My main observation is that it is darned hard to trim a tree all by oneself. This tree swallowed boxes upon boxes of decorations and you know, after it turns into an endurance event it starts to take a bit of the bloom off the rose, if fake trees had blooms and they were roses. A number of boxes of things just didn't pass the audition this year when I ran out of energy, though not out of tree space.
But I am soooooooooo very glad that I waited until now to do this. Instead of doing it some year earlier, when I'd have to do it bravely 'in spite of' the pain of memories and regrets. Or in a year where it would be just 'okay' and neutral. Instead I waited until I really wanted to see and embrace whatever might be there, and I found...none of the painful history anywhere.
Partly that was because it's been twice now that I've had to divide out these things with someone and so I'm not looking at their history (not to mention their ugly-ass ornaments). But what touched me about today was that what memories that have come forward are such good memories. I'd nearly forgotten that my mother has given me some of the family decorations from 50-60 years ago. Such cheap drugstore stuff but I remember as a child being enthralled by it. Memories of Max and Gryphon and Diva and Courtney grace this tree. I called Becky in the middle of it, to tell her that her friendship saturates so much of this, because the last time I saw these objects it was with her, in my cabin on Lazy Mountain, going through all of it and packing it up again as property division. My old friend, who has been with me in more than one breakup and moveout and move-on. Some things that came to me from friends now returned to Spirit.
Not that there weren't tears, but they were tears of the heart-touching sort. I talked to Michele about this later and she commented that she was so glad I'd done this and reclaimed that part of my history. She made the sweet observation that since these things hold our memories, they are alive, and they need to be brought out and cherished and given air and light.
And a few more items came into the collection this year and they will have their own memories. Last weekend as I chose a few new items, a young man nearby was scrutinizing a box of ornaments with pretty blue and silver snowflakes. "Silver and blue really means Christmas," he said aloud. I smiled politely and thought to myself, "No, red and green and gold really means Christmas, silver and blue really means Hanukkah but whatever floats your boat, dude..." and then I bought a box of the snowflakes too. He blurts out happily, "This is my wife's and my first Christmas together, and she's still sleeping at home, and I've come out to get the tree and buy all the ornaments and come home and surprise her."
Gosh, he must have been dying to share that with someone, and I'm pleased as punch to be the lady in the aisle when it came spilling out of him, a co-conspirator in his lovely scheme. I remember what that sort of first-year delight felt like, and I'm so glad that I can remember it now without necessarily having to connect the losses that came later.
Two very unobtrusive ornaments hang on this tree. One is a small pair of white plastic doll shoes. They came from my first Christmas, at ten months old when my grandmother gave me a doll which I ripped apart in only a few minutes. My mother took the shoes - the only part that wasn't destroyed - and they've hung on the tree each year since. The other is a little plastic rattle in the shape of a B, from an alphabet rattle set that my brother Barry got when he was a baby. I held it in my hand today thinking of how his tiny hand had once held it, and a door opened between the nearly 30 years since he was killed, and I felt him with me and in me and I wept, as I'm weeping now. Not because he's gone, but because he's right here.
I love our Christmas tree.
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