For the Love of Christmas

by Jeanne Bice

  After one celebratory meal at my brother’s house, we all decided to walk off the calories. We strolled around the property while Daddy reminisced about the old place where we’d all grown up. Situated mere feet from my brother’s home, the rickety frame house was long gone, but there were still plenty of things to look at in the yard that once surrounded it.

  Daddy pointed toward a scraggly row of cedars, each one bigger than the other. “Do you remember what those are?” he asked.

  An unexpected crush of memories transported me to Christmases past, when artificial trees played no part in our holidays. Every year we decorated a living tree—hauled, complete with root-ball, from the woods by my father.

  The tree always stood in the corner of the front room, sticky-prickly branches dripping with glowing lights, sentimental ornaments, and tinsel. Daddy propped the tree in a bucket of water to keep it alive. Before he plugged in the lights each day, I enjoyed sitting beneath it, swirling my fingers in the cool depths and inhaling the piney aroma.

  As soon as Christmas was over, Daddy took the tree outside and planted it in the front yard where it joined a row of other cedars, memorials to holidays gone by, that grew into a thick wall I loved to play behind. It shielded me from cars passing on the street close by and provided a fragrant shelter.

  When I was six, we moved to Alabama, leaving behind the woodsy screen. I wondered if Christmas there would be as wonderful as those in Ohio. Would Santa know where to bring our presents? Would the little Nativity scene look out of place? Could we even have Christmas without snow? But Daddy stepped in.

  One December day, he disappeared into the woods and returned a short time later carrying a small, shapely cedar he set in a bucket in the living room. We decorated it with the same ornaments saved from holidays past, along with colorful paper chains and stars we cut from construction paper. Wise men smiled from the Nativity scene, pleased to celebrate the Christ child’s birthday with us in Alabama. And I told myself Santa would find us no matter where we were.

  On Christmas morning, gaily wrapped gifts appeared under the tree, and stockings filled with goodies hung heavy near the crackling woodstove. The day was as wonderful as I’d hoped, even without any snow. And after the holidays, just like he had in Ohio, Daddy took our Christmas tree ­outside.

  Easing the root-ball from the bucket, he planted it beside the house where it eventually grew into a beautiful, full-bodied tree. Each year he added another until there was a tapered line of cedars—like those we left behind in Ohio—standing point over our Alabama house.

  My father had grown up in a home where Christmas gifts were few and far between, and whatever holiday ­sentimentality he may have harbored was stuffed deeply beneath the surface. Yet, somehow he hit upon the one thing that proved how much the season meant to him. Long after Daddy is gone, those trees will stand there, a living testimony to the warm heart nestled inside the quiet, sometimes curt old man.

  And they’ll remind me that there is much more to Christmas than decorations, presents, Santa Claus, and snow.

  Tinsel Time

  By Joanne Hirase-Stacey

  What a glorious holiday it would be. After four years, my husband Bill and I finally decided to get a real Christmas tree. We’d never had one before because our house was small and we didn’t want the hassle of storing decorations.

  In the past, we’d had tabletop trees—a fake ten-incher with a burlap sack wrapping the bottom, a gold wire spiraling to a peak, and a green wooden triangle flecked with bright colors. We lit pine-scented candles and sprayed our wreath with eucalyptus oil, but it wasn’t the same as having the woodsy scent of a live tree.

  The bushy evergreen we selected fit perfectly into a corner. I gently opened new boxes of ornaments, and we hung each fragile decoration with great care. Globe by colorful globe, our tree took on its unique look.

  “Where’s the garland?” Bill looked around.

  “I didn’t buy any.”

  “We need some gold garland.”

  I dug through the bag lying at my feet and pulled out two small boxes. I handed one to him.

  “Tinsel?” He made a face.

  “I love tinsel. It’s fun to throw it on the tree and let it land wherever, then straighten it so it hangs just right.”

