Christmas tree, O Christmas tree: Part Six

 

A reminder of Christmas trees of old

When I was a kid, decorating the family Christmas tree was a family affair. Sort of.

My sister and I were allowed to participate up to a point. But my mother and father strictly governed the process from beginning to end.

My father was a hard-working provider and a man of few words. Think Darren McGavin in “The Christmas Story” with rougher edges. He was in charge of procuring and erecting the tree, which always came from one of several temporary treelots set up across Big Spring each year sometime before Thanksgiving.

Getting the tree to stand up straight was always a struggle, an ordeal my old man endured with muttered curses and baleful stares at my mother. He also strung the lights, a step inevitably complicated by two or three non-functioning bulbs that had to be replaced in mid-installation by frantic trips to TG&Y.

At that point, he’d turn the tree over to my mother. Her job was to cover the tree in ornaments she kept stored in the garage storeroom, a cherished set of family heirlooms in ancient boxes in danger of failing apart. Each held a memory for my mother, and my sister and I were compelled to treat each with careful reverence.

She watched us like a hawk as we attached these treasures to the spots she designated. If we dared to use our own judgment as to placement, she was quick to adjust it to her artistic vision.

The final step was covering the tree in what my sister and I called the “shingles,” the narrow strips of tinsel that were meant to approximate icicles and gave our trees the desired shimmering effect.

 In 2011, my mother was in failing health and unable to live alone in the house she and my father, who died in 1989, built in 1954. She had fallen early that September, and she never fully recovered from its effects.

So in October, she came to stay with my family through the holidays. Since it was hard for her to negotiate the stairs that led to our guest room, I installed a bed for her in our front living room, which was the only place in our house large enough for The Beast, our nine-foot Christmas tree.

That year, The Beast stayed in its canvas bag, and I purchased a smaller tree for our foyer, positioned so that my mother could see its sparkling lights from her bed.

Mom entered a nursing home the following January and died there in March, the day after her 87^th birthday. The holiday season she spent with my family in Grapevine and the months I was allowed to take care of her are precious memories embued with a sweet sadness and longing I can’t put into words.

This ornament, with its vintage image of Old St. Nick, reminds me of those Christmas trees on Morrison Drive in Big Spring and of my mother. She, like her son, considered Christmas the very best time of year.