Our friend Heidi was a high-level environmental policy adviser to a progressive governor out West. Well-educated, well-informed, committed and successful, Heidi has an impressive resume, and is a formidable strategist and policy pro. She’s run a congressional campaign, staffed a think tank, and held down several other notable paid and unpaid political organizing positions over the years. Exquisitely articulate, yet fast on her feet, Heidi is a natural for a press op.
Just after fellow office staffers pushed Heidi in front of the cameras on short notice, they voiced amazed satisfaction at her quick, poised, successful performance. Yet whom did Heidi credit? Her training? No. Her experience? No. Her savvy? No. Nope, nope, nope. Her first credit was to–shades of the Oscars — her upbringing!!!! Heidi’s retort: “I grew up in a family of journalists and lawyers. Every night at the dinner table was like a press op!”
Now, Heidi left home at the age of 17. She has not warmed a regular seat at her mother’s table in more than three decades. Yet in Heidi’s telling, those early years were so influential and so formative that she continues to chalk up her TV smarts to the grilling from dad and three older brothers oh-those-many-years ago. On the up side, this is a marvelous testament to the importance of the dinnertime tutorial more common in the bygone era of the evening family meal. On the down side, Heidi seemed too quick to minimize the role of her subsequent excellent education, experience, and training, and thus discredit her own hard-won political and public speaking skills. I’m all for the warm embrace of childhood, especially the parts that build character. We all tag declarations with the qualifier that “I grew up ” . . ., e.g., eating white bread, walking to school, singing hymns, camping out, what have you. But let’s also hear it for the wit and wisdom we accumulate once we’ve left the nest.
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September 9, 2008 at 2:56 pm
It’s a great insight. I think he like to say these kinds of things because its in our nature to tell stories about ourselves to make sense of the world.
September 9, 2008 at 5:41 pm
I would have been disappointed if you had the anticipated response. The dinner table seminar has value in shaping habits of thought, analysis, and expression, but one should never under-estimate the impact of schooling, reading, and peer inter-action on the shaping of a mature adults skills, values, and poise.
September 12, 2008 at 9:00 am
I, too, was greatly influenced by the numerous dinner table conversations that were the routine in my family growing up on the Southwest Side of Chicago. These are one of the truly stand-out memories from my childhood. They were as much fun as they were instructional for us 3 kids. My parents encouraged us to express ourselves and cared about what we thought, so the conversations were really dialogues more than instruction – when we talked about politics and other heavier topics and weren’t trying to make one of our siblings laugh so hard they had to run to the bathroom (!). As I grew older, I can remember sitting around the table for a long time after dinner was over and not wanting to leave because the conversation was so enjoyable.
I tried to repeat the pattern with my husband and children in later years, but it did not happen very often. More hectic schedules, more extracurriculars during the dinner hour, and probably I didn’t have the same knack my parents did to make it happen. Nevertheless, I remember having many meaningful conversations with my daughter, but most often in the car traveling between various activities than around the dinner table! Is that the modern venue for family togetherness?