  “It’s droopy, stringy, and old-fashioned. No one uses tinsel.”

  I opened my box, grabbed a small handful, and tossed it at the tree. Then I carefully moved the silver strands so they draped nicely over a branch.

  “See? It’s beautiful.”

  He handed me his box and left to watch ­television.

  After I finished decorating, I dragged Bill back into our living room.

  “It doesn’t look too bad.” He tugged on some tinsel.

  “Thanks. If we have a real tree again next year, I’ll get garland,” I promised. “Any color you want.”

  Since I’d already wrapped my husband’s presents, I hauled them from the closet and arranged them on the glittery tree skirt. The space looked bare, so I decided to wrap the other gifts we’d bought and put them under the tree as well. Presents for family, friends, and the girls (our dogs) completed the festive scene.

  Hands on hips, I stood back to admire my handiwork. “It looks like a picture straight out of a ­magazine.”

  Bill brought the dogs into the room to see the tree. Cindy and Honey sniffed a few branches and walked away. Lucille and Abigail took their sweet time, nudging ornaments with their noses and snuffling presents. When they decided the tree was disinteresting and nonthreatening, they moseyed back to their beds.

  A few days later, Bill called me at work. “When are you coming home?”

  “My usual time, why?”

  “You’d better be prepared to see what your girls did.” Amazing how the foursome always became my dogs when they were naughty.

  I hurried home—and found my beautiful tree in the middle of the floor, new ornaments shattered and pine needles scattered, several presents torn open. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

  None of our friends or family will get to enjoy our masterpiece, I mourned. Tearfully, I put the dogs outside and cleaned up the mess. I knew the neighbors would wonder why our tree was stuffed in the garbage can, lights and all.

  “Mom is mad at you, Lucy,” Bill chastised our little pit bull. “You wrecked the tree.”

  “Cindy and Honey wouldn’t have done it,” I agreed. They were older and never got into any trouble. “It could have been Abby, though. Why are you blaming Lucy?”

  “The evidence points at her.”

  Curious, I cupped Lucy’s sweet face in my hands, but I didn’t see any telltale sign pointing at her as the number one suspect.

  “Uh, you’re looking at the wrong end.” Bill tried not to laugh.

  I turned Lucy around and saw it—tinsel peeping out beneath her tail.

  “The vet said not to pull.” Bill handed me an old pair of scissors. “You just have to keep it trimmed until there isn’t any more.”

  I took the scissors and eyed Lucy with ­reluctance.

  “I hate to say it,” Bill paused for effect, “but you should have gotten garland!”

  Visions of Tree Trimming Dance in Our Heads

  By Marybeth Hicks

  We’re trying to get into the spirit of the season, but we repeat the mistake of planning idyllic experiences—which, of course, ruin the coming of Christmas. Case in point: trimming the tree. For years I tried to eliminate all potential reasons why tree trimming could become (how to put this?) an evening in the fires of hell.

  Once, when our children were little, we created an idyllic afternoon in which we planned to explore the local Christmas tree farm, choose a majestic fir, spruce, or pine (who can tell, really?), and drive home with the perfect Christmas tree tied to the roof o
f our family van. All the while, we would sing carols in unison. (Or would harmony be more ideal?)

  Don’t be shocked, but it didn’t turn out that way.

  If I recall correctly, the temperature was something like fifteen degrees. I wrapped the children in so many layers that they couldn’t move their arms and legs. Inexplicably, I dressed them in single pairs of flimsy cotton socks and inadequate snow boots (made of a substance not found in nature and unequal to the task of warming their feet).

  “I’m cold,” a child griped seven seconds after we got out of the van and walked (or waddled, as the case may be) toward the wagon that would drop us in the forest.

  “At least you have the good mittens. My hands are frozen,” another chimed in.

  The complaining escalated.

  “You always get the good mittens.”

  “That’s because you lost the other mittens.”

  And then, one of the children said the wrong thing. “Why is this taking so long?”

