Sit-down dinners may be a thing of the past.

I hesitate to suggest this, as I remember serving meals to my children around a common table, where we talked about this or that from our days. But, if I'm honest, I have to admit that the nightly meal together started to fragment when my daughters and then my son began to have other things to do about that time of the evening. What dawned on me, finally, was that the old routine of a dinner at six p.m. just didn't fit everyone's schedule.

What I think changed is the way we think of our children. In the old days, meaning when I was a kid, there were no after-school activities. If you were on the football team, maybe you had a practice, but that was it. Nowadays, our daughters may have after-school activities, too. Soccer practice or softball. Things that didn't exist way back when.

Our old notion of everyone sitting down to dinner at a certain time has had its day. We all now come and go on different schedules. Which I think is, in some ways, good. Grab what you need to eat and be on your way! Go, girl!

It does, though, throw the whole concept of an evening dinner into flux. That one time of the day when we sat down, as a family, and talked about things. We families of the new millienium who don't sit down with each other for dinner anymore have to wonder: What is lost? What is gained?
Well, what is gained is the ability of each person in the family to control his or her own in-take of food. Our kids are left to their own judgments as to what to eat or not eat. And when to eat it.

What is lost is our control over what our kids eat. We parents hope it's something healthy -- not just endless Big Macs or tacos. But we have to let our kids have their say, right? On the other hand, we can say: Come home and I'll make you a good meal that includes veggies. I'll know that you have ingested at least some things that are good for you. You don't have to sit down with us and eat it, but it's here. (Hey, we can cook it and cover it with foil, right?)

What is also lost, more importantly, is that time around the table. Granted, not all those times are pleasant, especially as our kids grow into adolescence and then adulthood, but they are still times spent with family, talking. And, if you think about it, maybe those most difficult discussions with growing children are the most important -- even if they devolve into shouting matches -- because they are still all about family.

What does family mean to this budding young man or woman? How much allegiance does this young person feel to the family? Let's get it out in the open, over meat loaf and mashed potatoes, and deal with it. Let's have these hard talks right here at home, with everyone, including young siblings, present. I think these conversations are going away, and I don't know another place they can happen. The dinner table may be the last place for a frank discussion with our kids.

And be honest: When was the last time you and your teen-aged children sat around a table and talked about anything important?

For that matter -- to up it a notch -- how long has it been since you've had everyone in your family -- from grandparents to your kids -- around a table at one time? Last Christmas? Thanksgiving? Never?

And if you did have one, how honest was the conversation? Maybe it was all polite, which is good, but maybe it turned into something not so pleasant but, in its own way, necessary, as the different generations had their say.

I do think that sit-down dinners, among families, either immediate or extended, are going away. After all, it's easier to just take everyone -- from grandma to great-grandson -- to the nearest "all you can eat" place, and avoid not just the clean-up but the confrontations and even just the awkward chitchat that occurs when you're all marooned in somebody's house, and there's no escape. You've got the family all together, or what's left of it. Now what? Talk? Escape? Maybe reconciliation? Love? Or is that hoping for too much?

Sit-down dinners may be going away not just because they're a lot of trouble but also because we don't want to deal with old family issues. And those kinds of get-togethers, within our family or with our in-laws and other relations, make it hard to avoid them. We may just be an avoidance sort of people these days: life is hard, so why make it harder?

But family is what we have to deal with, for better or worse, and sit-down dinners are where we all have to deal with them. It's when we're face-to-face across a table of good food, and what better setting for a settling of differences? I don't propose or oppose them, but I think we should decide for ourselves if and when we want to have them. Or not.

The sit-down dinner is an institution of our society, and it's up to us whether to maintain it or not. There are pros and cons on both sides. In the end, it's up to us and those we love.