We set up the Christmas tree last night. I used to scoff at those who began decorating before December as over-eager, feeling superior in my cool approach to the holidays.
Well, I don’t know if it’s because I’m hanging onto traditions with all my might as the kids approach young adulthood or if I’m just taking greater comfort in things I can control, but we’ve been putting up the tree earlier and earlier each year. We picked this one up at Whole Foods on Wednesday before the rush (I would fit right in in a Progressive insurance commercial). We set it in its stand and watered it, and left it to relax its branches for a couple days.
It’s become my job to string the lights around the tree, replacing old bulbs and affixing each light to the tree with the little clip beneath the bulb. My meticulousness has its limits: when the third strand didn’t light up, I searched in vain for a spare fuse and opted to switch out the strand with one that doesn’t match. But hey, it lights up!
I turned on the Christmas music, summoned the family, poured Chris and me the old trimming-the-tree bourbon on the rocks, and…my mother called. Edwin seized on the pause in festivities to grab his sister and run to the store for egg nog and cookies.
In 20 minutes we were back, and everyone was content with their refreshments. We admired all the old favorites among the ornaments we’ve collected and received over the years. Dominating the tree are the glass champagne buckets for every year we’ve been married that a family friend has been giving us since 2003.
Chris’s favorite is the frowny face snowman crocheted by his great aunt. I’m partial to the little brass band of angels that I arrange in a cluster on the tree (besides, of course, the faded preschool pictures of the kids in handmade frames). Edwin likes the shimmery red and white peppermint striped glass bulbs, and Maxine gets a kick out of the plastic Mr. Burns that Chris taped wings onto one year and used as the angel atop the tree – a cynical joke about the consumerism of Christmas. He enjoyed a few good years before I got tired of him glowering greedily from on high and relegated him to the lower branches.
We always have more ornaments than will reasonably fit on the tree, and I feel a little bad for those that remain in the box for a year, kind of like the Land of Misfit Toys.
As we turned off the lights in the living room and left the tree to cast its warm, cheerful glow around the room, the cats perched on the bookcase next to the tree, wide-eyed and waiting. Uh, oh, I thought. What do they have planned? Jessie had already knocked the handmade wrapped wool nativity scene figures from the West Bank off the buffet in her vigorous, overly affectionate nuzzling.
So far, so good. Only one fuzzy little mouse with a wedge of cheese has been pilfered. I picked him up off the floor, no harm done. As I placed him back on the tree, I noticed two green eyes on me. It won’t be long before I rescue the mouse again.
My Corner of the Village 