Every year when we walk through the tree farm, I think about this awful story I was told as a child. It was about a fir tree that wanted nothing more than to be picked for someone's Christmas tree. Year after year he watched other trees be chosen and he felt terribly sad and unwanted. Then finally, he was big enough to be picked. He was chopped down, dragged home and decorated. He basked in the glory of his splendor. What he didn't count on was that the Christmas grandeur wouldn't last. Eventually he was stripped of his decorations and left in the attic to rot. During his years in the attic, he made friends with the house mice and various other attic creatures. As he told them stories of his previous life, he came to appreciate, albeit too late, the beautiful life he had in the woods. Eventually, some men clean out the attic. The tree thought that he was going to be celebrated again, and was thrilled. Unfortunately, he wasn't celebrated at all, but was rather chopped up for fire wood. The end. The moral is to appreciate what you have instead of wishing it away. Nice message, but good grief, what a depressing way of telling it!
I couldn't remember who wrote the story, so I Googled it today and found it. It was The Fir Tree Christmas Story by Hans Christian Andersen. Had I really thought about it, I should have known that it was Andersen, because the story reeks of the same morbid intonation as The Little Match Girl, which my grandmother read to us every single Christmas Eve and sobbed, appropriately, through a majority of it. (Click on the titles to read the stories) The Little Match Girl is about a homeless child who hallucinates scenes of warmth, feasts and family while lighting matches one by one in an attempt to stay warm on Christmas Eve. At the end of the book she is found frozen to death. I tried to tell Greg the story line last night over dinner and I got all choked up just giving him the abbreviated version! Nice, Gram. Good book choice. I'm fairly certain that my grandmother and Hans Christian Andersen are wholly responsible for this haunting cloud of depression that lingers over me every year during the entire month of December.
I also think about the fir tree story every January 1st when I drag our tree to the back porch, and again in February when I have given up waiting for Greg to take the tree somewhere, and I throw it over the side of the deck...then again in June when he finally gets sick of seeing the decaying Christmas tree in the back driveway and actually chops it up or hauls it away. Poor thing. It really is only given a few weeks of glory. Oh well, instead of worrying about the future feelings of abandonment that our tree will feel, I'm going to focus on the joy it brings us right now...and pray that our cat doesn't knock it over too many times during the next few weeks!
This is the one!
I realized yesterday that I have had that coat for 17 years! 1. It's time for me to stop making fun of my dad for wearing a pair of sneakers he got in high school. 2. I really need to invest in a new coat. In my defense, it's a really warm coat, and I only wear it to get our tree or play in the snow.
Andrew takes a turn helping Greg with the saw.
Jake's turn.
"Hey mom, what about this? This could make a nice tree."
Timber!
The "men" and their prize!
It wouldn't be a family outing without at least one short tantrum.
"I can't help but think of that poor, sad tree's destiny!"
"I love chopping trees!"
"Me too!"
Sam had a hard time buying into the Christmas spirit.
"These ornaments are awesome!"
Taking a break for some snuggle time with Sam.
The star has been placed and the tree is complete!
And this is the best picture I could get after yelling about a photo. Serves me right, I guess!
Oh yeah, and I realized last night that I can sing two full verses of O Tannenbaum in German, but don't know any more than "Oh Christmas tree, Oh Christmas tree" in English.
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