Empathy In My Family

730 Words3 Pages
Habit formed early in my household; my parents would head to work every day, my siblings and I to school. While we each had personalized experiences during the day, the dinner table was a collective setting. My mother prided herself sitting down as a family. I often commented that I’d rather watch Monday Night Football or eat out with friends. Despite this childish behavior, she remained stern across my upbringing, and, luckily, with greater age came greater understanding. Even though my friends had joke about the renowned “Hyman Family Dinners”, the reclaimed campfire table held my (individualistic?) family together. As little as fifteen minutes provided the necessary time to not only recount on the day’s events, but more importantly time…show more content…
When I was very young, my parents and I had the opportunity to attend the Taste Of Chicago. What happened there, I cannot fully remember; however, I am told that on the way back to the car, I unhesitantly handed our remaining food tickets to an elderly homeless man. The extent of truthfulness of this event is unknown, but my parents consistently reference the relief that resulted from the encounter. Empathy is an intangible, and from the eyes of a lawyer and a doctor, it reflected my capacity to understand. At some point, my parents no longer felt obliged to wait until all children were in college to file for divorce. The divorce would drastically alter the dynamic of not only the dinner table, but my role in the house. The baby of the family was now to assume the responsibilities of the man of the house. Like my siblings, I had expected to head to college, and leave my mother and my father to share their remaining years together. Although the banter of children would no longer echo throughout the house, they would have each other. This is anything but the case. My father is absent; he moved fifty miles away before the end of the year. It’s just my mother and I, and, of course, our dinner table. (Add something here - Not loving the end of this
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