Christmas Trees Aren't as Innocent as They Look

Getting a Christmas tree up gets many of us down. It’s enough to make even the most placid souls ditch cutting down a tree in favor of cutting up an elf.

Image copyright, Teece Aronin

My father suffered the agonies of the damned every time we put up a tree. It was as if the tree had it in for him and had taken it upon itself to avenge every Christmas tree everywhere, along with a couple of poorly maintained topiaries. My father tried to show the tree who was boss, swearing at it in curse words more colorful than a birthday bash for Katy Perry. Then my mother would say things like, “Honestly, Kenneth, the kids." And my father would say things like, “Well, by God, it’s time they grew up!”

One year, after I'd grown up, I became not only a single parent, but a single parent who was the only obstacle between my kids and their dreams of the perfect Christmas tree. Even before my divorce, I was more or less on my own Christmas tree-wise because my ex-husband is Jewish and has cerebral palsy, so he might as well have been permanently exempted from Christmas tree duty twice. He would giggle, salute, and say, “It’s your holiday, not mine.” Then he'd be off to wherever it is Jewish husbands go when they don't want to help shikza wives put up Christmas trees. 

Another complication with which many of us cope when putting up, and keeping up, a Christmas tree, is pets. Pets have been known to make or break a Christmas tree. They make them by lying peacefully beneath the trees, like contented lambs or break them by - well - breaking them. I'm in a few cat-lover groups on Facebook and am amazed by the number of photos I've seen of cats nestled among the boughs of their humans' Christmas trees. 

When I was about 13, the tree my father put up taunted him by leaning, no matter how many times he re-screwed it into its base. As a last resort, he secured the tree with twine tied to a picture hook in the wall. In the middle of the night, our dog took off after our cat and both dashed behind the tree. The tree-trunk, weakened by all the screwing and re-screwing, snapped, along with the twine, and the tree landed in the middle of the sofa bed where my brother was sleeping with his wife.

One year, my kids and I had a tree that started falling apart as soon as I got it up. Within days, our carpet was so buried under dried out henna-hued needles that it looked like the floor of Donald Trump's barber. It took weeks after we got rid of the tree to truly get rid of the tree. 

By the following year, the kids were old enough, yet naive enough, that I could stick them with most of the work. Now that they're in their late teens, I pretty much sit back and supervise. But I'm noticing something interesting, that every year as they put up the tree, they curse just a little bit more. 

But in a way, I don't mind; it makes me feel closer to my dad, rest his soul. 

Thanksgiving Quirky

I'm writing this on the Sunday after Thanksgiving 2016 and reflecting on how the day went.

My flower child daughter 
this Thanksgiving.
Image copyright, Teece Aronin

The kids and I were with family and just like previous years, I was told not to bring anything but ourselves because "we know how busy you are." 

It's true, I am busy. But how can I be busier than the others who show up lugging bowls big enough to host nationally-televised football games and baking dishes you could fill with water for small children to bathe in - oh and small children; some people were were lugging those too. 

It might be that I get off so easy because historically not the best things in life have come from that dark, shadowy, cobwebby room in my house I call the kitchen. 

But I'm happy anyway because my family honestly does wave me away lovingly and because they do genuinely care about how much I have to do these days. 

But you'd think they'd at least let me bring the cider provided I buy it somewhere and not try to make it from scratch by pulverizing my own apples which with my track record would turn out to be wormy and rotten.  

So what I do instead of cooking is to bring a nice hostess gift. This year I scored a deal on a huge holiday wreath and that was my contribution to the day.  

Also with us this year were a man who might have been alone otherwise and several other people who didn't start out as "family" but are now that they've been with us at these gatherings for years. 

This Thanksgiving was the one many people felt trepidation over due to the political storm still stalled over the U.S. after the recent presidential race and election. In case you're reading this in the year 3062 and our country has just now managed to forget, a lot of Thanksgiving hosts and hostesses were nervous about the potential for fights at the table and the crescent-roll-turned-weaponry-style battles that might break out during dinner. 

