"There was something about the smell of a roasting Idaho that was so cozy, and also, well, conservative, was the way Macon put it to himself. He thought back on years and years of winter evenings: the kitichen windows black outside, the corners furry with gathering darkness, the four of them seated at the chipped enamel table meticulously filling scooped-out potato skins with butter. You let the butter melt in the skins while you mashed and seasoned the floury insides; the skins were saved till last. It was almost a ritual. He recalled that once, during one of their mother's longer absences, her friend Eliza had served them what she called potato boats-restuffed, not a bit like the genuine article. The children, with pinched, fastidious expressions, had emptied the stuffing and proceeded as usual with the skins, pretending to overlook her mistake."In this scene Sarah tells Macon she is leaving him and he reacts in the typical uber-sensible Leary manner.
In an out-of-character move, Macon begins to date and then moves in with Muriel, a single mother who lives in a poor neighbourhood of Baltimore with her son Alexander. In the end, it is this out-of-character move that ultimately saves him.
