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My Gen X Playlist: Crowded Table – The Highwomen

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Absent any new WordPress daily prompts, I pulled one from thecoffeemonsterzco.

As a child, what dinner meal did you like the least?

There was a rule at my house as a kid. Eat all the food on your plate. Period. If you are Gen X, your parents probably recited the old saying – There are people starving in this world. Don’t waste food.

My parents also had a similar rule when we went over to a friend’s house for dinner. It started out the same. Eat all the food on your plate. My parents added a few phrases on the back end. Even if you don’t like it. Be polite and remember your manners. This was ingrained in our heads.

When you grow up this way, you eventually begin to like everything, or at the very least, learn to tolerate it. Just ask me about lima beans. Used to hate them. Now I don’t mind them. Do I like them? Hell no. But if they are on my plate, I’ll finish them.

Our friends used to cook two meals at dinner time. One for the family, the other for their fussy little boy. They eventually stopped the two meal evenings as he got older, but by then, the damage had already been done.

So if you ask me if there was a meal that I didn’t like as a child, I’m drawing a blank. We ate whatever mom put on our plate. Fortunately she was a pretty good cook, though. But cooking every night for four kids gives you a lot of practice. Nowadays, it’s less about the meal and more about the company around the table. There’s nothing quite like breaking bread among family and friends.

My brother and his family are coming into town this weekend and we are all having dinner tonight. We see them maybe once a year and it’s a treat to have the entire family together. My mom is especially excited, she’s been texting us quite a bit these past few days. It’s always a special time when the whole clan is sitting around the table for dinner. It just feels like home again.

I know I’ve already chosen this song in the past, but thought it was worthy of a second go. Here is Crowded Table by the Highwomen. Enjoy.

You can hold my hand
When you need to let go
I can be your mountain
When you're feeling valley-low
I can be your streetlight
Showing you the way home
You can hold my hand
When you need to let go

I want a house with a crowded table
And a place by the fire for everyone
Let us take on the world while we're young and able
And bring us back together when the day is done

If we want a garden
We're gonna have to sow the seed
Plant a little happiness
Let the roots run deep
If it's love that we give
Then it's love that we reap
If we want a garden
We're gonna have to sow the seed

Yeah I want a house with a crowded table
And a place by the fire for everyone
Let us take on the world while we're young and able
And bring us back together when the day is done

The door is always open
Your picture's on my wall
Everyone's a little broken
And everyone belongs
Yeah, everyone belongs

I want a house with a crowded table
And a place by the fire for everyone
Let us take on the world while we're young and able
And bring us back together when the day is done
And bring us back together when the day is done

28 thoughts on “My Gen X Playlist: Crowded Table – The Highwomen”

  1. Liver and onions. I never got used to that. And in our home, the saying was “Don’t you know there are children starving in Biafra who would line up to eat that?” (Biafra was a small state in the west African country of Nigeria that declared independence, existing only from 1967 to 1970; never heard of it again after that.)

    Nice song choice – I must have missed it first time around. Enjoyed the harmonies.

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      6. Hahaha… maybe a lot of hot sauce then! I’m learning from the comments that I’m lucky my parents didn’t like organ meats…

        I was at a restaurant that served skewered meats. I grabbed a few thinking innocently they were beef. Turns out, one was chicken liver, the other was chicken heart. I wasn’t a fan of the texture. I think the surprise of the texture overwhelmed what they actually tasted like. I can’t remember if I liked the taste! But I’m not overly curious to go back and find out!

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  2. Despite my parents having lived through the depression, as teenagers and young adults , we were never forced to eat anything. Or to clean our plates. If a ‘new’ food was served we could taste it or not and there were foods my parents ate that they didn’t even attempt to serve us – tho we were asked if we wanted to taste them. For some reason my parents ate innards – liver, kidney, brain etc. – I can happily say I never touched them. Often my mother would cook one meal for herself and another for the rest of us. My father often did the same, tho they often made their own special preferences for lunches or breakfast – my father liked kidneys and eggs for breakfast. My mother had her liver and onions for lunch. We were exposed to a wide variety of cuisines but it was always our choice whether to try it or not. And there was always something else to eat. Food was to be enjoyed and if you didn’t like it, you didn’t have to eat it.

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  5. I could name a hell of a lot. Both of my parents weren’t very good cooks. Some things they could make but for the most part, I grew up eating broiled shoe leather (aka chicken & pork chops), overdressed soggy salad (which my brother and I grew to ❤️), Ketchup topped onion greasy meatloaf, charred charcoal grilled “BBQ” chicken legs. But boy my Dad made the best omelets and my Mom made incredible bread stuffing to name a few. I think my brother became good cooks because we didn’t want to follow in their footsteps. 😅

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    1. OK, I’m not sure if I could endure eating shoe leather and charred anything would be tough to swallow! I smiled when I read your dad made an awesome omelette. I think a dad making a good breakfast is pretty cool! I hope he sometimes cooked breakfast for dinner for you! I love that!

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  6. Our rule growing up was that you had to take at least three bites. I remember one meal that I couldn’t tolerate more than one bite. I snuck the rest of it to my dog under the table. My parents grew up on farms in Ohio, and they raved about fried mush with syrup. Ugh! I did not like the flavor or the texture.
    Have a wonderful time with your family tonight! I love when my whole family gets together to make a crowded table. ❤️

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    1. So I had to look it up. Was it cornmeal mush? I read one recipe that talked about it being a common meal in parts of Ohio! I like the thought of it being a regional dish!

      I read many people ate it with syrup or jam. I think I would have tried either honey or maybe a twist, a lot of hot sauce instead. I love hot sauce on anything.

      Texture is a funny thing. Sometimes it’s difficult to get past…

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  8. I have a rule in my house: Eat it or leave it.
    I cook everything, from beans to soups to pasta, etc. My kids wish I could cook only pasta and fries, but it doesn’t work that way. So, I ask them to taste it even if they don’t like it, and sorry I don’t make a second meal. So…eat it or leave it.

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