I'd made it through three forkfuls of turkey before some rabble-rouser brought up the election. It turned out to be my own daughter. But one thing to be thankful for was how one swift kick to the ankle made her instantly a-political and un-opinionated. And I was one proud mother to think I still had that much influence over her behavior. 

Then one of the ladies at the table asked my son what grade he was in and when he said "Tenth," the lady exclaimed, "Oh, tenth grade was the best year of my life!" Someone else at the table quietly inquired, "Why - you got pregnant?"

Of course we all laughed and laughed. Actually, we really did. 

After dinner, my daughter let her baby cousins give her a makeover from which she emerged looking like a 1960s flower child and my son posed for pictures placid and dignified in his two-year-old cousin's tiny pink sunglasses.  

And I . . . I thought how thankful I was for everyone there and how delicious dinner had been - partly because everyone insisted I not cook.  

Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer - on Purpose!

Holiday Season 2015 is upon us. Yes, Thanksgiving is finished cramming its accidentally-left-in-the-bird-giblets down our throats, the menorahs are back on their shelves and St. Lucia has blown out the candles on her head-wreath. But we’re still looking at Christmas, Kwanzaa and New Year’s – and that’s assuming I haven’t forgotten any. Oh, and Boxing Day, but that's Britain and Canada, so it doesn't really count.

Me, right after getting drummed out of the
elf corps for insisting on wearing black.

Have I forgotten any? Maybe, and this time last year, I’d have been too frazzled to know the difference. This year I’m too tranquil to give a fig.

But whether I stay calm or not, I’ve decided the holidays have been responsible for way too much upset in my life and this year I’m done with that nonsense. This year, I don’t care if Santa falls off the roof and dies; it’s not going to get to me. Even if he lives and sues, I’m staying zen about it all.   

We let the holidays stomp all over us with their big, black, rubber snow boots, and come to think of it, it’s not the holidays' fault; it’s ours. By ours I mean the mothers, the fathers, the grandparents, the retailers, all of us. We either make the holidays hell (retailers and Black Friday shoppers) or we allow our holidays to become hell (normal people and Black Friday shoppers).

Blame it on my baby boomer mentality if you will, but I don't remember Christmas pressure starting so early when I was a kid - I don't think it did, anyway. Or maybe my parents just didn't buy into it so I wasn't aware of it. These days we allow shopping chains to start ho’ing us around in their greedy grips before our jack-o-lanterns are moldy. We start worrying that our homes don’t look like the hotel in White Christmas. If we’re Christian we start resenting our Jewish friends for getting off so easy and if we’re Jewish, we think it would be cool to get more presents for once.

This doesn’t even factor in for Kwanzaa or St. Lucia’s Day. In fact, the real holiday miracle is that the faithful haven't burned the world down at least once by now.  

Boxing Day is the only winter holiday I can think of that doesn’t involve a lot of candle-burning, but still, every year, people beat each other senseless thinking they’re supposed to be boxing like boxers. Or they smack each other stupid with empty, leftover gift boxes. It’s TRUE. (No it's not.) But who really understands British and Canadian holidays besides the British and the Canadians?

Here’s the reality for far too many of us this time of year: Helpless and hopeless, we throw ourselves under the next one-horse open sleigh that comes along. And most people don’t know this, but the song, Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer is based on a true incident which happened in 1947 when a stressed-out grandmother named Iva Haddit threw herself in front of a rogue reindeer at a petting zoo in Minot, North Dakota; all this in an effort to land herself in the hospital until the holidays blew over. That’s true too! (No it's not.)

This year I’m getting on Etsy, buying myself a handmade kerchief and settling my brains for a long winter’s nap. I’ll go down before Christmas and get up in time for Groundhog Day. And if Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow, I’m goin’ back down.

