What the bleep were they thinking?!!

Silence Dogood here. Reading our friend Ben’s post (“Spam! What is it good for?”) this morning reminded me that someone had mysteriously managed to link to our blog under the heading “Decorating Your Dining Room with Glamour and Style.” Hopefully, this wasn’t actually spam, but clearly these people had never seen our “dining room.”

Mind you, I have in my day seen a dining room decorated with “glamour and style”—in OFB’s parents’ Colonial home in Nashville. OFB’s Mama’s (genuine) Colonial furnishings in that vast, glittering room would put any bazillionaire’s dining room to shame. It’s an elegant, gracious, sophisticated, welcoming room.

Unlike ours. Let me take you on a little tour of the Hawk’s Haven “dining room”: First of all, there isn’t one. Like our predecessors in this house, we have a little round oak table at the back of the big kitchen. It’s situated under a vintage flea-market light fixture in front of the deck door, so we can enjoy the view of the deck, outdoor cats, birdfeeders, stream, backyard, and farm fields while we eat. The table is so small only two people can really eat there, though we’ve managed to occasionally squeeze (“squeeze” being the operative word) as many as four in there if we absolutely had to.

And that’s just the beginning. To give our birds the best light and view of the outdoors, we have their cages lined up between our standing pantry and the wall so they all face the deck door. We think they find the view entertaining, but this means that they’re on one side of our table, contributing a nonstop, raucous commentary and the occasional spray of birdseed to our dining experience.

Our dining table has also been known to host the occasional cat explorer (Layla is most notorious for this, once even turning the table over), though not when we’re actually eating. And despite my feeble protests that it wouldn’t happen again this year, a number of houseplants have somehow managed to creep onto the table and establish themselves in permanent residence, reducing both visibility and dining space.

Those are the good parts. On the seat of my antique chair at the table are two ancient but still serviceable towels that we use to dry off our golden retriever, Molly, if she has to go outside in inclement weather, as well as the even more ancient coat I wear to head outside with her when it’s cold so I won’t freeze. Between the table and deck door are a grocery bag full of recyclable paper products destined for our fire pit, a bag of recyclables for the recycling bin, a cat carrier in case we need to take someone to the vet, a stack of newspapers waiting for the paper shredder and/or a perennially lagging OFB to read them, Molly’s leash, and a cardboard box that holds the bags of treats for the chickens. Often, our under-sink composting bucket joins the melee, at least when it’s full and it’s time for OFB to trek out to the compost bins and dump it. Oops, I forgot the two water jugs for the chickens and plants and the boot caddy with our Muck Shoes and snow boots. And did I mention the bookcase crammed with cookbooks or the cabinet full of CDs?

Mercy, have you ever heard of such glamour and style? Bet you can’t wait to redecorate your own dining room a la Hawk’s Haven. And by the way, please forgive us if we don’t invite you over for dinner: We’d love to, but we don’t know where we’d put you. Unless you happen to like birds.

          ‘Til next time,

                      Silence