06 December 2009

Oh Christmas Tree!

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Have you put up your tree?
Is it Living?Is it just cut-Barely Living- a Real Tree? Or is it Living in the Attic from year to year?

Memories of bringing home the Christmas tree always began with the question-When will Daddie be home?

Nothing Much commenced until the appearance of our own personal St. Nick- referred to as"Big Red"(a nickname bestowed in high school owing to being well over 6 feet tall and owning an abundance of auburn hair ).


Our own personal St. Nick was in Tennessee or Kentucky following sales of the Burleigh tobacco market. Yes-indeed those are Old Memories- as very few actual tobacco auctions transpire in today's world. I was raised upon it-the heady scent of cured tobacco before it was wrapped in paper,filter added and the end burned for what I consider a very sickening odor-but I digress. What I am talking about here is the scent of fresh pine-heavenly.

When would Daddie be home?
When could we get the tree?
When? When? When?

Every year the answer was the same-Not until your father gets home. December 19th, 20th? That late? If we didn't have an invite to cut a tree somewhere locally we would be heading off to the city to get OUR tree-finally.


Going this route our darling family was inevitably met with the less than trees on the lot and the most expensive. This was before the advent of the silk tree forests that Santa discovered while jetting about in his sleigh- introducing Instant POOF! Christmas Tree-No Chopping Required. Live trees cost quite a bit back then-I remember one year- I was likely about 12, so about 1960, we paid over $50 for a tree-that cut into Big Red's Christmas bonus Big Time I'm sure.

But it was all worth it. Getting the Damn Thing to stand in the stand, crawling about the already dried out-to be sure-limbs to water the Damn Thing, stringing fat colored lights (still absolutely Love those) on the Damn Thing, spending hours with them to actually get them to work.  Ah Yes, those were Memories indeed- That was Daddie's job-Of course we waited. Who else was going to do all that work? None other. One year Big Red walked into the house with a tornado of a German Shepard puppy. A Christmas surprise that included driving 8 hours home from the Burleigh with that "wee" one. Did we even Have a Tree that year? Probably- It was about 1965.

Oh! A Puppy, Daddie! Who does it belong to? (Okay- I was only 6 at the time- Of course I was in first grade-but still a Complete Naive.)


Naive? Well, just let me say-It was another year, I suppose I was about 9- that my two older brothers seriously damaged my psyche when they let it drop that St. Nick really was Big Red- and even more St. Nick was really Mother!
That was during the Georgia market- a yearly family enterprise. Summer meant Georgia Tobacco. There I sat in the middle of the big-surely bigger than Santa's sleigh- wood paneled station wagon with flanking brothers spoiling what was once the most magical season of my entire year- Christmas. Mother holding down the fort(the wagon that is) in front, while Daddie was in the warehouse checking up on business.

No Patricia Gaye- There isn't a Santa Claus, a St. Nick either! It is at this point in the tale- I must tell- I was naive and a slightly scared of Old Saint Nicholas. No- I was afraid of Santa and don't even get me started about the Elves. For me Santa was a bit old, sneaky and could easily have been brought up on charges of breaking and entering (Yes, bringing all that great stuff- but still...) and the Elves- just let me say 0Flying Monkeys in The Wizard of Oz.


I must also tell you- I took this news incredibly well, I was perhaps even relieved. I would say- quite maturely for someone who believed in a damned scary man that just happened to want children sitting on his lap and menacing Elves. No more Fear, A Christmas Wish List with more heft!  I was convinced then and there in the sweltering summer heat as none other than deep South Georgia can give- that there was no Santa-only my wonderful loving generous parents. Still- surely there was an Easter Bunny? I really said that. I believed in Harvey-in every way. The Easter Bunny still Lived On. At that very moment I uttered that -my two flanks rolled out of the open car doors to laugh hysterically at my precious innocence. Mother, I am sure saying Stop teasing your precious innocent sister.


But I digress.
This is a story about Trees.

After all of the offspring left home-Mother enjoyed accompanying Daddie to the Burleigh. What two vagabonds want to come home and toil over a sappy prickly tree on December 20th? That was the year- probably 1979-the Silk Christmas Tree Tradition at the Tapps began. My mother cried when the little white lights went on the tree replacing the darling fat color ones. She still believed. I cried too. So do I. Thirty years later the tradition continues. This year-an added bonus- No bending over to plug in the lights but the addition of little presser foot to flick the lights on as we say Merry Christmas!


Where does your tree live?
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19 comments:

  1. I light (turn on) the topiaries on my front porch. I do this every night at sunset to honor the light and the darkness and I do this until the first day of spring when, for me, the light turns right again. Letting go of things that mean nothing to me, to greet things that mean deeply to me was quite simple, really. I don't believe in god or christmas, but I do believe in the nature of being.

