A few weeks ago, we had a Christmas party. We started this tradition about a decade or so when we both left the full-time newspaper business.

We look forward to the event every year and never have a bad time. Even with the bad weather – it rained all day this year – the 2009 edition turned out as wonderful as ever. Except for one thing.

At no point in the party did we all sit around in a circle and break into an impromptu sing-along of holiday songs.

I don’t think anyone wanted to, but I have watched enough television over my life to know that it happens at Christmas parties all the time. Well, at least Christmas parties thrown by fictional characters.

I don’t know why it dawned on me while watching a show earlier this month, but I realized that this fits into that category of things that only happen on TV.

The formula never changes either. There’s some tension or stress, so the party sing-along serves as a great ice-breaker. Someone always has a musical instrument or the host happens to have a piano. And everyone at the party not only knows all the words to all the songs, but they have wonderful singing voices as well.

I guess we could have pulled this off. We do have a piano in our living room so everyone could have gathered around it, but I don’t know if the singing would have been any good. And I don’t think anyone had a Santa hat. Someone is always wearing a Santa hat in those parties on TV.

So maybe we will have to try and institute the sing-along next year. We can do it right after the other tradition which I only think exists in the mind of TV writers: gathering around the table and saying what we are thankful for.

Does anyone actually do this at Thanksgiving or anytime during the holiday season? I’m not trying to take away the sentimentality of Turkey Day – I already hate how it is getting lost alongside Black Friday – but I can’t see this really happening.

I’m thankful for turkey and stuffing and other starchy foods and football and the fact that my mother-in-law serves supper early in the afternoon so I can get a nap and catch most of the football action after we eat.

Do we really want to sit around a table of hot, steaming food and hear stuff like that? Every family has at least one smart aleck like me so you know the true intention of the practice would be crushed when that person took their turn.

I guess the only way I see this tradition working is if it fulfills the requirement that family members share some uncomfortable moments on Thanksgiving. Making people spout platitudes they are uncomfortable sharing might just make the day t hat much more special.

Still, I only see it on TV when the host or hostess sits at the head of the table and presides over the family meal. I guess I’ve had it all wrong with digging into a heaping plate of food while everyone tries to remember who likes dark meat and figures out if we have enough butter on the table.

At least there isn’t any singing.