The newest in a long line of Christmas trees stands in our living room with its bare branches waiting for the lights and decorations. We went and cut it down the other day—just the two of us this year—and the whole ritual has brought back a flood of memories of Christmas trees past.
For my early childhood years, there are no specific memories. I just have vague images of trees with big, bright bulbs, tinsel, and all those amazing presents waiting to be unwrapped.
By the time I was in grade school, specific memories start of my father going over those strings of big, bright bulbs, making sure that they all worked. And then the actually placing of the strings started and it became a bit like the well-loved movie, “A Christmas Story,” with a bit of cursing now and then as bulbs wouldn't stay where placed. Once the lights were in place, my mother, brother, sister, and I could start placing the ornaments, having to be very careful not to break those delicate glass bulbs. And last, but not least, the tinsel had to be placed one strand at a time, per Dad’s orders. No throwing bunches or you were banned!
My maternal grandparents purchased an artificial Christmas tree in the sixties. I can see it now—metallic silver with a light shining on it with rotating color gels of red, blue, and green. Groovy!
My paternal grandmother always had a small tree that was artfully decorated, but my favorite decoration at her home was a marble statue that was draped with a tinsel garland. She was so bohemian, and I loved it!
Our first Christmas tree purchase as a married couple was in Ithaca, New York, and Charlie Brown would definitely have loved it. The next year, we purchased one that even Charlie Brown may have passed up, so my wonderful husband drilled holes in the trunk and stuck in the branches that had been trimmed from the bottom to make it look fuller. It still makes me chuckle.
And speaking of my husband, the engineer, early in our marriage he insisted on constructing the perfect Christmas tree stand—one that held the tree completely stable and had a plastic pail that allowed us to keep the tree fully watered. Each year, it would be pulled out and modified slightly before the tree was inserted. I do have to say that it did do the job, and it did provide its share of laughs, especially the year it was accidently nailed to the floor. Today, we now use a stand purchased from a tree lot that is the same basic design as our old one. Why didn’t we get a patent on it?
Okay, back to the trees. There were the trees in Mexico that were so scrawny that we had to tie two or three together to make them look like one halfway reasonable Christmas tree. The trees in Tokyo were small and so expensive, but they were lovingly decorated and admired in a country where there were no other big Christmas displays.
Once we were back in the States, we started the tradition of cutting our trees, taking our big van and all of us singing along to the Muppets Christmas Carols. Our mission was to get the tallest, fattest trees we could find that would fit in our living room, and we succeeded every year. The trees were decorated with ornaments collected from our journeys, given to us by friends, or made by the kids. And each one was more beautiful than the last one. Multi-colored lights were traded in for white lights, and a couple years ago the tree went high-tech with LED lights.
As I think of all those Christmas trees past, I realize that I have very few memories of the actual presents. The memories are all of family, sharing traditions, music, laughing, and love.
Enjoy your memories of Christmas trees past!
