“One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, hey, you guys, Mom made seven pies this time, two cherry, two apple and three pumpkin!  She made cinnamon rolls and bread, too.”  We had to wait to eat until Uncle Mac, Aunt Mim and the cousins arrived. The whole house was warm and damp with odors wafting from the kitchen. Mom had a twenty-two-pound turkey in the oven along with all the trimmings which for us included smashed potatoes (as we called them) with gravy, peas, cranberry sauce, stuffing, homemade bread with real butter (not margarine,) and Waldorf salad and pies for dessert. There would be fourteen of us for dinner, so did that mean half a pie for each of us?

The cousins came from the Willamette Valley. We thought of them as the city folks from Forest Grove. As we lived in the country, I always felt they were more “knowing” than us. Jean the oldest, just four years older than I, then Jack, two years older and Doug, two years younger than I. They knew the latest slang, shows on TV, and what clothes were the coolest.  They must have enjoyed bringing us up to date.

It rained this Thanksgiving, and the weather had turned cold, so we ten kids had to find things to do in the house.

Jean and Jack got us organized in the living room.  “Let’s play the latest board game everyone in Forest Grove is playing,” announced Jean. “We planned to bring it, but we forgot it at the last minute, so we will make one.”

She set us to work cutting out paper money. We cut ones, fives, tens, fifties, hundreds, and five hundreds from butcher paper that Mom used to wrap meat for the freezer. Jean, Jack and Tom worked on a piece of cardboard, drawing squares of different colors and filling them in with lots of information I didn’t understand. They also made cards to match the board squares and told us to just keep making more money. Every time I asked what they called the game they ignored me and kept working.  “How many of each are we supposed to make?”  No answer.

Several hours passed before Jack announced we were ready to play. They had just written the name of the game in the middle of the board: “MONOPOLY.” We had each found something to use as our playing piece.  I had a red button.  When they discussed the rules of the game  I didn’t understand, and I expected to lose. As the second oldest in my family of seven and I didn’t want to appear stupid in front of my little brothers and sister, so I pretended to get it.  Several of the younger ones, bored from cutting out play money, headed upstairs in search of something else to do.

When the game finally got underway only six of us played. Knowing the name of the game didn’t help me understand the rules, as I didn’t understand the meaning of the word “monopoly,” but my cousins did. They bought up all the property while I hoarded my money.  We used macaroni for houses and beans for hotels.  Soon the board was filling up with these and I realized my money would not last. Every time I passed GO I got more money, but it still wasn’t enough when I landed on Jean’s hotels.  I watched my money pass into her hands, but I stayed to see how the game would end.  The only ones left playing were Jean, Jack and my older brother Tom.  They were making deals, but I saw Tom would lose to our city-smart cousins.

While we didn’t have their skills for these kinds of games, we had country smarts. The rain was letting up, so we suggested a hike into the woods. The forest behind our house was dense with huckleberry, ferns, salmonberry, and lots of wet moss. We led the way going as fast as we could along our well-made paths. Everyone was getting soaked from the wet brush.  We were cold.  The tall spruce, hemlock, and fir trees made it dark even in daylight.  Soon we could hear our cousins asking, “Do you know where you’re going?  Are we lost?  Let’s go back!”

We headed for the huge spruce that grew deep in the woods behind our house. When we got there, we told our cousins to make a circle around it holding hands.  It took all six of us to envelop the tree trunk.  As we looked up into its branches, I glanced over at my cousins and saw their looks of awe and wonder.

Monopoly was OK, but our spruce tree was the coolest.