Yesterday we liberated our decorations from storage, dozens of boxes that spent the last eleven months stacked in the barn or crammed into a corner of the basement. In years past, that would've been followed by driving to a local tree farm, trudging through the woods and choosing the perfect tree.
There will be no live tree for us this year, no bright smell of fresh-cut pine wafting through the house. In the corner of our living room will stand a conical, pre-wired, steel-and-plastic faux fir, the one that usually greets holiday visitors to our front porch.This will be my first artificial-tree Christmas. Just thinking about that saddens me, but our family makes compromises these days. Not spending money on a real tree this year is but a small one.
What I'm missing most of all, more than the live tree itself, is the ritual of choosing it. Whether it happens in a parking lot or on a snowy hillside, I've always looked forward to picking out the tree, always imperfect in some way but absolutely perfect, the one tree that's like no other in the world.
It's a sentimental journey that'll have to wait 'til next year, at least. Today my family and I will celebrate the home that lives in this oddly wonderful house, drawing holiday traditions from our hearts and fond memories from the boxes now piled around the tree.
We'll put sticks of cinnamon into a pot on the stove and play holiday music on the stereo. We'll take great care in handling fragile ornaments once hung by our grandparents and, with a smile and a tear or two, we'll linger over decorations made by our spawns in grade school. When all the boxes are empty, we'll step back and admire the twinkling trove.
In that moment, it won't matter that it's an artificial tree behind the glitter. It's still our Christmas tree.
What's more, we'll acknowledge that we're not stuck in some faraway sandbox, cradling a rifle in one hand and choking down MREs with the other. Neither finances nor fire has driven us from our house. There's food in our pantry, a glow in the furnace and love in our home.
We're a fortunate bunch, we four -- and that, I think, will be the spirit that fills our holidays.
* * *6:05pm: We just finished our "decoration day." It was full of emotions, for many reasons, especially for my wife and me.
The tree looks great.
Out on the porch sits a wooden child's wagon, missing its staked sides, that's as old as I am -- and I know that for a fact, because it was mine when I was a kid. Today, as is our holiday tradition, our spawns filled it with large colored ornaments and draped it in evergreen garland. I gathered an armload of cones that had fallen from the red pines out in the side yard and added them to the wagon display.
The simplest of pleasures.
Right now Mrs. KintlaLake is preparing dinner -- hollowed-out loaves of Italian bread layered with fresh basil, garlic, and plum tomatoes, plus slices of Provolone, pastrami, turkey and ham, dressed with olive oil and Balsamic vinegar and warmed in the over 'til the cheese melts and the flavors marry. This family-favorite "comfort food" will be shared this evening with our recently displaced young friend.
Another good day in this life. Our spirit thrives.
