I love my dining room table. We have mismatched chairs all around it. The end is always covered in miscellaneous papers, school supplies, and running clothes that I forgot to bring to school. Right now, as I write this blog, we have a Halloween candle that is still burning long past its life expectancy. There is a mason jar with an inch of water that will likely get thrown in with the dinner dishes. My mothers to-do list notebook and our vintage Scrabble Game that we play once a month are sitting by the game instructions to Sleeping Queens (actual game nowhere in sight). This dining room table is and always will be the better place to do homework.

The difference from the miscellaneous items on the dining room table, from the miscellaneous items on my desk is that my desk is much smaller, the room my desk is in is much smaller, and I hate doing work where I sleep. I like to sit at the dining room table overlooking my street through two big windows. Once I’ve set up my area, and began my work, felt super productive and crossed at least two things off of my to-do list, it’s usually time for dinner. And so, all of my stuff gets pushed to the side and we eat. Now it may seem that one would just assume I would start up again after I cleared the dishes. Wrong. This is when my lovely parents reside in the sun room to watch TV and make sure to tell me not to stay at the dining room table. 

This is the worst part of my nightly routine, but each night, I stay at the table just in case. But alas, my father’s philosophy of “you can’t do homework when we’re watching TV” always prevails. 

Maybe the “forbiddenness” of the table makes it more appealing, or maybe I am truly more productive there. I guess I’ll never know. What I do know is that I will take any opportunity to sit there whenever I can. Most weekend days I get to sit there all day. My parents are out of the house, it’s quiet, and I can work for hours. My school supplies slowly creep across the table. Things get pushed back as I neglect them, and new folders filled with undone work and lots of satisfying “to-do list crossing off” potential end up replacing their empty spots. If I was at my small upstairs desk, all of my stuff would end up on the floor next to me. Constantly bending down to get something out of a neglected binder disrupts my productivity prospects. It just isn’t the same!