The law of family dinner time.

My mother insisted on a family dinnertime. She required us to be there, be courteous, on-time and properly dressed – no elbows on the table, and we began with kneeling family prayer. I’m amazed at families whose dinner times consist of a note about what’s in the fridge to microwave.

In our home of eight children dinner time was a time for sharing, complimenting, recognizing, reviewing, advising, discussing. Family sharing in a friendly, relaxed atmosphere, on a regular, daily basis. In “Cheaper by the Dozen” father directed the conversation – requiring table wide conversation (TWC), not tete-a-tetes between seat mates, and quenching conversation not of general interest (NGI).

“The statistics are clear”, writes Michael Elias in Time, “Kids who dine with the folks are healthier, happier and better students, which is why a dying tradition is coming back. . . Studies show that the more often families eat together, the less likely kids are to smoke, drink, do drugs, get depressed, develop eating disorders and consider suicide, and the more likely they are to do well in school, delay having sex, eat their vegetables, learn big words and know which fork to use:.

"If it were just about food, we would squirt it into their mouths with a tube," says Robin Fox, an anthropologist at Rutgers, about the mysterious way that family dinner engraves our souls. "A meal is about civilizing children. It's about teaching them to be a member of their culture." Elias, supra. My mother would have agreed in spades.