The season is upon us, and it is time again to pit human beings in a contest against needle- and sap-shedding trees, to see if mere mortals can manage to coax a transplanted conifer into a metal contraption and ensure its survival for several weeks.
Let’s pause for a minute to consider the ramifications of this challenge. The era when people — even hardy New Englanders — ventured into the woods to cut down trees and turn them into boards, firewood, or skillfully-carved creations has long since passed and most of us — yours truly included — are ill-equipped to subjugate a tree to human needs.
I grew up with a father who shook his head and sighed after his countless efforts to unsuccessfully teach me how to use a hatchet, axe or chainsaw. But meager forestry skills do not deter me from heeding my wife’s summons and venturing forth every December to coax, curse and cajole the healthiest 8-foot-tall tree we can find, from our favorite Christmas tree lot to our home.
It is a task steeped in tradition and, by turns, amusement, vexation, rage, depression, and, eventually, celebration.
The tree-buying excursion used to begin with my wife bundling her father into his warmest coat and cowboy hat and outfitting the dog with decorative antlers. Regardless of the temperature, she put the top down on her Sebring convertible and headed for the tree lot with dad and the dog in the back seat.
Alas, those days are gone. But the dog still gets dressed up for the occasion and endures the ride with a look veering from alarm to resignation.
Once we’re at the lot, she stays in the car while we give the nice young guy carrying on a family tree-selling tradition a hearty “hello” and commence the search. Each prickly, sap-oozing specimen receives verbal approval or condemnation from my wife: This one’s “too bushy;” that one’s too tall. Another gets branded, “too Charlie Brown-ish” in homage to the comic strip and TV special legend’s pitiful tree.
This year, the tree whisperer I am married to walked up to a robust-looking almost-eight-footer and announced, “This is the one.” I urged her to search some more but she shook her head and I gave the kid $75, plus a little something extra for Christmas.
Conjoined as we are by our hearts and wedding vows, the true test of marital strength began when we arrived back home and confronted the daunting task of wrestling the tree into the house.
We scooted the dog out of harm’s way and lumbered onto the front porch, one of us laboring under the tree-trunk’s weight while the other grasped its upper end. Now we faced the first of two great tests: Ascending the stairs to the second floor, assailed all the while by pine branches and each other’s exhortations.
With one mighty shove, we cleared the bannister and hustled the tree into the living room where the tree stand awaited us.
There is no sensible reason to think that something that has spent its entire life firmly in the ground is ready and willing to be uprooted and then spend weeks bolted into an oversized metal bowl.
But a combination of shouting, swearing, sweating, sawing, twisting and turning the stand’s anchor bolts until they are tight prepared the tree for its final ascent to become a towering pinnacle of Christmas triumph, or a tilting, Charlie Brown-ish testament to human ineptness.
We took a collective breath and lunged, angling the tree upright, and then we paused, stepped back slack-jawed and speechless, and stood side by side to marvel at our tree’s perfect symmetry and secure footing inside the stand.
“I told you,” said my wife — her tone equal parts mockery, love and gratitude — “This is the one.”
Merry Christmas to one and all.
