Lessons from dinner: we must allow ourselves to be changed by the stories of others.
I know very little else other than this.
A note: Names in this essay have been changed.
Hello friends, hi, wow. This week. This world. Every day. Impossible, impossible, impossible. We’re still here. We’re here.
I had my second Dinner With Strangers this past Thursday. And I could talk to you for hours about what I believe to be the significance of this project, what affect it has to take away the element of talking about work, how just the nature of the event causes people to show up ready to introduce themselves to each other, by which I mean they actually meet each other, they share with each other, they offer each other a part of themselves. And greatest of all of the magic, I think, maybe, is that we practice this thing that we largely have forgotten how to do these days: we sit with each other around a table, which is as literal as it is proverbial, people who look like us or don’t look like us, who are similar or not similar to us, and we listen. We bear witness to each other’s existence. We make time and room to listen to a little snapshot of what it’s like to be someone else without forming a response or a think piece or a rebuttal. And I think, having witnessed 27 dinners now, this mysterious unfolding that happens around the table is one of the paths that will save us in this time.
There is a lot of logistical preparation for these dinners - naturally there are the invites, ticket sales, so many (so many) emails, general organization, menu planning, grocery shopping, wine ordering, napkin folding, cooking, table setting, flower arranging, cocktail making, card printing, etc etc - but there is also an incredible, intentional amount of emotional prep. How, as a facilitator, do I need to prepare my own energy in order to set the tone of the room for the night? What questions can I ask that might allow us to share stories and share a part of ourselves with each other? What is required in order to bring a conversation into that tender, sacred place of unfolding ourselves to each other, how might we all feel safe and ready enough to hold that space with each other, and how do we return back to the surface with a soft landing?
And this week, ever prevalent: how do I host and hold a conversation when there is so much going on in the world, when I literally don’t know who is showing up, where they come from, what their story is, what they’re dealing with, how they’re feeling and carrying either at the very least the heaviness of the macro picture of the conflict and violence that is happening in the Middle East and the millions of ripple effects right here, all over, or not macro at all, maybe someone is walking in who is directly affected by this violence. How can we proceed with this dinner that makes space for all of that impossibility?
The theme for Thursday’s dinner was gratitude, and the questions I prepared for the sit-down portion of the the night were as follows:
What is a decision you’re glad you made?
What is something you like about yourself?
What is something you struggle to be grateful for?
Who would you like to thank?
That third question was where there was a distinct shift in the night, starting with Haley sharing about losing her husband a year ago; is she grateful for life, and for the people who have shown up for her, and the surprises of goodness and grace in the midst of her grief? Of course. Is it a struggle to be grateful for the little things when you’re grieving your husband? Absolutely.
People shared about struggling to feel grateful in the midst of being single, for jobs they are lucky to have and don’t absolutely love, for the kids they love who drive them to their last nerve of sanity, for seasons that test patience, and we nodded along with each other, yes, I know that feeling, I understand. Next it was Joy’s turn to share.
Joy shared that her family is in Israel, and they experienced a terrorist attack in their back yard. So, given the question, is she grateful that, for now, they are all ‘in-tact,’ as she put it? Yes, she is grateful for that. She shared, “Should ‘in-tact’ be the ultimate goal? No. We are terrified. Everyone is heartbroken.” Here at the table, Joy is a human with a broken heart and a family who are experiencing the unimaginable. We can all relate to that.
A few people later, it’s Oksana’s turn to answer. She shares that she is from Ukraine, with family currently living in the middle of a war zone. She speaks to Joy’s experience, understanding the many complicated emotions of being the person who is in Canada with loved ones in a place experiencing great danger. Oksana also expressed her concern for the people of Palestine and the ramifications to come because of Hamas’ attack.
I will be honest, I don’t know if I facilitated this moment well. I expressed how heartbreaking this time is, and how impossible it all is. That context and history is lengthy and not something I pretend to be an expert in. I know that violence of all kinds is wrong. Anti-semitism is wrong. Occupation and colonialism and suppressing people is wrong. And I say that as a Canadian living on stolen land, let’s not forget. My friend Joe texted me this week that people in Sydney, in London, in New York were chanting ‘gas the Jews’ this week. That is wrong. Palestinians having no way of escaping, no one coming to their aid, is wrong. Babies being murdered is wrong. Pointing bombs at each other, in any direction, for any reason, is wrong. I don’t understand why this is our currency of retaliation. Why this is our currency of justice. There is nothing just about hate and violence and destruction. I don’t know how to reconcile any of that. I don’t even know how to make sense of any of that.
I don’t pretend to be an expert on policy or history or the nuance of all of this, the macro picture, the context and lens and all that. What I know is that 24 people sat around a table on Thursday, at least one of us was Jewish, at least one of us was Ukranian, at least one of us has an ex-partner who is from Palestine, and all of us with our own histories and our own families and so many people that we love and people we are scared for all sat together in our humanity and shared a meal.
Our only hope is to learn how to see each other in our complex and imperfect humanness. Our only hope is to learn how to come to the proverbial table and sit ourselves down and look each other in the eye and ask - and listen deeply and generously enough to hear the answer - what it means to be them. What our histories and contexts and nuances of the places we’re from and what the people we love have endured and survived has shaped how we see the world, how we express ourselves, what we care about, and what specific things breaks our hearts. This is not a Pollyanna Miss Universe pageant answer. This is hard, painful work at times. There are quite a few topics that we don’t speak about even in my own family. I have a former mentor that I haven’t been able to soften myself to speak to for two years because of her political views that break my heart. It is messy and painful. And we must learn how to take care of each other.
I am sending love to each and every one of you, in your own personal history, in your own personal and universal heartache. I pray for peace. I pray for mercy. I pray for justice. I pray for a different way for all of us. May we learn to love each other.
I shared a bit of Padraig O’Tuama’s poem ‘The Pedagogy Of Conflict’ at dinner the other night, and I’ll share it with you in closing:
When I was a child,
I learnt to count to five
one, two, three, four, five.
but these days, I’ve been counting lives, so I count
one life
one life
one life
one life
one life
because each time
is the first time
that that life
has been taken.
Legitimate Target
has sixteen letters
and one
long
abominable
space
between
two
dehumanising
words.
I ask that you’d be kind and respectful in your responses. Peace to you all. Lord have mercy.
Lord have mercy 🙏