A (Not So Christmasy) Christmas Carol
written by: Craig E Harms
“Bah,” said Scrooge, “Humbug.”
“@#*$,” said I, “#$@%*&.”
Dickens’ three spirits of linear time, having had holiday success with a disenchanted Scrooge, rattled into our dolefully dark sitting room one early December evening to restore in us the magic of the season after nearly two decades spent in Yuletide gloom. My wife, Sue, and I were neither surprised nor shocked by their presence as nothing much surprised or shocked us any more.
The Ghost of Christmas Past took us by his bony metacarpals and flashed us back to a “could have been” reality–Sue and I watching younger versions of Sue and I gathered ‘round years of perfectly-decorated trees, letting in a bit of solace that we had deprived ourselves of all those years. We seemed at peace and content, if just for the next few weeks. The holiday spirit floated away, leaving us feeling nostalgic and memory-frosted.
The Ghost of Christmas Present materialized next and showed us a “can be” reality versus the one we were mired in now–we blinked and watched ourselves in real time reveling blissfully ‘round our perfectly trimmed, ceiling-sweeping fir, sipping Baileys, munching on candy canes, our flannels on, looking calm, for once. The alternative tableau perfectly exemplified (will exemplify) the season, I thought, then blinked again, disappointed that now the bookcase was back where the tree had been (will be). Sue looked disappointed, too.
After the Ghost of Christmas Future fast-forwarded us into seeing many, many more bright and shiny “could be” moments ahead like the one in the other-here-and-now, we decided this would be the year we would finally suck it up and do a Christmas tree again.
We were thankful the spectral trio had all come and gone before the tree lots in Burlington closed at 9 or we might have lost our momentum and postponed our spook-induced decision for another year. We bundled up, drove the half-hour to town in the cold and dark, picked out the perfect ceiling-sweeping Fraser, hit the open-24 hours discount store for balls and lights and garland, and returned home to give it the Martha Stewart treatment–which would now be delayed by another round-trip to the store in the colder and darker because:
Speed shopping—as always—to get through the crowd, we didn’t notice the wires on every strand of LED lights that we had purchased were white. White—to complement a tree trimmed with fake snow . . . ours wasn’t. So began our flocking holiday cheer that might have even made Bob Cratchit crotchety.
After the hour-and-a-half travel delay, we got back to our cozy abode, wrestled the tree in the stand I bought for a quarter at a yard sale many years before, and got the green-wired lights wound around the branches that didn’t get bent or broken after it blew off the car roof on the way home. We took our time trimming, fussing and fiddling until it was Christmas-card perfect, and we were done.
Done—until my unfortunately eagle-eyed wife found and read the tree’s care and maintenance tag she fished out of the wastebasket I had tossed in there because who needs to read care and maintenance instructions when the thing grew on its own just fine before being sacrificed for our coniferous holiday pleasure?
“Uh, CraigE, you sawed off an inch from the bottom of the trunk didn’t you?” she asked, knowing full well that I had not. “It needs to drink.”
After consulting the tag and losing my feeble argument that it should stay fresh until New Year’s the way it was, I most placidly removed the garlands, ornaments, and lights, and most calmly told myself it was just a dress rehearsal for January 2nd. With cognitive dissonance beginning to set in like Mrs. Cratchit’s pudding, I got out the bow saw, and hacked away. “I need to drink worse,” I muttered, getting scratched and pricked as if the tree was seeking revenge for being murdered in its prime.
Back in my bargain stand; back to spiffing it up to its previous shining glory (although looking a little less “Martha Stewart” this time, because the stuff was put on with a little less diligence). Sue, smugly satisfied, gave it a long, stiff drink (but denied my request for one).
Her victory gloat was short-lived, though, when the water trickled through a hairline crack in my twenty-five-cent investment and into the carpet. The Pine-Sol reeking porcupine got dismantled, the carpet unexpectedly shampooed, then another sleigh ride to Burlington, accompanied, round-trip, with soft-spoken admonitions of “I-told-you-so’s” and “you never listen to me’s” from the driver’s side, to wit: “I told you we should have bought an extra tree stand—one from this century—but Ebenezer, Jr. here didn’t want to waste any more shillings on such things.” My holiday illusions of peace and joy egg-nogged on by Dickens’ ghosts were dropping as fast as the temperature outside.
