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Pining Away: The Wright family's Christmas tree. Mr. Wright usually chooses the biggest tree on the lot, while Mrs. Wright prefers the small ones.
Photograph courtesy of Cookie Curci-Wright
Remember When
The annual Christmas Tree debate
By Cookie Curci-Wright
According to the World Almanac, 35 million Christmas trees are sold and decorated in North America every holiday season. Each household decorates these trees in its own distinctive way. In most families, unchanging ritual governs the selection of the tree.
Because my husband and I have different criteria for perfection and family rituals, the yearly selection of our Christmas tree is never an easy task. Each year, as we descend upon our local Christmas tree lots, we inevitably engage in the same seasonal warfare: He wants the biggest green tree in the lot; I prefer the small white one. I adore the bushy Balsam; his heart is set on a flimsy Douglas fir.
And so it goes, year after year. If somewhere on the lot there's a crooked pine tree with missing branches, hopelessly tilting to one side, my husband will be drawn to it like a fly to a backyard barbecue. As if possessing telekinetic powers, he'll pass over dozens of well-shaped pines in order to zone in on the one emaciated tree. With the instincts of a homing pigeon, he'll circle the tree lot until he finds it.
Every year, I have the same decision: to let my husband select the holiday tree and cringe when visitors come to call, or resort to clever trickery and connive a way to bring home a tree I can be proud of.
Each Christmas, we set out in joyful repetition to select our holiday tree. Both of us agree, beforehand, on the exact size, shape and image of the tree we want to bring home. But the minute our shoes hit the sawdust and the scent of fresh pine fills our nostrils, all bets are off. The silent war begins. My husband will coyly suggest that I choose the tree. "Any tree on the lot," he'll say, in a tone of compliance. With a false sense of security, I accept his generous, if not suspect, offer and quickly select a tree that satisfies my aesthetic needs.
But the moment I snap off the price tag, hubby has an immediate change of heart. Following true to form, he pleads, "Wait a minute, honey, I want to look around a little bit more." I'm not the least bit surprised when he passes over my beautiful tree in favor of a lifeless pine he's found hidden somewhere in the darkest corner of the lot.
All is fair in love and the tree-shopping war, and now the gloves are off. I'll have to resort to the old bait and switch trick. Magnanimously, I suggest to my husband that I will gladly pay for the tree myself while he brings the car around. Never one to resist a monetary gain, he readily agrees. Meanwhile, I switch his tag with the tag from my tree. The attendant loads the tree matching my original tag neatly into the trunk of our car and my husband is never the wiser ... or is he? I sometimes wonder if this is his shrewd way of getting me to pay for the Christmas tree every season. Maybe I'm not so clever after all.
On the occasions when I've let my husband bring home a tree of his choice, the results were disastrous. For instance, there was that year he came home with a 10-foot tree for our 8-foot high ceiling. "I'll just take a little bit off the bottom," he assured me. The words were barely out of his mouth when the hum of his Skil-saw began vibrating throughout the living room. By the time he finished sculpting, the once-mighty tree had been abbreviated to the size of a small, dilapidated bush, and our living room was buried beneath three layers of sawdust.
Then there was the time be brought home that pencil-thin Douglas fir. Each branch was separated by a foot of space. Something about it, he said, reminded him of his childhood. Like Charlie Brown, he insisted that all that little tree needed was a good home and a little tinsel to set it right. Fifteen boxes of tinsel, six boxes of ornaments and five strings of lights later, its flimsy little branches folded up like a cheap umbrella in a windstorm. Our cats, Squeegee and Tweety, ingested some stray tinsel and had to be rushed to the vet. For what we paid in decorations and vet bills, we could have supplied our entire neighborhood with Christmas trees.
Each year, my husband and I debate over Douglas fir, silver tip and white or green Scottish pine. We disagree on color themes and decorating schemes and argue how the tree-topper should be placed. We fret over broken ornaments, hassle with replacement lights and grumble over burned-out fuses.
But on that holiest of nights, when the lights are turned low and the household gathers around our tree, it shimmers and glitters in the darkness like a brilliant supernova setting our home aglow with all that's good about the holidays. And for a little while, all is calm, all is bright--until next year, when the whole, darn, wonderful fiasco begins all over again.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
