When I was growing up, we spent many a Thanksgiving at grandpa’s house in Haxtun Colorado. Thanksgiving was a much anticipated and happy time. We would leave home on Wednesday afternoon after dad got home from work. It was a long 7 hour drive to Grandpa’s house in those pre-interstate highway days, so it would be really late by the time we arrived.

We stayed at grandpa’s house, so aunts, uncles, and cousins were stashed in every bedroom upstairs and down, plus on couches, hide-a-beds, and any other place there was room to throw down some blankets and pillows. When I was quite small, they put my brother and I and some of our cousins all in one sofa-bed, and several more in one bed in the basement. We were stacked in like cord wood.

This is grandpa’s sofa bed. Several of us cousins would share this sofa-bed at Thanksgiving and Christmas. My cousin Sue is on the left along with her husband Ken and daughter Tori. I am on the right. The sofa-bed now lives at Sue’s house.

The next day, my brother and I would play with our cousins while the adults worked on Thanksgiving dinner (and/or watched a football game). Dinner was quite a production with a lot of people involved. There was grandpa, his six children and their spouses, plus all of the children, 25 people in all. That was a lot of people to fit around the big table with all the extra leaves, plus there were card tables. We had all the usual fixins, plus whatever grandpa provided if he had been hunting and was successful. When we hit our teens, my cousins and I could go along with him. Grace was said or sung or both. Singing grace was a family tradition. I still remember the tune. Our version went something like this:

Be with us at our table Lord.
Be here and everywhere adored.
These mercies bless and grant that we
May feast in fellowship with thee.

Good food was shared. I can still remember finding an occasional piece of shot while eating duck or pheasant or whatever else grandpa had provided for the feast. Much happy talk would go on around the table. Past memories and recent events would all be shared. Some of the memories were sad. Grandma died when I was very young.

There was lots of room to play, both inside and out. The basement coal room was a place of mystery since none of us cousins had a house with a coal room. When I was small, Uncle Ken became the family horse. We took turns riding him around the house. In addition to a big house, there was a big yard (at least it felt big at the time), with the arbor, the old car (Model T or A) that sat in the side yard, a separate garage with a big depression in the floor so you could work under the car, and the playhouse in the back of the yard. Outside, we were pirates or explorers or whatever else struck our imaginations. My cousins and I made mud pies in the playhouse which we actually tasted.

The pantry behind the kitchen always had a box of chocolate chips that my cousins and I would secretly get into throughout the day. Chocolate chips worked well to fortify us for the day’s adventures. We were very careful not to get caught. It wasn’t until grandpa’s funeral that my cousins and I learned that our parents were snitching chocolate chips too. Grandpa let one of my aunts in on his little secret. He would buy several boxes, and hide all but one or two. When one box got low, he would put out another one.

It was a real joy to be together. After a two or three fun-filled days, we would all head home.

I still look forward to Thanksgiving. Sometimes all of our children are home and sometimes just one or two, or we travel to them. We do the traditional dinner with turkey and all the trimmings. I’m particularly fond of cranberry in various forms. There are usually two flavors of pie and we get a bottle of sparkling juice. We talk and laugh and share memories both happy and sad. Sometimes we sing the same table grace I sang in Haxtun in the 1950s and 60s. I’ve gone from being one of the grandchildren to being a grandfather. How did that happen?

May this Thanksgiving bring you joy, good memories, and happy times with family and friends!