This reminds me of an evening when our family were dinner guests at a colleague's home for a fairly formal evening. Total of five people. He was a good cook, and the food was terrific. The table was set with plastic plates and grape jelly jars for glasses. We didn't care, and it was just fine, but we did think it seemed kind of odd in light of the china hutch full of nice china dishes and stemware, right next to the table! We didn't comment or ask, but we did wonder what he was saving that stuff for. Maybe he just inherited it or something and hated it.
That's pretty funny! I think a lot of people have "formal china" that they never use. When I got married the first time, I registered for china because that's what you did back then. But I really never used it. I used my every day dishes all the time. Not quite the same as using disposable, but same in the way that the china just never got used. In the 12 years I was married, I bet I used that china less than 10 times. I ended up selling it after I got divorced. I really didn't love it and it was just taking up space.
I wonder if your colleague doesn't even really think of the china as something to use, but just as something he has on display in the china cabinet. I kinda wonder if that's the trouble with keeping your china in a china cabinet. I didn't have one, but I stored my china in the dining room rather than in the kitchen, making it less accessible and less in the front of my mind. Looking back now, that was probably one of the biggest reasons I never used it.
And... now that I think about it, I also didn't want to put my china in the dishwasher so I didn't look forward to washing all those dishes by hand. Silly, right? But there it is!
See, I love my china and am actually on a mission to use it more often. Our living situation for the past couple years has meant that the china has had to be packed up and put in storage, but we're getting ready to move and I'm hoping to start a habit of using it for Sunday dinners every week. It probably helps that our china is technically dishwasher safe, although I tend not to trust that and just wash it by hand anyway. But I don't generally mind washing dishes- I even find it kind of calming and meditative- and the china is so pretty to look at that I mind washing it even less!
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