Come to the Table
Chapter One
Celebrations
Like most people my age, I have a hard time remembering what it was
like to be six. I have an equally tough time recalling how it felt
to be four, or eleven, for that matter. But ask me what it was like
to turn six, and it's a whole other story. On the topic of my sixth
birthday, I can go on at great length.
I can tell you, for example, that on June 2, 1951, at my request, I
had calf liver for dinner. And, much to their dismay, so did my two
older sisters, having failed to talk me into asking my mother to
make something-anything-else. Since I wouldn't eat a piece of liver
today to save my life, I suspect I chose it precisely because my big
sisters opposed it so violently. When you're the baby of the family,
moments of power are rare. They're also addictive: I requested the
same exact menu for the next three birthdays in a row.
We still laugh about my "liver years," my sisters and I, but in
retrospect I think those dinners speak volumes about what it was
like growing up as the junior member of the Ted Kelley family in Oak
Lawn, Illinois, during the postwar years.
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