what my childhood taught me about hosting
and hospitality standards I hope to live up to
This week I’ve been thinking a lot about the art of hosting and what makes a good gathering - any getting of people together in one place.
Growing up, I would eagerly look forward to these events, even though they were a very common occurrence. Almost every other week there would be a dinner one of my aunts was hosting (for no apparent reason other than wanting all of us to be in one place), a birthday party, or a sleepover. Spending all that time together - in conversation, playing, creating, having meals - created memories that wove the fabric of my childhood and built the foundation for the tight-knit bond my family and I now share.
Below is an attempt to reflect on the makings of these memories and find the commonalities between them. I hope it’s a list I can look at from time to time and build on with my own lessons-learned hosting in the future.
Always greet new guests with the door already open, or better yet, in the driveway
I’m sure this is custom in many cultures, but it has to be one of my favorite teachings on hospitality. Anytime someone new (or old honestly) came home, they needed to be greeted with an open door, or in the driveway and walked into the house until they were situated. They also needed to be walked out of the house and to their car when leaving - we were not allowed to go back inside until the car had taken off.
This simple act, to me, has always felt like an ultimate gesture of love. There is something incredibly endearing about seeing a family member or friend looking forward to seeing you in their driveway. The only thing better is seeing them waving goodbye from their driveway, refusing to go back inside until you’ve turned the corner. How is it so soft and grand at the same time? A habit that is now lodged in my soul to the point where I am physically uncomfortable just thinking of closing the door before someone has left the vicinity of the house.
Err on the side of too much food
this was just dessert + missing cake When entering a get-together, there was always a mock-tail or lemonade to sip on and an abundance of appetizers. Food was the focal point of every gathering and the first topic of conversation as we walked in. The initial moments looked like exchanging recipes, discussing ingredients and caterers, how long the prep took, and the constant nudging of trays full of food towards us.
Everything must be tried, and everyone must have food and drink on them at all times. This was usually a self-imposed rule by the hosts, who would treat anything less as a personal failure on their behalf. Funnily enough, a frequent point of discussion after the night ended was how there were too many appetizers and so guests didn’t have enough of the main course.
It was a purposely recurring problem because the opposite - not enough food - is absolutely unthinkable.
Create (or find) space and an enthusiasm to play
When we were younger, we would look to the host kid to suggest a game or activity - we’d usually end up doing whatever they were interested in at the time. If it was movies, we’d all watch one of their choosing. If it was arts and crafts, we’d paint or make something. If their favorite game was hide & seek that is what we’d play.
If the host kid was undecided, our first instinct was to go out and play whatever all of us mutually decided (not without heated discussion and some possible sulking). This meant the adults would have to hunt us down at dinner time while we asked for 5 MORE MINUTES to finish whatever elaborate activity we were in the middle of.
A few things have changed as we’ve gotten older. We usually talk about what we’ve been up to, and then one of us will put on our favorite youtube video or new movie trailer which prompts discourse that turns into spirited conversation. Even now (most of us are 20 somethings) when we get together back home, we like to end the night playing something we used to play as kids (kings, hide & seek, a variation of lock & key, crocodile1) or by putting on a Just Dance video and giving our parents an unwarranted performance (I’m sure they love it).
I still have so many thoughts on hosting, cultivating a warm and cozy environment, creating spaces that encourage play, and more. But I’ll save those for future essays and snippets of thought. In the meantime, I hope to gain experience doing some hosting of my own!
This year I’m hosting Thanksgiving for the first time - it’ll be a few people I grew up with but I couldn’t be more excited at the thought of planning games, movie nights and menus. The goal is to capture the nostalgia of sleepovers we would have as children while also building new memories to look back on when we’re older.
reads that got me thinking for this piece:
the power of recurrings by Mathu
5 things that quietly make you really good at getting people together by Sarah Jannetti
all traditional childhood games, probably called something different depending on where you’re from