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Annual Christmas Tree Battle
December 31, 2006
As some of you might remember the Schaads have a tradition of getting rid of their Christmas Tree before January 1. In fact, here is a flashback:
I discovered something about our own Holiday Traditions that I never knew. Actually, I was probably completely debriefed one year and have totally forgotten it. Or, I wasn't paying attention. Anyway. What was I talking about? Oh, traditions. Well my wife explained to me that the Christmas Tree had to come down by midnight on New Year's eve. I didn't know this. I don't know if I had just managed to get it out of the house before then and it never came up or what.
So tonight, at 10:34 pm, I suddenly remembered the tree. It looked lonely, sitting in the darkened living room, completely bare of lights or decorations. Its needles were still on the boughs, delicately balanced, waiting to drop en masse at the slightest jarring or barest breeze. We sized each other up. I could feel the tension between us. I, the victor, chopper of the douglas fir. And it, the fir, hoping for one last act of defiance. We stood like that for what seemed like hours. Then I lunged. In a blur of plastic I grabbed the giant tree bag we had laid at the base of the tree and in one quick move had the entire beast bagged up. It shook with rage, and the bottom of the bag swelled with thousands of needles. But it was too late; I had won. And the fir knew it.
I'm happy to report that this year I was a huge Tree Hero. I obtained the nasty beast (a genuine Scandinavian Emerald Fir), I set it up, put lights on it, decorated it, undecorated it, took the lights off, and dragged its sorry carcass out to the back yard, where it now sits in the same grass-less patch as its predecessor. I was the Tree Hero this year partly because Alert Cashier Tammy, who may or may not be my wife, was clever and wily enough to get a job during the weekends when one would normally bag, stuff and mount a Scandinavian Emerald Fir. The other part of being a Tree Hero was selfless loving Carl, but that was probably the much smaller part. (This part is usually kicked in the behind and given a wedgie by grumpy headache-y Carl.)
All of this trauma with the Scandinavian Emerald Fir this year (hereafter SEF, as my hands are cramping again) made me think of my childhood. Yes, that's the ominous music you hear cueing. It happened when I was trying to get the tree out of the house.
When it came time to get rid of the tree, I realized that no one has ever taught me how to get rid of a tree. It seems pretty obvious, doesn't it? I mean, how to get rid of a tree. The tree is in the house - the tree needs to be out of the house - just take the tree out. But there's a way to do just about everything. Several tree disposal methods came to mind while I was brainstorming after having removed the ornaments and lights:
1. Fire. This seemed to be the most enjoyable method. But even I knew that setting your tree on fire while it's still inside of the house will just make your spouse mad.
2. Saw. I thought about sawing off the top half of the tree and then removing them in two separate pieces. This would require sawing, which is about as rewarding and as much fun as removing wallpaper, or paint, or tartar, or...well, you get the idea. But taking out two smaller, half-trees would be easier than one big fat tree. But then I remembered the needle dilemma.
3. Dragging. Next I thought I could just kick the tree over and drag it out of the house. This would have the benefit of sending a message to other trees that would be watching - no tree likes to see that sort of thing. But again, even though the tree was 15 feet from the front door there wouldn't be a single needle left on its bitter boughs after that sort of rough-housing.
4. Carry it. Ultimately, this is what I decided. But how do you carry a tree? This is where my total Lack of Training entered. I decided that I would reach into the boughs, grab the trunk, lift it straight up, and walk like that out of the house - tree in front of me at arm's length.
This might have sounded like a good plan, but something you need to know about SEFs - once they're cut, their sap slowly turns into lead. By the time the New Year rolls around, your SEF can weigh up to 2000 pounds. (907 kg for you folks in Scandinavia.) And so, here I sit blogging away with a painful back. And wondering, where does a person learn these sorts of things? Wikipedia, I guess. Once upon a time I think it fell upon the Fathers to teach their Sons these sorts of things. I guess I'll have to come up with a good plan to pass on to Connor. Okay, I've got one.
"Connor, we're going to Lowes. They're having a sale on Artificial Trees."