spite

During a visit to Racine, Grandad & Carolyn taught us a card game called Spite & Malice. It's played with two decks of cards. It can be played with up to four players. Sometimes Grandad, Carolyn, Ross and I would play. We enjoyed it. If we were taking too long to decide what to do, Grandad would get impatient and say, "Come on.." with some witty phrase about an ice age coming or the season changing. Then if we continued to delay, he'd threaten that our move would be forfeit and sometimes begin a countdown. I always wanted to make the best play, so I would think over all the possibilities, and must have taken an annoyingly long time. I got a bit faster as I learned the vagaries of the game and I'd be planning my next move even before I was finished with my current one. Then as I understood the game better I got faster and would make my move the instant the opponent laid down their card on the discard pile.
I was more into playing games, so I think I enjoyed it more than Ross. Sometimes I would play it with only Grandad or Carolyn, or occasionally both of them, while Ross was doing something else. I don't know if they let me win, but I was pretty good at the game and often won. I really liked playing and for a while, I would play as many games as possible. Every time I won, they would make some comment about how lucky I was, and how they would have to raise some money and send me to Las Vegas so I could make them rich. I remember a couple days of playing game after game with Carolyn. After the first few, she would say it's the last one, but I'd convince her to play just one more. Between games, and during breaks, I would make us glasses of Lipton instant sugar free iced tea. For some reason I really liked the chemical taste of the reconstituted tea and saccharin. I drank glass after glass, and began to associate the strange metallic taste with winning. After that visit, I always wanted to play that game at home, but Ross didn't want to play too often. Whenever I had the chance, I would teach a friend that game so I could play with them and usually beat them. Most people would play a few times with me, then not any more, either because they didn't like the game, or perhaps they didn't like losing most of the time. So every time I visited Racine after that, I always made it a point to play at least one game with Grandad or Carolyn, or both, if possible. It was such a pleasure to play cards with them in the living room on the old card table.

Living room with fire
(card table not pictured)

I remember playing in the summer when the weather was nice and the windows were open and a nice breeze blew through, and playing in the winter when there was a fire in the fireplace, radiating its warmth and cheer over the card players.
When I was in college, I taught some school chums to play and enjoyed a few games of Spite & Malice. I bought some Lipton instant sugar free iced tea to drink while we played, but I think they had changed the formula, and it lacked the harsh metallic taste of victory. After that, I never won with such regularity.