Putting up the Christmas tree

I like a real tree and I think everyone else in the house does too. It's just such a bother compared to the artificial tree we purchased years ago. The biggest problem with that tree is taking the branches out of the box strightening them out to make them look nice. A few years ago we bought a new fake tree that screamed sell out. It reminds me of that scene in 'A Charlie Brown Christmas' were Linus and Charles Brown are looking for a tree and go to this commerical lot. Linus taps on a fake tree and comments about it bring the true meaning of Christmas home or some such. The tree comes out of the box in three sections, it's got lights and on top of that it even has music. What more could a good christian household ask for, convenience! Well, it's not really Jesus' birthday anyway, it's a pagen holiday that Emperor Constantine decided would be a good day to celebrate Christmas. So with all this Charlie Brown commericialism it'd been years since we'd had a real tree. We tired last year, but spending $100.00 on a tree that would be up for three weeks just didn't cut it.

I have a picture of the girls standing infront of the car with the last live Christmas tree we purchased, some time around 2013. They show as much enthusiam as the kids in Christmas Vacation do at the start of the movie, when Clark is taking the family to cut down the family Christmas tree.

The four of us go out to dinner at the Hard Wok. Precovid we'd be there several times a week, it was a good value, not so much any more. It's still good, but it seems expensive now and it is more a treat then a we're to tired to cook, let's go to Hard Wok. After Hard Wok we head to St. Margaret's school to get a tree. Rumor has it they have cheap trees. Teri asks me where is St. Margaret's. Now my dad and Teri's dad Tony delivered to St Margaret's for the longest time, but I never did. So I fake it a little and I tell her yeah, I know where it is, hoping the school I remember on Washington

Avenue in Pearl River is it. We head up Washington once in Pearl River and drive past the school, nothing, it is dark. We turn around and head to Middletown road where Teri says there is a guy selling trees. There is always a guy selling trees on Middletown road in Pearl River in December. I think it is the place we bought the last real tree from. We pull in and the guy says six footer's are $70.00 and five footer's are $60.00 We look at the trees and Elena picks out a nice one that everyone agrees is nice. We look for a little while longer and decide to go with the first tree. I say to the guy, "so this is $60.00",figuring it is a five footer. THe guy says yeah, I can let it go for that. It was a short six footer, I real wasn't trying to negotiate. He's a real nice guy, he cuts the stump so it is fresh, he wraps it and ties it on to our roof and off we go. I have it wrong, Hard Wok was after getting the tree. I remember someone commenting that the tree was still on our car after we'd eaten. At home it's put next to the garage waiting for the weekend to be put up. The tree stand that hadn't been used for around ten years is amazingly handy, like it has been waited for this day, knowing that it would one day again be used. So many warm summer days in the attic I'd been tempted to toss it out because I just couldn't see us using it again, I'm glad I didn't.

Teri wants the tree up and Christmas to be simple. Somewhere down the road, in the past, Teri and I used to do Christmas up. But life seems to be a little tough these days. It's been like this for several years. It's not like we are having trouble paying bills, we're not. It's just that with us both working, then trying to make dinner and not eating until 8 PM seems to take everything out of us. So there doesn't seem to be time to enjoy Christmas. We put the tree up on Sunday when both girls are home. I put it in it's stand, strighten it and tighten the screw. I then notice how short the tree is. But that is ok, this isn't the 1960's when I was a kid and remember decorating the tree on a Sunday night while Bonanza played in the backround. Or the time when I lived in Stony POint on my own and decorated my tree with the newly purchased Hallmark ornaments, now over thirty years old, that I was just so much in love with. Teri asks what I want to put on the tree and yes I say I want to put the Hallmark ornaments up. They are bought down. I put some bigger lights on the tree that remind me of Christmas' past. Shaped bulbs and the one most seared in my mind the bubble light. I remember them from way back to that Sunday night with Bonanza on sitting in the chair and just being amazed at how beautiful the tree looks. The tinsel hanging off the branches, lights flickering on and off and the bubble lights bubbling. I sat there and soaked up the season like only a child could. It's not like that any more and I wonder if my kids ever felt like that over the past ten, eleven years. If not I'm sorry, there is nothing like that feeling.

I throw on the next set of lights the ones that we'll connect the Hallmark ornaments to. Everyone is unplugging bulbs and plugging Hallmark ornaments in. The ones that have lights, sound or motion come back to life every time a new ornament is plugged in. Then one time someone plugs one in and nothing happens, the lights stay dark. After a little while I notice and begin to check the lights. This of course is the light string that if one is out half or even all will not light. I go bulb by bulb, ornament by ornament, nothing. I remember some light strings have fuses. I check the fuses, two little glass fuses in the plug, so small that I have to ask Matt who is decorating his first Christmas tree if the fuse is good or not. I then realize he may not have ever seen a fuse like this. So I tell him to look for a small filiment and he says there is none. Dead string of lights. We finish the tree, it looks pretty poor when we are done. Very few ornaments, almost no lights, forget tinsel with dogs just plain old not so good. The next day I go looking for lights, Home Depot is out. My mom gives me a string that doesn't work, but the fuses are the same.After dropping the fuse and losing it twice I manage to get both in and the lights still don't work, bad fuses. It's nine days until Christmas, there's still time!! But then again there is still Elena's room that needs so much and I have nine days to get her into it...oh boy, Merry Christmas A few days later armed with another three strings of lights, given to me by my mother, I redecorate the tree. I check each string before I put it on the tree. They work perfectly, a Christmas miracle. I attach the Hallmark ornaments that have some how become thirty years old recently and I dig out ornaments that my mother bought in the 60's plastic cheap things that were alway put on the lower branches so if the dogs hit them and broke them, it was no big deal. They have joined the treasured keepsakes with long memories attached to them. After I'm done, I step back and it finally looks like Christmas has arrived. I hear Tiny Tim say "God bless us everyone" I look toward the TV..... /