows while he ate, which allowed him to bring his face down to his plate and thereby shorten the distance his fork must travel in order to successfully shovel each bite into his mouth. So I took his elbow and moved it off the table.

Immediately, I flashed back to my childhood, and told Matt that I just remembered that my mom used to flick my elbows with her fingers. (I'm probably not allowed to do that. And good thing too. No offense, Mom.)

After dinner, Matt informed me that my, shall we say, "emphasis" on table manners was making mealtimes tense.

I may have suggested he take over etiquette training. I may have suggested he teach an etiquette class. I may have suggested he take an etiquette class. I was in fine form.

And as we debated/argued, he finally launched this perfectly logical question: why are elbows unacceptable at the table?

I paused. All I could come up with was "it's rude."

"Why is it rude?"

...

I've got nothing. I laughed because I couldn't come up with a single reason. I laughed till I cried. And then I called my mom (who didn't answer). Yeah, mom. Why are elbows on the table unacceptable?

She didn't know either, and sent me to google. Apparently, this rule surfaced in the Middle Ages when people were seated closely and at long tables, meaning your elbow would be in the middle of another's dinner plate. Now that we dine more comfortably, many say the rule is defunct. I think I'm losing this one.

******

Also, as I write this post, Boy sits at the table, coloring a little book of pictures he made at school. This is a consequence, because if you lie to me and tell me your teacher says you're not allowed to color something just because you don't want to color it, you can bet your bottom dollar that I'm gonna make you color the whole blasted thing.