As a kid I remember feeling jittery and impatient, bouncing my knee, tapping my fingers on the table. How early could I ask to be “excused” from the dinner table? The adults were all talking, but I wanted to go and get hide-and-seek started, or a board game, or anything besides just sitting and talking. “Do adults really think that’s fun?” I’d think, skittering away from the table. “Why sit and talk when there are so many other things you could do?”

And yet so much preparation went in to those sit-down meals. Place cards were set at each seat, napkin rings cradled cloth napkins, and fancy plates stacked with smaller salad plates were placed at each seat. A centerpiece was carefully arranged, the table runner smoothed out. “A lot of effort for just one meal,” I’d think. But the effect was always beautiful: plaid flannel used as a tablecloth, glass jars filled with cranberries and greenery, topped with floating candles. It was magical. My mom has a way of making a table feel festive so that even sitting down to eat feels like an event. I have yet to find a restaurant experience that can rival our table at Christmas. But as a kid all I saw was a whole lot of effort. Wax would drip from the candles, crumbs and spills spattered the tablecloth, and in a few days the decorative jars would become grimy. “Why don’t we just use paper napkins?” I’d whine. “Why are we using these plates, they don’t fit in the dishwasher very well, we’re going to have to hand-wash most of these.” The things my mom saw as beautiful and special I saw as chores. “We’re making more work for ourselves”—as if the goal of hosting people was to avoid any extra effort or labor. But if hosting were about keeping our lives simple and carefree, we’d never host.

Fast forward a few years to my first year living in Washington, D.C. I moved to D.C. without a job, barely knowing a soul, oh, and did I mention I hadn’t spent more than twenty-four hours in the actual city before moving there? It was a stressful time, but the first reassurances I had that I’d be OK were two dinners at which people opened up their homes to me. A friend from college living in a row house on Capitol Hill invited me to dinner with his eleven other roommates, plus additional guests. Everyone there was lively and laughing, warm and comfortable in the city. And though I was very quiet at that meal, I looked around and thought, “This could be me one day.” Maybe this was why the adults had wanted to linger around a dinner table? You can’t help but want to be around merriment when it’s present.

Later, a young couple with their adorable one-year-old had me over for dinner in their walk-up apartment on Capitol Hill, a mere few blocks from an idyllic park. They also had a random assortment of guests, people older than me who seemed at home in the city. It was a delicious meal—far beyond my meager cooking attempts. I marveled at how nice it was to be served from something that wasn’t the same pan in which the food had been cooked. No, at both dinners a place had been set for me, not paper plates, but actual china, silverware set on either side. Both of those dinners were an effort on the part of my host: I didn’t make their lives easier, but they both made my life better. It’s funny now looking back on those early meals and how those people and places are intermingled into my life today. Sitting down to eat with a bunch of strangers offered me reassurance about my own future in an unknown city.

A year later I moved into a large, old rowhouse. It was crumbly and creaky, but full of character. When everyone around me was living in tiny English basements, a monstrous hosting space had been thrown into my lap. My cooking skills still left a lot to be desired, but I couldn’t get the idea of filling my home with people gathered around food out of my head. All those memories of my mom hosting were flooding back to me. In one of my favorite children’s books (the Betsy-Tacy series) the heroine’s family hosts “Sunday night lunches.” Her father uses whatever is on hand to make sandwiches, and anyone could stop by at any time. Sometimes they’d play games, or dance, or sing around the piano. It wasn’t complicated or fancy, but was a chance to gather.

Sunday night lunch was an institution at the Ray house. The meal was prepared by Mr. Ray. This was the custom of many years’ standing. In the kitchen on Sunday evenings he was supreme. There was always a fire in the dining room grate for Sunday night lunch. Often the crowd spilled over to pillows. Almost everyone ended there, with a second cup of coffee and cake. Talk flourished until Julia went to the piano. –Heaven to Betsy

It sounded like a dream to me, but that was a time reserved for the 1900s (when the book takes place), not something that could happen in the twenty-first century. But one Sunday, after our evening church service, my friend and I decided to host, just to see what would happen. We went to Trader Joe’s for soup and baguettes. On that chilly fall day, a small group gathered in the living room to eat, laughing and chatting.  Taking it all in made my heart soar. Before people had come over there had been stress. I rapidly sliced the baguettes; I tore apart the kitchen looking for the “extra big soup pot.”

Every host has moments of panic: “What if no one comes? What if there are awkward lulls in the conversation? What if there isn’t enough food?” Hosting forces vulnerability.  Opening up your home, your heart, and your hands, means exposing the untidiness of your home (i.e., the mouse traps in many of the corners) and the risk of awkward conversations, or even small numbers of attendees.

As it turns out, that first soup night was just the beginning: there would be even more soup and game nights. There would be a Friendsgiving of epic proportions. There was much Christmas joviality, and a murder mystery dinner party. Girlfriends would sleep over, mattresses dragged into the living room and brunch made in pajamas the next day. Surprise parties (with cherry pie or Funfetti cupcakes) would leave confetti and glitter on the floor for years to come. Three years in that house were filled with fun and laughter, and people consuming food. I never could commit to buying the “gather” sign from Home Goods, but maybe we poke too much fun at that word. The more I open up my home, the more I realize how much we all crave gathering. We want to feel warm and safe, full of food and friendship.

My grandma is a food-pusher, and it is one of the most endearing things. If you sit at her table eating toast, she’ll ask if you want a donut hole. Or bacon. Or another cup of coffee. Or some fresh fruit. I loved to receive it as a child, this outpouring of food she always offered. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to recognize my own food pushing tendencies. Being with my grandma for Thanksgiving provided an opportunity for two food pushers to go head-to-head.  Food pushing is a way to communicate love. I want to provide safety and comfort to those around me.  Perhaps that’s why my mom wanted place cards, so people would know that their name was known to her, and that they always had a seat at her table.