Everyday China

My Grandma Sheranian is one who believes that if you have something good, you should use it. And so after her set of everyday dinnerware finally wore out, instead of replacing it with some cheap stuff from Target, she brought out her mother’s china for everyday use. The family was shocked. How can you use china everyday? Won’t it get broken? Won’t it loose its charm? But grandma wasn’t concerned: “It’s been in my cupboard all these years and has hardly been used. What’s the use of having china if you never use it?”

Grandma did own more china than usual. She had her own set of china she got when she was married—cream colored and Asian looking with blue flowers. We didn’t see it much because many of the pieces had broken and there wasn’t enough to set a full table. She had her mother’s china that was gold rimmed with blue and pink flowers, which I had never seen until she had brought it out for everyday use. She had her mother-in-laws set of Rosenthal China that only came out for VERY special occasions. And she had another set of china that I’m not sure where she got, but it was what we normally used for birthdays so we saw it quite often.

I’m sure you can understand why someone who has four sets of china would put one to everyday use, and now it makes sense to me too. In a way it shows grandma’s attitude about life: enjoy it while you can.