Hot Potato

I was making leek-infused mashed potatoes the other day. It’s one of my favorites. Yeah, I know, I say that a lot, but it’s true. Another one of those umami blends that fit right into a soul food kitchen. Anyway . . .

I had just pulled the boiled potatoes off the stove and had begun the process of peeling them, which fucking sucks because my hands are so damned sensitive these days. My dad also had sensitive hands, which we all used to laugh at — this serious businessman who had faced down so much adversity in his life cringing any time someone handed him a bowl of hot soup. I never knew he had psoriasis.

Anyway, my own comical juggling act in the kitchen that morning, trying to slip off the potato skins without handling them too much, immediately recalled the kid’s game of “hot potato.” Unlike so many other games I grew up with— jacks, hopscotch, johnny on a pony, half rubber, bombardment — “hot potato” puzzles me with its strange amorphousness. What’s the point here? With whom am I competing? With whom collaborating? What is a hot potato anyway?

Years later, as I am hopping around the kitchen at 5 in the morning like a crazy mad-hatter, I have a much more visceral sense of that child’s game. And yet . . . And yet. There is always a deeper significance embedded in those games we grew up with, always a certain sociology. But “hot potato”? I’m still at a loss.