The wedding plans for daughter Mandy and her beau, Matt are about to gear up into Warp 5 mode for real and we will be reporting our experiences as they seem entertaining. (Sorry, Mandy, you’ll have to put up with Mother just a little longer . . . it’s all in fun!!)
In the meantime, I offer something I penned a few years ago . . but never goes out of date . . thanks for your indulgence and your friendship . . Merry, Merry Christmas to all . . and may we all count our blessings every day of the New Year!! . .
ISN’T IT JUST THE BEST ONE, EVER?
The countdown to Christmas Eve is on speed dial; Santa’s sleigh is polished and poised for the magical ride so, yikes! I have got to pull myself together and. . . . get the tree.
Twice since Tom and I have been married, we’ve bought two trees to get one. The first set came when Billy was about four months old. Rather smugly, as I recall, we purchased a very small, very inexpensive tree for a very small boy very early in December. My father arrived on Christmas Eve, took one look at this arboreal aberration leaning against the side of the house and said, “Is this your Christmas tree?” “Looks like it was too young to leave its mother.”
He bought us another one, a more normal size, and the adolescent tree was relegated to the front lawn where it did seem to be looking for its mother.
Our second episode of tree rejects happened when someone brought home a tree with such severe scoliosis it certainly needed major orthopedic surgery. If we put the trunk in the stand the way you’re supposed to, the tree bent over so dramatically as to give the appearance of being a pine branch arch. If we jerry-rigged some ropes from one wall to another, and gave up the idea of putting it in a stand, the top was actually pointing up. However, when one of the kids said, “Why is our Christmas tree lying down?” It went into the woodpile, and we bought another tree.
Our really oddest-looking tree came the year my friend Nan told me that “everyone” was going to this place out in the country to chop down their own tree. Thinking this would highlight a real folksy American tradition particularly for our visiting Italian student, we bundled everyone up and headed out, replete with saw and ax. As a starter, the weather was freezing and the ground at the tree farm was rock hard mud. Our lovely guest was wearing her favorite Italian leather boots with no lining, and after a couple of hours of all this wilderness togetherness announced that she couldn’t feel her toes.
Of course, out there on the range, one loses perspective of the height of one’s living room ceiling and the distance between one’s living room walls. As a result, we brought home a tree meant for Paul Bunyon’s house. Cheap, but completely outsized for our modest rooms. By the time Tom cut enough off the bottom to make it stand vertically without drilling hole in the living room ceiling, there was more tree left outside on the lawn than going through the front door. The skimpy branches still attached to the top of the once magnificent thirty-foot tree had long since grown ahead and away from his fellow branches. So we ended up with a sturdy trunk and about four long skinny branches, which shot out horizontally from wall to wall. The few pine needles it did have were like porcupine quills about three inches long, and drew blood anytime one of the kids got near. All the ornaments we owned were hung single file laundry-line style across the living room.
That cut-your-own story pales in comparison with the one about some newlywed friends. Being very anxious to start their own holiday tradition, they drove north one Saturday afternoon for a romantic lunch and tree chopping. Lashing the most perfect tree they could find to the top of their car, they brought it home to their city apartment while they dressed for a dinner date. He was still in the shower when he heard her shrieking uncontrollably from the living room. Something about a snake and the tree. Racing out, stark naked and dripping wet, he looked frantically for the reptile while she hid in the hall. While he was poking under the couch, their dog came up behind him and bussed his bare derriere. Stunned, he jumped back, cracked his head on the glass coffee table and knocked himself out. Hearing no noise, she came back into the room to see him out cold on the floor. Hysterical, she dialed 911 and screamed that her husband had been bitten by a snake and was dying. When the paramedics responded, they quickly rolled him onto a stretcher. But when they picked it up, the snake slithered out from under the couch startling them so much, they dropped the litter and broke the patient’s collar bone! So much for chopping down Christmas trees.
However, the good news about Christmas tree selection is that when we gather together this Christmas Eve, warmed by family and friends and holiday spirit, we will all agree. . whether the tree is a little lopsided or missing branches on the back, whether it’s a Douglas Fir or a Balsam or Cape Cod Cedar, skinny or fat, or if the star at the top is teetering precariously to one side. . whatever. . .that this year’s tree is definitely. . . the best one ever!
Love, Carol. Dot.Com
Grandparenting 101
The Bragging Absolution
Identity Verification
And I Have a Ton of Sippy Cups!
Flunking Dog Bath
Wrapping It Up
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