Oh (no), Christmas Tree!

The live tree has had a good run, but it’s time

My relationship with Christmas trees has been well documented and chronicled through the years, whether in previous columns or family Christmas letters.

If you find it odd for a person to describe a “relationship” with a Christmas tree, well, I am right there with you. It is anything but normal.

Nevertheless, I own the idiosyncrasy.

I grew up in a family in which, each year, we would visit a Christmas tree lot sponsored by a local civic organization and purchase a tree for what I am sure was a reasonable price. I know it was a reasonable price because my parents, poster children for post-World War II frugality, would have done nothing else.

Our family trees were not what anyone would have described as marvels of home decorating, but they were decent. Typical of the era, they had clip-on colored lights, and I remember a couple of trees adorned with those gosh-awful tiny strips of aluminum called icicles.

Per instructions, they were to be applied one at a time, but because hardly anyone had the time or patience for that, it was more common for them to be cast upon the branches in clumps.

And after their application, an icicle-laden tree looked like a tree with clumps of ugly aluminum all over it. Folks eventually figured that out and it was a short-lived phase.

In our early married years, Susan and I followed the tradition of buying real Christmas trees, even as some friends were beginning to have real-looking artificial ones.

We enjoyed going to pick out a tree and decorating it. Susan brought the decorating up a notch, with beautiful ornaments she had collected from her childhood and acquired at different times in her young adult life. Our “young married” trees had an element of design with which I had been previously unfamiliar.

But somewhere along the way, I lost my mind. Christmas trees became a nightmare.

I think it started with the first house we bought. It had a vaulted ceiling in the family room, so it occurred to me, at Christmas, we should fill that extra air space with a treetop.

I think it was within the realm of reasonableness the first time we did this, but it was not long before I began to equate “tall” with “massive.”

That’s when the trees, even though they seemed secure in their stands, began to fall over. Lights and ornaments were shattered. Shards of glass from the baubles imbedded themselves in the carpet, creating a hazard for the shoeless.

Once cleanup of the fallen tree was accomplished, it had to be decorated again.

I don’t know why it came as such a surprise to me that my long-suffering wife and children were not interested in repeated nights of tree-decorating.

Remedies for falling trees included tying fishing line around the trunk of a tree and tying said line to a nail in the wall. The year I did that, in addition to cleanup up the fallen tree, drywall repair was required after the failed fishing line pulled the nail out of the wall upon the tree’s falling.

I acquired a “miracle Christmas tree stand” with a patented swivel feature that was supposed to keep the tree straight and balanced. True to form, that tree swiveled right onto the floor.

About a decade ago I bought a five-prong stand, which was a huge advancement. It lasted about five years before the weight of the tree cracked the base of it, causing water from the built-in well to spread over the floor. This tree did not fall but it had to be removed from the now-defective stand and put into its replacement, another five-pronger.

It was Christmas 2020 when I convinced Susan we should purchase a tree at the most expensive place in town and have it delivered and set up while I watched.

The guys who did that setup were (unfairly) critical of my tree stand and tried to sell me one of theirs that they just happened to conveniently have in their truck. I advised I had no intention of further patronizing their premium Christmas tree lot by purchasing one of their premium stands. Use my stand, I told them.

They strongly recommended buying one of theirs for the next Christmas.

When Christmas 2021 arrived and I again convinced Susan delivery and setup was the way to go, the same guys arrived with the tree. I handed over my stand and watched their reaction.

They said nothing, but when they entered the house with the tree, they told me they were giving me one of theirs. I am glad I had held out and not bought one. (I still don’t understand what was wrong with the one I had, but I got a new one for no cost, so who cares?)

This year I told Susan if she would once more agree to delivery and setup of a real tree, it would be the last one. With what I have expended in not only money but time and anxiety over Christmas trees, I have already bought many artificial ones.

The time has come, and I surrender.