Take a slightly dried-out six-foot Scotch pine, add sun-hot, big-bulbed red lights with aluminum reflectors, hang tinsel (that usually ended up being pulled out of the cat’s butt) and wait for the impending house fire. That was our Christmas tree growing up. God be with anyone who tried to poach a present. The needles would impale you like 1,000 rabid porcupines.
I get festive just thinking about it.
And why wouldn’t I? I used to lie on our living room couch, bathed in the tree’s light’s red glow as I’d spend hours dreaming about my Christmas morning. All the packages had been inventoried. The annual present census decreed by Caesar Augustus was complete. I knew who was getting what and where. There was no room in the inn — there were too many gifts.
There was something magical about Christmas back then. And I’m not really sure what.
Maybe life was simpler back then. Maybe. All I know is that Christmas of my youth died when I was in college. My university exams would wrap up around December 22, leaving me very little time to move back home and shop. I felt the joy slip from my grasp as I’d rush around, picking up last minute presents like “Georgia on my mind” ashtrays. And I haven’t slowed down since. Somewhere along the way, stress replaced wonder. Christmas became more about presents than presence.
I’ve been told Christmas is for the children. Lord knows I’ve done everything this side of bankruptcy to make it fun for mine.
That’s worth repeating. Christmas is for the children.
Hmm. That’s good advice for all of us to remember: Make it for the child in all our hearts.
So this year, I’m going to ask Santa for a childlike heart. I will lie on the couch and stare at the lights. I will shake the presents and do my inventory. But I will skip the dried-out Scotch pine. My puncture wounds from 40 years ago are just now starting to heal.