Modern setup brings more to the family's dinner table

In some families, please is described as the magic word. In our house, however, it was sorry.

-- Margaret Laurence

There are some new TV commercials out there -- I'm sure you've seen them -- that focus on the values of a family coming together at the dinner table at the end of a long day.

They talk. They joke. They smile. They share information.

Somewhere Norman Rockwell is nodding agreeably.

The subtle message is: Buy our product, and you can do this, too.

Well, to tell the truth, that's pretty much suppertime at my house.

Most every night, me, the wife and son sit at the table, say the grace, eat the meal and review the day, all while the dog patrols the floor between the chair legs looking for errant crumbs.

Our family, with occasional exceptions, does everything it's supposed to do at supper.

It's only afterward that we break up.

That's because as soon as the table is cleared and the dishes are dealt with, everyone wants to watch something different on TV.

This is not the way I grew up, because we just had one TV.

That's how I learned compromise, negotiation and, ultimately, life's whimsical unfairness.

It's also why I watched a lot of variety shows and Lawrence Welk, because I had used up "my turn" at the TV and we had to watch what someone else wanted to watch.

It's not that way now.

In my family we never agree on the shows, so we all go somewhere different. It's the advantage of having at least three TV sets.

My son will watch shows featuring sophomoric humor (appropriate because he is in high school).

My wife will watch Dancing With the Stars or American Idol or The Bachelor . If they aren't available, she will review reruns of the medical show House or the criminal show CSI .

I once joked that she was simply taking notes for a way to cleverly poison me, then cover up the crime. (She did not laugh.)

I would join her, except I can't stand these shows ... well, maybe House , which I really enjoyed until I found out it wasn't supposed to be a comedy.

Usually, my solution is to find some working TV in a back room and watch a ballgame or perhaps educational television where I seek out useful documentaries on UFOs and Bigfoot expeditions.

That's how we spend our family evenings -- in separate rooms.

But is it a bad thing?

Was life better when there were only three TV channels and one set per household?

I don't think so.

A family with different tastes in TV programming is a family with more information to share.

It gives you insights. It gives you different perspectives. It gives you something to talk about when you get back together at dinner the following night.

That's where my son will repeat a silly joke. My wife will talk about someone's lack of musical talent. And I will top them both with a dramatic account of an alien abduction.

That's family life in the new millennium.

Reach Bill Kirby at (706) 823-3344 or bill.kirby@augustachronicle.com.