A PLACE AT THE TABLE

A few days ago, someone wrote to tell me that my comments on her posts make her feel seen and appreciated. Then she added something that surprised me even more: that she considers me an important part of this community, both as a writer and as a reader.

Those words stayed with me.

Maybe because I still do not quite see myself that way. I have only been on Substack for five months, and I still feel like a beginner: someone who hesitates before taking a step, who worries about getting things wrong, who is still surprised when someone sees him with such generosity.

Over these months, I have received many kind words, sometimes so generous that I find myself wondering whether I truly deserve them, or whether other people are able to see something in me before I have learned to recognize it myself.

And it was precisely those words, being told that I was an important part of a community I am still not entirely sure I belong to, that led me to this reflection.

What does it really mean to be part of a community?

I live on the other side of the ocean, in an ancient part of the world, and so much has happened here in such a short time that it has left me a little disoriented, as we say where I come from. Maybe that is also why I listen more than I speak: because I still feel I have so much to learn before I can truly consider myself part of something.

And yet, those words made me realize that perhaps a community begins here too: in the moment when someone realizes that, on the other side, another person has not simply read their words, but stopped. Listened. Recognized something.

That truly matters.

The community I dream of, the one many of us are looking for, is not made only of content, newsletters, comments, or numbers. Above all, it is made of people who choose to truly be there, each offering what they can.

Some are able to financially support what they believe matters. Some give their time. Some offer attention, solidarity, knowledge. Some bring a different culture, an experience lived somewhere else, a way of seeing things we might never have encountered on our own.

We do not all start from the same place, and we do not all have the same opportunities. That is why I do not believe contributing should mean that everyone gives the same thing, or gives the same amount.

A community comes alive when what each person can offer is recognized for its value, without anyone being made to feel less important simply because they can give less than someone else.

For me, perhaps cultural, social, and economic equity begins right here: in recognizing that differences exist without allowing them to become a measure of a person’s worth.

And also in understanding that a community cannot always be carried by the same people.

Someone may be able to offer money, someone else time. Someone may bring a skill, someone else a few words that arrive at exactly the right moment. And there are times in life when perhaps all a person can do is simply be there.

That matters too.

Because I do not believe a community begins when everyone gives in the same way.

I believe it begins when no one assumes that giving should always be someone else’s responsibility.

And yes, what is missing is the human contact that would confirm that all of this is real. A voice, a look, a presence. There are screens between us, different languages, habits we do not know and, in my case, an ocean as well. Sometimes I wonder how much of what we build here can truly cross that distance without losing something along the way.

But the desire to be there is not missing.

And sometimes, that is already a beginning.

The community I imagine is like a table that keeps getting larger. It brings to mind an Italian musical from the 1970s, Aggiungi un posto a tavola, which roughly translates as Add a Place at the Table. More than fifty years have passed, but that image has stayed with many of us: moving a chair just a little so someone else can sit down.

As a child, I probably never thought about what that image might come to mean many years later. It was simply a tune you heard, a phrase that stayed in your head. Today, though, it seems to me that there is something in that very simple gesture that also speaks to what we are trying to build here.

Adding a place not because the table is already perfect, but because we believe there is room for one more person.

Not because the person arriving has to be like us.

Not because they have to bring something extraordinary.

But because their presence can change, even in some small way, what was there before.

Everyone who sits down brings something with them: a gesture, a thought, an experience, a culture, a contribution, however small or large. Some can offer their time, some can provide financial support, some bring knowledge, some bring the ability to listen. And there are moments in life when perhaps all a person can do is sit beside the others.

That should have value too.

During these five months, I have often wondered whether there really was a place for me at this table.

I am not sure I have found an answer.

Maybe I do not need to find one yet.

But I am beginning to think that belonging to a community does not simply mean knowing that someone has kept a chair open for us.

Perhaps it also means noticing, at some point, that there is another chair beside ours.

And moving over just a little, because sometimes it is through such a small gesture that another voice finds more room in this world.

Author’s Note

This reflection began with a comment someone left for me a few days ago.

She told me that my words, and the way I respond to hers, made her feel seen and appreciated. Then she described me as an important member of this community.

I did not know what to do with that sentence at first.

Perhaps because I have only been here for five months. Perhaps because I still feel much closer to someone learning how to belong than to someone who can confidently say that he does.

But the comment stayed with me, and eventually it led me somewhere else.

It made me think about what a community asks of us, not only what it gives us. About the different things we are able to bring. About the fact that contribution cannot always be measured in the same way.

And about a very old image from my childhood in Italy: a table, a chair moved slightly to one side, and enough room for one more person.

Maybe belonging begins there.

Not when someone tells us that a place has been saved for us, but when we begin to notice that we can make room too.

— Antonio Castellaneta

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