Sunday, December 8, 2019

Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree


Every time I see the Christmas picture of my baby brother and myself, I remember that Christmas morning as though it were yesterday.  There we are in our worn-out t-shirts and grinning.  My baby brother Glenn he is seven and I am fifteen.  We are holding our Christmas presents.  Mom had told us that we would not be getting very much that year.  I am holding a little wooden box that contains a red corncob.  The outside reads, “Emergency toilet paper.”  I lost that present in the house fire.  I had it in a hope chest in the attic.  Mom had promised me a car that year.  I was holding it too.  It was a tiny matchbox car.

Momma got a big kick out of the gifts.  I know you might be thinking that was her gag gift, but that was really my Christmas present that year.  I told momma that she did not have to get me a present but make sure my brothers and sisters got something under the tree.  I knew that it was only a temporary setback in the Hopper family because some years momma was able to get us some nice gifts.

I remember staying up late one Christmas waiting on Old Saint Nick to come.  I know that momma and daddy must have wondered if we would ever go to sleep.  When we did, it seemed as only a moment when we went running into the living room to find Huffy bicycles under the tree.

About the time I was getting the corncob is about the time I realized that momma would go deep into debt to buy Christmas and spend (no pun intended) the next 365 days paying for that magical morning.  I knew that we did not have the money to buy presents.  We had what money cannot buy and that was love for each other.

Momma accused daddy of being Scrooge.  I realized later that he was not a Scrooge but was actually a Bob Cratchic.  Bob was the one that worked for Scrooge in the movie, A Christmas Carol.  Right now, I am playing the Ghost of Christmas past as I write.  I used to warn my kids every year that I think I feel a Scrooge moment about to come upon me when we go Christmas shopping.

I remember momma crying at Christmas from time to time.  She wanted so much to have a nice home filled with Christmas decorations.  My wife Lisa has a theme-oriented Christmas tree in every room.  For mom, we had to find her a cedar tree that looked like a Christmas tree.  She would decorate it with balls, ribbons, silver icicles, strings of popcorn, and other junk as dad would say.

Momma and my sister kept the house so hot with the one gas space heater that daddy, my brothers, and I stayed outside most of the time.  When momma started decorating the house, we all stayed outside even more.  That is a tradition that I carry on today.  When Lisa starts decorating the house I go outside and stay.  My job during Thanksgiving season is to retrieve all the Christmas junk and place it in the specific place I am instructed to stack it.

I fetch hammers, nails, wire, and other paraphernalia, but quickly exit the house when fulfilling my Christmas obligations.  I could care less about a tree.  I have an official “Charlie Brown tree” in my office.

I had a brilliant moment of inspiration idea several years ago.  My office chair collapsed while I was leaning sideways.  The office chair was rated for a two hundred fifty pound man.  Since I weigh more than that, I had stressed the designer’s recommended specifications, which resulted in an office chair failure.  I tried on several occasions to repair the chair, but the aluminum alloy frame holding the shattered like a broken eggshell.  The seat and the wheels were good.

Led by Pam’s (former secretary), stroke of genius of wanting a Christmas tree on wheels, I mounted the office chair wheels to the bottom of a Christmas tree.  To say the least, when I proudly presented my latest invention, but Christmas Tree Purist were not impressed.  Most said it made the tree too high.  There were some references to my rigging, but I won’t go there.  Well, it wasn’t too high.  The base of the five wheeled office chair allowed the tree to stand lower than the tree stand.

Ignoring the critics, I rolled it into the living room.  When my oldest son the interior designer arrived on Thanksgiving eve, I showed him my invention.  He said that when he decorates for businesses and large corporations for Christmas that their large Christmas trees are mounted on wheels to make decorating easier.  With Andy’s seal of approval, all was well.  There is peace on Earth that Christmas, I mean in the Hopper household.  I wondered if I should get a patent.  I know that it won’t be long until another office chair failure.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.  And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.  And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger Luke 2:13-16 KJV

May the Peace of God be with you and your household.

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