By Oliver B. Pollak
RICHMOND, California — In July we vacationed in Oceanside and visited relatives and friends living near the coast. We sat with my cousin Rob and his wife Ande in their Carlsbad living room on chairs and couches within arms-reach of a stunning coffee table acquired over 50 years ago by his parents. It travelled from California to Minnesota and back to California. The heirloom of carved wood topped with glass stood on a Turkish carpet. The coffee table displayed travel books, and 1000 Record Covers by Michael Ochs first released in 1996. Treat yourself and listen to some of his brother Phil’s folksongs on YouTube.
Spurred by quotidian subjects we visited people from their mid-30’s to 82: a single person, four young families, and eleven empty nesters and retired. The ubiquitous coffee table represents personality, activities, interests, lifestyle and values from childrearing to grandparent’s mementos, object d’art; from clutter to neat freaks. The coffee table is an often overlooked aspect of domestic culture
When Alexander Payne (Citizen Ruth 1996, Sideways 2004, etc.) and James Zemaitis googled “coffee table” while preparing the 2003 3.5 pound The Coffee Table Coffee Table Book. The search yielded 2,160,000 entries. In August 2018 the same request produced 860,000,000 entries. Seinfeld introduced a coffee table book on the Regis Philbin show in 1994. The three YouTubes received 145,000 views.
The newspapers, magazines, coffee, wine, and cocktail coasters, plants, sculpture, games and entertainment remotes represented order and chaos. The living room coffee table was a landing strip for stuff, storage, and game boards.
Nathan, my friend from junior high school days, and his wife Ann Marie hail from Henderson, Nevada, and have cooler quarters in San Diego. He carried the Las Vegas Review Journal and Oregon Trail, a card game not a book, to San Diego. He shared that Las Vegas has two newspapers. “Both are Jewish owned. The Review Journal owned the by Sheldon Adelson family. Very conservative and Republican. The Sun is owned by the Greenspun family. Very liberal and Democrat. Separate editorial angles.”
Debbie and Mark moved from Burbank to Irvine. They are the downsizing demographic. She writes, “Our current coffee table is a resource for learning about our new city and surrounding areas….culture and arts, restaurants, shopping, maps, fashion, nature trails, real estate, beaches, and much more.” They held a fundraiser in 2008, and my donation netted a 12×12 photograph book, Water is the Key: A Better Future for Africa, signed by the author.
Karen O, of Omaha, is staging her Costa Mesa home for sale with “Sotheby’s Magnificent Jewelry” on her coffee table. Scott and Becky, our Richmond neighbors displayed Another Side of Paradise by Sally Koslow, the New Yorker and East Bay Express.
No tables were empty. The coffee table is a mise en place and a mise en scène and activity, from minimalist to maximalist, and work in progress.
Beryl and Joyce in Brentwood have a coffee tables in their living and family rooms piled with books, we “have a doozie.” This is the ‘doozie” with at least 46 volumes. Joyce cleared off 15 Jewish themed books and moved them to a shelf about two weeks ago.
Something’s missing. My cousins Ralph and Donna, she’s a former Sunday school teacher, captured the Jewish lacunae. When asked if she staged this, she replied, “Isn’t it always like that????”
Our cluttered three level wheeled Italian coffee table experiences high turnover. The bi-weekly J of Northern California, Proof from PG Library, the Des Moines Jewish Press, New York Times, New Yorker, etc. quickly age out. Beneath the glass lies Manhole Covers (MIT Press, 1994), three books on birds including the 6-pound Bird, The Definitive Visual Guide by Audubon, and mementoes; a woven basket, two heart slinkies, and photograph albums, hardly ever touched other than for dusting.
Young families use coffee tables as activity and storage centers. Empty nesters and grandparents generally conveyed a sense of repose. What about end, side, and occasional tables, bedroom night stands, and desks. Marcia wrote, “I’m a neat freak but our end tables are piled with books. Now, if you do a study of office desks, I can send you a picture of Michael’s that will gag you.”
Michael Nolledo wrote in InsideHook on December 15, 2017, “The 40 Essential coffee-table books of 2017, “We’re gonna need a bigger coffee table.” “Coffee-table books will always be the perfect gift. Since they’re meant for display, they act as a testament to how well you know your recipient: a subtle way to honor his or her interests, passions or obsessions.”
A friend mourning for the loss of a sibling reports that her table has been enhanced by “books from thoughtful friends about grieving” including The Jewish Way in Death and Mourning by Maurice Lamm, Kaddish by Leonard Wieseltier, and I’ve been thinking …Reflections, prayers, and meditations for a meaningful life by Maria Shriver. Mementoes of travel are great. Symbols of Jewish life and rites of passage are greater. Mix them up, perhaps a book on Jewish art.
*
Pollak, a professor emeritus of history at the University of Nebraska Omaha, and a lawyer, is a correspondent now based in Richmond, California. He may be contacted via oliver.pollak@sdjewishworld.com