You can call me in time for the summer solstice.    

Jenny and the Christmas Vomity Mess

In early December my house was a Christmas vomity mess, then it looked lovely, then it was a Christmas vomity mess again. I hate it when Christmas vomity messes go full-circle - and they always do. 

Kitt, our cat, staking her claim in the
Christmas vomity mess. Copyright,
Teece Aronin. 

The Christmas vomity mess is that stage of home Christmasness characterized by ornaments scattered across floors and ornament hooks that hide among carpet fibers and don't come loose until they hitch a ride out of there embedded in the sole of your foot. 

The Christmas vomity mess is scraps of gift-wrap strewn like confetti - your house looking like New Year's Day, six a.m. It is also whole hanks of gift-wrap curled up on the floor like victims of a war on gift-wrap because someone didn't measure once and therefore cut twice. 

The Christmas vomity mess is every construction paper decoration and tree ornament your children have made since pre-K, now flung across the dining table from which the table cloth hangs, all catty-wompus and drunkenly grazing the floor. 

The Christmas vomity mess is all your Thanksgiving paraphernalia co-mingling and canoodling with the decorated plates, candy dishes, hand soap dispensers and towels which must be trotted out or it just wouldn't be Christmas. 

I first heard the term Christmas vomity mess from my smart, sparkling, optimistic friend, Jenny. Even though it can't always be easy as a working, single mother, Jenny has a gift for seeing the good. 

Jenny is the kind of woman who can tell you that someone just graffitied her truck and manage to spin the tale so that it sounds like the sun just flooded her garden, every flower turning its little face toward the light - and that it was adorable when one of them sneezed. 

When Jenny sees a Christmas vomity mess she sees fun-loving elves playing peekaboo in the debris. When I see a Christmas vomity mess, I see elves dressed as Chucky dolls. I don't perk up until the Christmas vomity mess is downgraded to at worst, a Christmas hiccuppy mess.  

I first heard Jenny use the term on Facebook right after Thanksgiving when this post appeared next to her pretty, smiling face: My house is a Christmas vomity mess! 

'Oh, my God!' I realized, 'So is mine!' 

This year I did almost all of my holiday shopping online, causing my Christmas vomity messes to expand and include cardboard boxes, stacks of them; a small-scale homage to Citizen Cane and the crate maze remains of a life spent grabbing, grabbing, grabbing. And spilling from the boxes to tumble all over the room were tiny air-puffed packing cushions equally useful as floaties for little baby rabbits. 

And because ninety percent of this stuff was intended for my kids whose last scraps of holiday innocence I'd like to protect by keeping at least some gifts a surprise, the Chrismas vomity mess has spread into my bedroom in a big way. This gave me pause one night as I turned out the bedside lamp. Normally, I navigate my dark bedroom like a fish in black waters. I know every curled corner on every throw rug and gracefully sidestep the tiny three-legged stool near my closet door.

But this Xanadu microcosm could send me tush over teakettle if I connected with it in the dark. I could fall, break a hip and become a burden to society when I'd be perfectly happy just burdening my children someday. Then a Scroogey voice inside my head nagged, "And you'll keep Christmas by losing your independence!" So, even as I told Ebeneezer to shut his figgy pudding hole, I got up and shoved the boxes out of the way.

But almost enough about me; Since the Christmas vomity mess is a multi-stage phenomenon, I manage to clean it up in time for Christmas morning and holiday guests only to witness it reinventing itself during the gift opening phase like an antibiotic-resistant bacteria. 

This year I found these cycles exhausting and so did my Christmas tree which eventually refused to light whenever the place was a shambles. Like me, it can't seem to get turned on when the house is a mess. 

So that's it for this year's Christmas vomity mess. I might feel nostalgic for Christmas from time to time but never for the Christmas vomity mess. 

And Jenny - smart, fun, light-hearted Jenny - what planet are you from and may I spend next Christmas there with you?