  Of course, it was taking so long because my husband was in search of the one and only evergreen with a straight tree trunk. For reasons beyond my comprehension, he operated under the misconception that there really is such a thing.

  From that moment on, our ideal afternoon on the tree farm dwindled into an exercise in frozen futility. I worried that the baby was at risk for hypothermia, so I did what all wives do when we know we’re running out of time and the demands of motherhood are about to collide head-on with the responsibilities of being a good spouse: I flattered my husband’s taste in trees.

  “Honey, you’re right, that clearly is the tree that Joseph himself would have chosen had he not been so busy finding a stable for Mary. It’s a ­winner.”

  He tested my sincerity. “Are you sure?”

  “Can we go now?” warbled a chilled cherub.

  “Absolutely,” I assured. “It’s the perfect tree.”

  Yeah, right. You know what happened next because it has happened to you or someone you know. Even if you don’t celebrate Christmas, you’ve probably experienced the equivalent in furniture assembly or wallpapering.

  We got home and Jim cut the bottom so it would drink water from the tree stand (assuming we remembered to refill the stand with water). This was standard operating procedure, after all. But cutting the bottom caused the tree to list to one side, so naturally he cut a little more. And a little more. And more still.

  Eventually, we stood in the family room next to a three-foot Christmas bush.

  If memory serves me correctly, Jim and I had an argument. I fed the children a can of soup and some watery hot cocoa. He put the little ones to bed with a promise to trim the tree the next day; I left to purchase a professionally cut pine from the vendor on the vacant lot near the gas station.

  Tears. Apologies. Forgiveness. Merry Christmas.

  On December 26 a few years later, I bought a six-foot artificial blue spruce on clearance, put it in the storage room, and smugly planned the perfect family tree trimming experience for the following year. At least I would eliminate a needle-clogged vacuum cleaner and potential sap stains.

  The six of us still believe that tree trimming is an idyllic experience despite annual tensions and conflict. And this year was no exception.

  When we pulled out our trusty artificial tree, someone (no one pointed fingers) had tangled the lights so inextricably into the boughs of plastic and wire that the plug disappeared. While my husband and I tussled with the lights, the kids unwrapped—and broke—several glass Santas.

  Tears. Apologies. Forgiveness. Merry Christmas.

  For whatever reason, our collective imaginations still harbor a fantasy of family togetherness that’s only possible in a Frank Capra movie. Then again, every year is somehow more idyllic than the last, even if we’re writing the script ourselves.

  Silent Night

  By Carla Zwahlen

  Buying a Christmas tree, I reminded myself, was not going to get any easier no matter how long I procrastinated. I lost track of how many times I’d passed the tree lot without stopping. I could not miss the display. It stood next to the post office where I picked up my mail every day.

  Six months ago, cancer stole my beautiful husband from me. As the cutting edge of loss clipped the threads that bound me to Werner, I isolated one of loss’s blatant characteristics: Firsts. Doing things for the first time without Werner.

  As the minutes ticked away, these Firsts automatically laced themselves throughout my everyday steps. Even though some were easier than others to get through, I felt the jagged-edged hole that Werner’s death left in my life. Even the smallest things he did for me, the ones I took for granted, became a confrontation with loss.

  Buying the Christmas tree was especially difficult; I feared the emotional encounter awaiting me at the tree lot. I worried and argued with myself, until a quiet voice in my head reminded me, Christmas Eve is nearly here. The thought of telling my family there would be no tree this year bothered me.

  By itself, the evergreen was not special. But enveloping it was a thirty-three-year-old Swiss tradition that Werner and his sons, Stefan and Jurg, carried out—a ritual they anticipated. In all those years, I had never selected or bought the tree.

  I drove to the lot.

  I took a deep breath, stepped out of my car, and walked between the rows of balsam and spruce. The heavy, woodsy aroma caught me and lifted me to another time and another row of trees years earlier, when Stefan was only three.