It was a couple hours past tree lot closing time now, and we were back at the discount store staring at the “21st-century” tree stand box Sue had coveted on our initial excursion here. I was leery right off the bat after seeing the company’s questionable selling proposition printed in bold red script that it was the swivel-straight Christmas tree stand–-the One Minute Christmas Tree Stand, but did not voice my skepticism because I like to let Sue win a few every now and again (and also because I enjoy eating hot meals, especially around this time of year).
The hollow proclamation hearkened back to the ceiling fan we bought just a few years previously that Assembles in Just Five Easy Minutes! After a dozen calls to customer service, consultations with two electricians, and many, many failed attempts to get the blades to turn, we at last succeeded . . . three days later. I shivered on the third trip home, although the heater was turned up high enough to make the devil sweat.
With guarded optimism, I slipped our piney pain in the $#& into its new, 21st century tree stand without much fuss, and the thing of questionable beauty stood upright! It was still leaning slightly like it did before, but no problem: with the swivel-straight Christmas tree stand–-the One Minute Christmas Tree Stand, this could be remedied, and in sixty seconds, tops.
I pulled the little green foot pedal out from the base, strangled the sticky trunk, pulled the leaning side towards me—and heard the sickening pop of plastic, an unholy sound even more blasphemous than holiday elevator music. It was an unholy sound that triggered Sue’s first episode of Christmas Tree Rage (CTR), a behavioral issue I had read about that can surface when loving couples try to “Deck the Halls” together. CTR can have various causes, none of them their fault.
Now I had to go underneath it once again for another double-needling, already 14 minutes, 33 seconds past the one-minute time limit allotted by the lying #+-#* company, sapped and scratched, trying to keep the gorilla-glue-seeping thing upright, while also seeing if I could fix the broken foot pedal, as Sue, calmly and lovingly, presented me with a “how-to” video from the the swivel-straight Christmas tree stand–-the One Minute Christmas Tree Stand company website and some soft kind and supportive words.
“Ahh-hah! I see the problem now!” I shouted on this now unsilent, unholy night. But I wasn’t watching the video—I was scrolling the comments section posted underneath it by other (male) customers. As I read the reviews describing how the swivel-straight Christmas tree stand–-the One Minute Christmas Tree Stand saved one guy’s marriage; another how it didn’t, on and on, it began to dawn on me that Christmas Tree Rage was apparently a growing epidemic among Christmas tree spouses, and grew more and more convinced that it would be an exceptionally long, cold winter if ours was not perfectly plumbed.)
Coming to my senses, giving into reason after failing to find a solution on my own, I resorted to one last, desperate measure and retrieved the swivel-straight Christmas tree stand–-the One Minute Christmas Tree Stand instruction booklet from the wastebasket. I was surprised to see that it contained something called a “Troubleshooting” section, and a possible solution: make sure the green foot pedal is pulled all the way out. I checked. It had jammed halfway and was not broken after all, thank you sweet baby Jesus–we’ll send you a birthday card of us posing in our new tableau!
It worked! Our potentially home-wrecking living symbol of the season was up and straight. This time, though, the baubles and such were flung on quickly, as I just wanted to get it over and done with at this point because Sue had already signed off on the whole thing, declaring in a melodious, not-upset way at all, that the project was completely in my hands now, before she gently stormed off. For the third time, the acht! tannenbaum was done, and after apologizing profusely to her for getting slightly testy, it was time to darken the room.
The LEDs with twenty different flashing patterns were plugged in–and each green-wired strand worked perfectly! Sue, after accepting my forgiveness (with provisions) and I went upstairs to change into the flannels we saw ourselves wearing, before coming back down to get imbued with the Christmas spirit the Christmas spirits had promised us, many hours before.
When we came back down, the tree had been mostly January 2nd’d again! It seemed that our macaw whose digs were in the same room had also taken a liking to the tree, as she was perched in one of its branches, bobbing rhythmically to the dancing colors and hurling off ornaments left and right with her beak, as fast (and as far) as they (and she) could fly.
So…our green reclamation project got re-re-flipped again, although more John Stewart this time than Martha, because of the flyswatters we dangled from the lower branches. The dreaded, scary flyswatters were the bouncers barring her forever from her parrot Studio 54.
“Finally,” I whispered, snuggling up to my wife to enjoy our candy canes and Baileys (now almost a breakfast drink) that for so long had eluded us this night. “It’s time to make carnate our ghostly visions. . . this is our Scrooge moment when the miser gets all soft and gushy. . .our Christmas card photo . . . our perfectly peaceful holiday comeback.” Then I bit down on my peppermint stick and broke a tooth.
Paraphrasing Tiny Tim: “A pleasant December 25th, to us all, everyone.”
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