Sweet Potato

First and foremost, I must wish my mother a HAPPY BIRTHDAY! When I talked to her this morning, she had already had a wild and exciting day.......she had slept in.......all the way to 8:30. (This is a huge accomplishment for someone who has been retired for years.)

Today is not only my mother’s birthday, but it is also TATER DAY! How cool is it that her birthday fell on Tater Day?!?! That is like the best day of the year in Kentucky. Ironically she said that she was not going to attend the festivities. I can’t imagine why.

Tater Day started when people in Benton and surrounding areas would go to market with their sweet potatoes. (How exciting!) It has gradually grown to include a parade and beauty pageant. There are carnival rides, hard-to-win games and bad-for-you food. The parade was always the highlight of the day. It is just like any other home-town parade…..flatbed floats with kids, Shriners, clowns and politicians, then came the classic cars, then the tractors, and the poopy-horses came last.

Since Tater Day is always the first Monday in April, we all begged our parents to skip school that day. Since my parents were teachers, I was always out of luck. It was always Senior Skip Day for the older crowd. Finally the schools gave up and always scheduled Spring Break during that week.

For those of you giggling about the name “Tater Day”, you better stop laughing now. Old Timer’s Day is just a couple of weeks away in Dickson and Mule Day was celebrated in Columbia this past weekend. Taters don’t sound so silly now, do they?

Happy Birthday Mom! You sure are a sweet potato! I love ya!