On Top Of Spaghetti

One may look at a plate of meatballs and spaghetti as welcome comfort food. . But I also see it as a metaphor and a reminder of one of the best uses of family time at the dinner table. Not sure that my wife would agree. Not sure it’s exactly what Anne Fishel, the author of Home For Dinner: Mixing Food, Fun, And Conversation For A Happier Family And Healthier Kids, had in mind either. (You can ask her at the 92Y’s big upcoming parenting event.) But I speak from experience!

What am I talking about exactly?

Normally, I’m on the front lines of getting dinner ready. Last week my wife, who was home with a cold, surprised my children and I with a delicious mountain of Turkish meatballs and spaghetti. So we ate, and we talked, and we ate, and then it occurred to me.

When the kids were younger, we used to have a ton of fun having spaghetti races to see who could suck down a long strand of spaghetti the fastest.

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And so we raced again.

And then it occurred to me. One dinner, when my wife wasn’t home, I showed my kids how much fun it was to whirl a strand of spaghetti in the air, and then fling it at the floor-to-ceiling mirror adjoining our dining space and see if it sticks (because then you know that the spaghetti is truly ready, I rationalized, mixing it up the old saying about seeing if it sticks to the refrigerator).

Turned out we were all really good at flinging spaghetti at the mirror (an activity we enjoyed more than once)—and no one was ever busted, provided we remembered to wipe up before mommy saw stranded strands.

But she herself made the dinner last Tuesday, and was home for the meal. Swallowing spaghetti contests was one thing; but spaghetti flinging was a whole other level of disruption.

And…we did it! I did it! Adam did it! Elena did it! Rebecca did not. But she didn’t wage war against it either.

I feel like I’m baring a family secret.

Doesn’t everyone throw food around? (I’m kidding.)

Will you still invite me to dinner? I’m all for good conversation as well.

Eric Messinger is the editor of New York Family. He can be reached at [email protected]

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