  Stefan had insisted on carrying the big shovel and struggled to hold the fat handle in his hands. He dragged it through tall field grass and into the forest. Every few steps, the shovel slipped from his tiny grasp and slid to the ground. He stopped, picked it up, and marched on toward his important mission—choosing a little balsam for his dad.

  Stefan examined each tree, while I told him about the Christmases of Werner’s childhood in Switzerland. “Santa Claus does not visit the Swiss children’s homes.” Stefan frowned at the thought. “However, a week before Christmas, on Saint Nicholas day, the Swiss children receive chocolate and special cookies to eat. They save Christmas Eve just for the celebration of Jesus’s birth.” Stefan’s face brightened.

  I told him how his dad’s family visited the forest to find their tree. When Christmas Eve arrived, they placed the little balsam in their living room and decorated it with oranges and homemade ornaments. They clipped candle holders onto the branch tips and placed short tapers into each one.

  “After dinner they sang carols,” I told Stephan, “and each person helped light the candles. Once all the candles burned bright, they sang ‘Stille Nacht.’ It reminded them that Jesus is the true light and savior in a dark world.”

  Stefan chose a three-foot balsam while he listened to my story. With help from me, he dug into the dirt and wrested the tree from the ground. We nestled the root-ball into the black nursery pot I carried. At home, we hid the tree behind the woodshed and hoped it remained a secret until Christmas Eve.

  The day before Christmas, we waited until Werner went to work and, like two jolly conspirators, we decorated the tree. We looped red and white paper chains around the needles, hung the little white candles on the branch tips, and hid the tree again. Stefan worked hard to contain his excitement while he waited to present his dad with a “Swiss Christmas tree.”

  That evening, Stefan and I slipped from the house and gathered the tree we had decorated in the colors of Switzerland. We placed it on the big granite step outside the front door, lit the candles—and hoped the wind did not snuff them out.

  Candlelight danced against the darkness and illuminated the big smile on Stefan’s face. We pounded on the door and shouted, “Merry Christmas!”

  Werner opened the door and gaped at the two of us standing there. When his eyes rested on the candlelit tree, a smile spread acros
s his face and reached far into that holy Christmas night.

  Every year after our first “Swiss Christmas Eve,” Werner, Stefan, and Jurg carried a tree from the forest and set it in our big solar greenhouse. On Christmas Eve, family and friends gathered for a special dinner and carols while we lit candles on the tree. Candlelight danced up and down the long windows and spread across each smiling face. For a moment, when all the candles burned, the room hushed. And then the caroling began.

  When the last strains of “O Tannenbaum” faded, Werner’s clear baritone lifted up the notes of “Stille Nacht,” his gift to us.

  But now Werner was gone and I had to accomplish my task alone.

  After some consideration, I chose a fat balsam. How will I ever lift this tree onto my car roof? I ­worried.

  I hardly finished the thought when the owner of the tree lot approached. “You are not going to put this tree on your car. I will call my husband to have him deliver it to your house.”

  It was a small town. People knew.

  “Thank you,” I said aloud, even as I sent a silent thanks to God for sheltering me from the experience of carrying the tree home alone.

  Christmas Eve arrived with the tree in its place. Family and friends gathered for a special dinner. Later we sang as we lit the candles. We rejoiced and remembered the first still and holy night, when God sent his only Son to be our light in this dark world. The birth of Jesus centered us on our first Christmas celebration without Werner.

  Candlelight flickered against glass and spread its glow across the faces of family and friends. The room hushed, but no one sang “Stille Nacht.” Instead, we stood for a moment of silence, each person not ready yet for that First.

  Perhaps next year . . .

  The Too-Tall Tree

  By Peggy Frezon

  Daylight was fading as we pulled into the Christmas tree lot. Maybe it’s closed, I thought hopefully. But festive white bulbs strung across the entrance were still lit.