I’ve always kind of liked the idea that, because I have no children or money and I believe in cremation, when I leave this earth my footprint will pretty much go with me, but Nancy Perry made me realize I’m leaving a whole ‘nother legacy behind – a food legacy.Perry is speaking tonight at the Saugus Historical Society (30 Main St., doors open at 6:45, and it’s free) on the importance of family recipes and the preservation of mealtime memories.I was speaking with someone recently who was lamenting the lack of table manners among today’s youth. I suppose that sounds like the least thing in the world we should be worried about, but, then again, part of a civil society is basic manners.When my mother taught preschool, one of her most important lessons was learning to say “please” and “thank you,” basic manners.I asked why she thought kids lack table manners, and she said probably because families don’t eat together like they used to, and I think she’s probably right. Every other food article is how to make quick dinners or dinners on the go. They might as well call them dinners we can eat in the back of a car while traveling to soccer, football, piano or dance team lessons/practice, whatever. And even if they are home, I feel like families often eat in different rooms, at different times.We had a rectangular dining room table. My dad sat at one end, my brother Michael, for whatever reason, sat at the other. My mom sat on one side, and Jeffrey and I sat on the other. Blondie, our golden lab, laid on the floor between my dad and I (we were most likely to “drop” something).Those were our places at the table, always, they never altered. The TV was never on, we actually spoke to each other or sulked because someone was mad at someone. There was one meal, and if you didn’t like what was served, my mother would suggest we try another restaurant. I occasionally thought of going to Billy Couitt’s house (kid next door) to see what his mother was serving, but I never had the nerve.As we got older, the ritual did change. It was often Michael, my mother and me around the bar in the kitchen, but we still set the table and sat down together. Heck, if my mother worked late, Michael and I would set the table and sit down together.And it’s not like we were all that civilized either. We have a picture of a teenage Jeffrey carving the Thanksgiving turkey shirtless. I’m sure my mother made him put a shirt on before we sat to eat, pretty sure anyway. I don’t have the actual picture, but it’s in my bank of mealtime memories.That table used to have a certain sway to it because it was a trestle table, and Jeffrey and I, who sat with our backs to the wall, would tip our chairs back resting our feet on the crossbeam until my mother would yell at us to stop tipping in our chairs.No tipping in your chair, no skateboarding down the hallway and no bouncing the basketball in the house, those were the cardinal rules of my childhood (and when you heard the police whistle blow, it was time to come home for dinner).Memories, however, aren’t the only food legacy. I have a stack of recipes, some I don’t even use, that I keep because they are handwritten from my aunts, my grandmother, my mother, my mother-in-law and even my dad. I love picking up a recipe or flipping open a cookbook and seeing notes in my grandmother’s handwriting.And I have some from friends and readers. I have the late Peter Bogdan’s Irish soda bread recipe, in his handwriting, which makes me smile every time I come across it.Perry will tell you that food legacies are about preserving those recipes and memories and passing them on, but don’t think that because you aren’t a big cook or a fancy baker that you have nothing to pass on.Growing up Thanksgiving mornings always included Pillsbury cinnamon rolls for breakfast. It was a big treat! I remember calling Michael a few years ago on Thanksgiving morning and asking him what he was doing.”I’m eating cinnamon rolls,” he said, like I was an idiot. I laug