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  2. I put my tree up tonight! It's a fake tabletop one...each year I vow I'll throw it away ( it's getting shabby) and every year i store it yet again! I feel guilty buying a live tree with the fake one sitting waiting to be used! It's a bad cycle.

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  3. Wouww beautiful story!!
    I hope to post today or tomorrow a picture of my Christmas tree!

    Greet

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  4. In my heart mostly. This year is very special as it will be the first one in my children's lives when thier Dad is with them - he has been deployed for the past three years worth... it is very moving but still misty. It's very much with him that he has missed moments like this with them but he has many memories to make.

    So, so, beautifully done. A lovely start to the week...

    Happiest of seasons to you and yours, Gaye.

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  5. I have followed your blog for a long time and never commented. The time has come.

    Firstly, brilliant posts, consistently. A very tall order indeed.

    Secondly, privileged to partake in the random musings of a true polymath.

    Finally, adored the mad, chaotic, heavenly, lovingly adorned Christmas tree. No carefully colour co-ordinated decoration from you. Oh No. Unabashed joy, love, and indeed abandon.

    One of the best reads going. Thank You!

    Anon.

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  6. If you're going to have a tree decorate it to the hilt, I say. Love how you went beyond the hilt, as it were. Ours, with roots, is on the terrace, acclimatizing after a few days in the over-heated store we ordered it from - they potted it a week early. It will be brought in again for a party on Saturday. Underdecorated, I'm afraid, but will satisfy us this year. Will post pictures after the weekend. Normally, I would not put up a tree until Christmas Eve just before friends arrive for dinner (I grew up with Christmas beginning on the 25th and lasting 12 days thereafter) but this year is different.

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  7. Oh Christmas tree is right- that is loaded. Has your tree ever fallen over? Great super great ornies.

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  8. I can't get past the Clarence House fabric...one of my favorites!

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  9. I see the whole family christmas tradition on your tree, ah. My daughter (A Caged Bird Sings) wrote in her recent post 'never buy a christmas tree in the dark', how I might criticize it for being vulgar! I confess I do that designer thing and my inner style fascist always disappointed the kids who wanted their own choice. How rotten is that. By the way, I long for those old fat lights. But they drove everyone mad by dying individually and closing down the whole display.

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  10. Inspiring tree, but I really want your chair for christmas.

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  11. Blushing- Ah, so wonderful and I think children of course make it -Dad's are special. The last Christmas I got a "doll"- my Daddie rode a bike uptown to purchase one for me Christmas Eve-thinking I would need that doll even though I didn't ask for one. Best Best holidays to you! Gaye

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  12. Jill and Balsam- I true favourite of mine too- check out my archives for other pictures of that chair and the fabric too (Clarence House) I've used it in 3 colours over the years. GT

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  13. Anon 1- welcome and so grateful for the comments-please continue. Assembled today are truly some of most favourite people commenting and they keep me going! thanks to you all.I did a silver and gold tree one year- sat and looked at it for a day or two and then added all my colors-I couldn't bear it. G

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  14. Well, this year my furniture alll had to be hauled away due to a flood coming over to my townhouse from the next door neighbor's wall (pipe with pinhole leak, long story) so I can't have a tree but seeing your magnificently bedecked extravanganza is just so heartwarming and fabulous tht I shall not miss having one thus one year! And not to mention your super narrative.

    Merry Christmas to you and your readers!!

    Suzanne on St. Simons
    suzhil@msn.com

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  15. Well, this year my furniture alll had to be hauled away due to a flood coming over to my townhouse from the next door neighbor's wall (pipe with pinhole leak, long story) so I can't have a tree but seeing your magnificently bedecked extravanganza is just so heartwarming and fabulous tht I shall not miss having one thus one year! And not to mention your super narrative.

    Merry Christmas to you and your readers!!

    Suzanne on St. Simons
    suzhil@msn.com

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  16. Until now, I've been a lurker but your tree is so evocative, so tender that I wanted to thank you for sharing. Widowed in 2008 after 50 years of marriage, I tried a stylized tree last year and hated it. So once again I'll pull out the doll that held a strand of pearls on our 1958 Christmas tree and the 2 surviving German balls that my mother in law's mother purchased just before WW 1 began because she feared that beautiful German things would be lost to us forever.

    Cheers.

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  17. Finally! Someone with a fantastically cluttered tree full of magnificent ornaments!! I love it. As for my tree, it's an attic dweller. In fact, it's lopsided, and people like to comment on how sparsely placed the branches are (much better to jam the thing up with ornaments, though, you know), but I like to think it has a certain charm about it.

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  18. Lauren! you are a happy elf I am certain.Attic dwellers take the weight load extremely well- infinitely so if you get the wire out-pulling from side to side. Wire them in on the tree, stuff them on the tree, shove them on the tree ( I hope that goes Seussical enough for everyone.) GT

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  19. Your Trees are more beautiful, more bountiful, more colorful, more fanciful than anyone else's in the whole wide world ! Love love Dorothy

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