Wait, Grandma Did What?!
When Esther reached out to me to make an off-season reservation for her knitting club, I didn’t even raise an eyebrow. A ladies club sounded pretty low-key; maybe even a little boring. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
When they arrived, they definitely looked the part. A bunch of older ladies with gray hair, knitting bags, canes, and sweaters. Most needed help with their luggage, and a few needed an arm to help with the steps. I met Hazel, Gigi, Bunny, Cookie, Mimi…. Turns out many of them used to be elementary school teachers, and they got together yearly. Then there was Mrs. Jane Louise Montgomery; she snapped her fingers at me after introductions, then pointed to her bags and turned her back on me. Apparently she was the queen grandma, and I—clearly!—was just the help.
It was just them and me. The weather wasn’t very good and they mostly stayed in the house. I wasn’t surprised that the excitement of knitting ran low quickly, and they began to look for other forms of entertainment. I had some board games, but they showed little interest. They decided they wanted to play cards.
I found a pack of cards in the game pile and brought it out. They were not impressed. They would need a few decks, given there were 15 players. So, I went into my apartment and looked around. I found one pack labeled across the front of each card, “It’s Okay to be Gay!” I figured it would do. I had another pack also, but each card displayed a different picture of a naked gay porn star posing with everything hanging out. I thought they might be offended, so I put it in my pocket just in case.
I brought the cards to the queen; as I’d suspected, two packs wouldn’t do. I pulled the third pack out of my pocket, saying, “Well, I do have one more pack, but I am not sure you ladies are going to like it very much.”
After a glance, a big smile appeared across her face, and she snatched the pack right out of my hand. Then they started pouring the wine and dealing out the cards. That was the moment I realized this was going to be a very interesting night. As they started playing cards, one-by-one the smiles and giggles began to flow as they discovered each different naked man. The comments came quickly after:
“Oh my, Mr. jack of clubs, that is really quite something you got there!”
“Let me see it, Mimi!”
“No way, you just want to see my cards and cheat!”
“Well, you already told everyone you had the jack of clubs!”
They all began laughing hysterically, including me. I’d never expected this level of hilarity.
Then a bigger surprise: they suddenly realized they were again running short on cards. Well, after interrogating a few suspicious-looking ladies, the mystery was solved and everyone began laughing. They had been pocketing their favorite cards!
They started to look again at our shelf filled with games and one lady pulled out a box. The game was Cards Against Humanity. She asked me what it was. Normally, I would have tried to talk the grandma out of playing this game, but after the response to the cards, I felt it would be okay to be honest. I told her, “It’s a very funny game, but it’s a little filthy, naughty, obscene, and it probably will offend some of you.”
She responded, “Great! Let’s play it!”
Well, we played, and it was absolutely hilarious. I felt like I was playing with Sister Mary Margaret, and I didn’t have the guts to explain some of the terms used in the game. So, I set up the Echo device, and taught them how to ask Alexa for definitions of any words they were not familiar with. The grandmas and Alexa quickly became close friends. Soon, Alexa was the star of the show. One lady was laughing so hard at what necrophilia meant, she fell off her chair.
When they decided it was time for a break, the queen grandma pulled a small container from her purse. And, to my astonishment, she pulled out a joint….
The next morning, to my horror, I spotted one of the ladies lying face-down in the backyard. I ran over, fearing the worst, to see if she was breathing. She was fine, and told me, “I looked at those three steps to get back in the house last night, and I decided to sleep out here instead. Just grab me a glass of water and help me to bed. Also, I think I will be needing an additional night to recover.”
I was done. I never again will judge someone’s ability to have fun based on their age or genteel appearance! I also will make sure I always have plenty of cards, just in case a grandma wants to play. ▼
Tom Kelch is the innkeeper and property manager of the Rehoboth Guest House. He is thrilled to share these stories with Letters’ readers.