Any time I sat down at my in-laws’ table, somebody moved my chair back six inches. It started as a joke about my elbows in 1996, but over the years it became an arrangement the whole family maintained without ever discussing it. His mother did it at Christmas, his sister did it at both christenings, and his aunt even did it at a funeral lunch while I was getting someone a drink. I never said anything because there is no graceful way to ask why someone keeps moving your chair. After about ten years, I started moving it myself, which is the part I’d take back if I could.
At my father-in-law’s ninetieth birthday in June, I put my own chair back before anyone had the chance. My son is twenty-four, and he watched me do it from across the table. He got up from his seat and moved his chair directly beside mine. My mother-in-law laughed and told him there was plenty of room on the other side. He looked at her and said, “There’s room here too.” Nobody laughed after that.
My husband finally asked what we were doing, and my son said he had been watching it happen his entire life. He said he remembered being eight years old and asking why Mom always sat farther away from everyone else. His grandmother had told him it was because I liked having space. My son said he had believed that until he was old enough to notice that nobody else ever needed six extra inches. Then he asked his grandmother why she had been doing it for twenty-nine years.
She didn’t answer. His aunt finally admitted it had started as a joke and had continued because “everyone got used to it.” My son shook his head and said, “That’s not a joke when one person is the punchline for twenty-nine years.” My husband moved his own chair beside mine, closing the gap everyone had carefully maintained for decades. For the first time, we all sat around the same table without anyone moving my chair.
