This photo was taken 50 years ago today!

Most of the paper photos I have left are in boxes out at the farm. One of these days, I need to bring them home with me…like, when I have this back bedroom cleaned out. I imagine there are some pictures in that box of the Christmas trees from my youth. Sometimes they were straggly little Charlie Brown trees with sad, empty arms. Usually brought home a day or two before Christmas when my dad could get a better deal on one.

I always remember the decorating with such enthusiasm. Dad would trim the bottom of the tree trunk to make it level and give it a fresh cut through which it could suck up the water from the old fashioned tree stand. Mom would bring the boxes of ornaments down from their storage place in the eaves of the attic. Dad would check the lights and replace any burned out bulbs. We used big lights with reflectors behind them to keep the needles from getting hot and catching fire. 

I was the youngest so I had the honors of placing the star on top of the tree. Dad lifted my high in the air and held me patiently while I fiddled with the top spire of the tree, trying to fit it in the topper. When I got too big to hold up, we used the kitchen stool that converted into a stepladder by lifting the seat. Ours was red, I think.

Many of the ornaments you see in this picture are hanging on our tree here at the Ponderosa. I tenderly store each delicate memory wrapped in newspaper and carefully placed in plastic tubs. Mr. FixIt would help me in a heartbeat, but I won’t let him touch them. It’s not that I don’t trust him, but if he accidentally broke one, he would feel terrible…and I wouldn’t want that for him. Instead, I put them up and take them down. I’ve only missed one year…Christmas of 2014. That was the year things went south on the farm and my elderly aunt and I had a parting of the ways. 

I left the farm on Christmas Day and went to my cousin’s for the holiday. Then I started house sitting in my friend’s Victorian loft in Marietta. That was such a weird winter. It was not only my second without Mr. Virgo, but the split with my aunt was fresh, I had no idea where I was going to go or what I was going to do next. When the offer came up to house sit, I jumped at the chance and spent the next few months scanning old photos onto hard drives and staring out the window at the snow. I remember there were twinkle lights, but I don’t remember a tree.

A legitimate Christmas Tree became a thing again once I moved back into the farm after my aunt went to live with her brother. I had lights on the porch and electric candles in the window and my mom’s ceramic tree on the dining room table. Christmas of 2017 was the first time Mr. FixIt and I had a tree together. I’ll never do a real tree again. Artificial trees are safer, more economical, cleaner, and they do the job just fine.

But the trees of my youth float in my memory whenever we decorate for Christmas. The smell of fresh pine. The prickly pokes you got when you hung the ornaments. The sticky sap on your fingers when you reached in to clip the string of lights to the branches. One year, Dad bought a long needle pine and I remember it looking so elegant, but it was so hard to hang ornaments from. We always put tinsel garland and silver “icicles” on our trees. I’ll never forget how glad I was when that went out of style!

I somehow have a vague memory of having a silver metallic tree with a rotating light that changed colors. That may have been when I was a young mother. My second husband was Jewish and we had trees for the first ten years, but when we had our first child together…my second…we didn’t have trees for many years. We only celebrated Hanukkah at that time.

Anyway, trees have always been the center of my holidays, and this photo was the earliest one I could find in my digital archive. It was in my mom’s living room. Hubby #1, who was Boyfriend #1 at the time, is dashing across the photo. Ahhhh…the things, and people, and celebrations that come and go in our lives. It’s a mystery, isn’t it?

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“The Lord is your protector, there at your right side to shade you from the sun. You won’t be harmed by the sun during the day or by the moon at night. The Lord will protect you and keep you safe from all dangers. The Lord will protect you now and always wherever you go.”

Psalms 121:5-8 CEV