I ended up not going down to Kansas City this year for Thanksgiving. I usually ride down with my Aunt Mary, but her car and mine both conspired to keep us in town. Talking with my mom a few days ago, I told her that if we had the “mashed potato conversation” again this year, I was so going to put it on my Web site. She said to do it anyway:

It happens every year. We’re gathered at the table, someone has said grace (a story for another time), and people are loading thier plates. When the mashed potatoes come around I quietly pass them along. That’s when it starts.

Mom: “Don’t you want any mashed potatoes?”

Me: “I don’t like mashed potatoes.”

“When did you stop liking mashed potatoes?”

“I’ve never actually liked them. It’s not about anyone’s in particular, I just don’t care for them.” My mom’s are quite good, by mashed potato standards, but that doesn’t really change anything as far as I’m concerned.

“You used to eat them. When did you stop?”

“When I was 8 or 9, I think. Old enough to load my own plate and therefore pass them along quietly, without further comment.”

Except, it seems, for the annual mashed potato conversation.