The Chaos of Gathering
and the benefit of having a "scruffy hospitality" attitude
Dearest Beloved,
Our church has been displaced. It’s been a mobile church from the beginning: meeting at people’s houses, a chamber of commerce, and most recently a dilapidated old barn where people would play music on Saturday nights. BLUEGRASS RULES in bright blue lights hung over the stage. The new owner has been very gracious to let us and the Saturday night crew stay, but it was time to move on to somewhere new.
We haven’t found that place yet.
So, somehow, our house became a gathering spot for some of us in the interim. The other night we had ten adults, four children, a dog, (and a partridge in a pear tree) crammed around our table.
I texted the group Thursday morning and said everyone could come over, but I had no idea what we’d eat because I hadn’t thought that far ahead. Within the hour, four people had plans for two different types of chili and cornbread.
The chaos of everyone’s arrival filled the house: bags dropped to the floor, shouts of caution as crockpots were delivered to the kitchen, and well-worn instrument cases were shoved against cabinet doors. Our dog Buckshot made sure to get his ears rubbed by everyone who entered, and then made himself a nuisance in the kitchen, hoping a crumb of cornbread would fall to the floor.
Photo of said beautiful nuisance
My sister arrived last with my beautiful niece and, after hauling everything inside the house that comes with a baby, she found me in the kitchen amidst everyone coming and going with people laughing loudly as they grabbed drinks and ladles and pork skins.
As she walked past me to the bathroom, Kate said, “It feels like Home Alone in here!”
We all recognize that kind of chaos. In the movie, Kevin McCalister’s gigantic extended family is gathered in his parents’ home the day before leaving for a Christmas vacation to France. The house is stuffed to the gills with big kids running up and down stairs, little kids causing mischief, and strange food combinations like pizza and milk (what? and WHY?). Just generalized, absolute chaos.
That was very much how it felt at our house.
When the bread was done, I tossed every bowl we had and most of our spoons on the table, and one friend grabbed napkins from our cabinet. Eventually everyone settled at the table, and after a short blessing, began passing bowls, scooping chili, and doling out pieces of bread.
My sister reminded me not to eat her bread, and I promptly forgot and ate her bread that she left on MY napkin. (This is not important, I just wanted you to know.)
Buckshot continued his watch near the table as the baby dropped food on the floor. Fairlight pointed and yelled “Ack! Ack!” calling Buckshot by his brother Jack’s name, who belongs to my sister and her family. Katie and I squeezed onto a piano bench shoved at the corner of the table next to my niece, and she spooned chili beans into the baby’s toothy mouth. My youngest slid under the table like she was spelunking in a cave, so she could abandon her bowl and go play. My oldest soon skipped off to plan a spy mission with her friend.
After supper, we broke out the instruments and jammed to a little bit of everything, from Glen Campbell to Dolly Parton to Bethel and beyond. Jubi grabbed a drum, Joy banged spoons together, even little Fairlight grabbed some plastic straws and eventually commandeered the drum when Jubi lost interest. Our friends sang, and one played a little Cajun triangle Daddy brought (he has a deep love of Cajun culture, which explains why that triangle was accompanied by an accordion with a giant crawdad painted on the bellows), while other friends played cards in the corner. Eventually Mama gave up her instrument to chase a newly mobile Fairlight around as she made laps around the house. I started playing the bass in her stead. I am not very good, but an effort was made.
It was loud and overstimulating and overwhelming.
And it was wonderful.
I’ve never lived in a quiet house. I’d often longed for it. Our house growing up was 860 sq. ft. with three women sharing one bathroom, and our daddy just hanging on for dear life. In college, I’d stay up late just because the house would finally be quiet enough to work. On top of the size restraints, as a ministerial family, we had people over all the time, even though our house was not really equipped for it. We did, however, have ham in the fridge and a cozy camper in the back yard where our friends would stay. We ate and laughed until they left for their next post. Others did the same for us in countless houses all over the Southeast as we traveled and played music. It’s just part of what we did, I guess. I appreciated our open home and had often benefited from the homes of others, but I wanted peace and quiet.
Fast forward to adulthood, and I’ve decided peace and quiet all the time is overrated. I like a good party. I throw a few every year and I really and truly enjoy it. There’s a lot of cleaning and menu-planning that tickles the part of my brain that strives for and thrives on order. But the impromptu get togethers like the other night’s are the best: no actual plan, a prayer that they’ll be enough food, and a willingness to make space for it.
In 2016, an article came out called “In Praise of Scruffy Hospitality” that changed the way I thought about hosting. In it, Robin Shreeves details her desire to have a perfect house before inviting anyone over, and how that desire actually impeded her ability to connect with others in her home. I’m not saying invite everyone over to sit in actual filth, but there’s no need to stress. Make sure the toilet’s (mostly) clean and that there’s a path into the house and call it good. When people showed up last night, our broken washing machine still sat on the porch after being replaced a few days ago. (Side note: if there’s a local buy nothing group in your area, join it! That’s where we found our new-to-us washer!) There were bags for donation by the door, and a pile of shoes next to them. When someone moved the big upright bass from its corner, a pile of dog hair sat under it that I missed when I ran the vacuum the day before. If I waited until my house was “good enough” no one would ever come over.
What matters is the people in the space, not the space itself.
Previous generations used to have people over for cake and coffee. Just a small chunk of the afternoon set aside for nothing but friendship and connection. And caffeine. Life is no more busy now, it’s just a different type of busy. We’re so “connected” but we’re also more lonely than ever before. Our friends are in our phones instead of our living rooms or around our tables, and that is certainly one sad difference between then and now.
I know it’s not easy out there. I may be perennially optimistic, but I am not naive. Times are hard. The holidays are rough even in good economic times. SNAP benefits being cut from so many hardworking people right before the holidays makes for a tight squeeze on the budget for so many people. Idiots on both sides of the political aisle bringing home paychecks while the American people suffer isn’t new, but it certainly is infuriating. (This makes me so angry I can barely talk about it.)
So let me encourage you to start small with the people in front of you. To help each other along in these somehow both precedented and unprecedented times. Invite someone over for coffee. Show the people in your community that they’re not alone.
Our door is open and y’all are welcome to walk through it and make yourself at home.
Love, Tristan
P.S. If you’re someone affected by the government shutdown and your SNAP benefits are gone, please reach out and I will do my best to help however I can. To whom much is given, much is required, and I hope to live up to that in whatever way possible. Everyone may have different tickets, but we’re all in the same boat.