The Christmas Tree and Family Tradition, 2013.
In my family, Christmas is the time of year to fulfill our yearly traditions. I guess that’s like most families, but since we don't do that Christian church stuff, we do our own traditions. The Bermuda side of my family has the tradition of Cassava pie on Boxing day and my mother's side of the family has a special tradition for the Christmas tree.
Yeah, so, my grandfather used to buy a little living tree every year and plant it some where on his property. When I was growing up, we never did this because I lived on a tropical island and there wasn't much need for evergreens. I guess we could have planted cedars, or any kind of tree, but we usually travelled to the States for Christmas time anyway. However, when my mother bought her current house a handful of years ago, she re-instated the tradition. And every year she would plant it in the fall and on Christmas we all go out and stand around it and obediently admire it, (as much as one can admire a little two-foot sapling) debate whether its tree number seven or eight, get cold, and quickly go inside for waffles and more coffee. ----->
In my family, Christmas is the time of year to fulfill our yearly traditions. I guess that’s like most families, but since we don't do that Christian church stuff, we do our own traditions. The Bermuda side of my family has the tradition of Cassava pie on Boxing day and my mother's side of the family has a special tradition for the Christmas tree.
Yeah, so, my grandfather used to buy a little living tree every year and plant it some where on his property. When I was growing up, we never did this because I lived on a tropical island and there wasn't much need for evergreens. I guess we could have planted cedars, or any kind of tree, but we usually travelled to the States for Christmas time anyway. However, when my mother bought her current house a handful of years ago, she re-instated the tradition. And every year she would plant it in the fall and on Christmas we all go out and stand around it and obediently admire it, (as much as one can admire a little two-foot sapling) debate whether its tree number seven or eight, get cold, and quickly go inside for waffles and more coffee. ----->
This year marks a changing of traditions when my mother recently informed me she had no more space or need for trees on her property and now that I was living in a home and not an apartment, it was time for me to take up the Christmas tradition. This is a lot of pressure.
The property needs a lot of trees, especially evergreens along the slope where our dirt road continues down to the other neighbors. So after finally getting my act together I started looking around at the local nurseries to find a tree but to my stress, nothing was to be found. I really wanted a good-looking, traditional blue Colorado spruce. When I moved to this property I was struck with how green our property was. (duh, Tim. Its called nature!) What I mean is, all of our trees are the same color green. Just straight-up, out-of-the-box, tree-green. So I’ve been trying to add some other colors onto the grounds and thought the blue spruce would be a good start.
Well, I even traveled south to Massachusetts looking for the little blue-green bugger and couldn’t even find one tree worth considering. The temperature here is dropping, with the nightly temps ranging in the 20’s, so this tree needs to get into the ground soon. I found two little evergreens that I planted on the beds behind the compost bin, but these were so tiny and scrawny (because I bought them on super-sale) that I couldn’t bare to tell my mother I had chose this queer, scrawny 18” Norwegian Weeping Spruce for my first Christmas tree. I could just hear the future snickering and mild ribbing for years to come. I should probably do this correctly at least the first year.
Cut to: next day. I am stressed about the tree situation. I notice the thin sheet of ice on top of the beaver pond didn’t melt from yesterday. It’s getting colder. I’ve gotta find this tree.
I was thinking about all of this while standing in my bathroom and happen to look outside. And there it is. My Christmas tree was being illuminated in a spotlight of sunshine on the edge of the forest just beyond the creek. Like Christ himself was for some reason concerned with my Christmas-tree-woes and cast a ray of light, a beam of solution, to my arborous conundrum. (I’d like to think Christ has better things to do even though we all know he was quite the stickler for coniferous decorations on his birthday even while he was traipsing around the deserts of the Middle East.)
Actually, the sunlight always does that and this wasn’t the first time I saw how nice the tree looked in the sunshine. But this was the first time I needed a tree. So, by the days end I had carefully and successfully dug up the tree, dragged it across the creek to its new home along the slope. It’s a pretty good-looking, well-balanced tree for a wild one. I’m taking a risk in this one dying because of the stress I caused its roots while moving it. The root ball was not a nice ball at all because the tree was growing next to a large rock but I think I got enough of them. I transplanted some other evergreens last summer that I took less care with and they survived last winter and showed signs of growth this summer.
I covered the roots with three bags of healthy soil and covered the whole area with tons of hay to protect the roots all winter. So, I cross my fingers and hope for the best, other wise I fear certain distant future snickering.
-Tim
The property needs a lot of trees, especially evergreens along the slope where our dirt road continues down to the other neighbors. So after finally getting my act together I started looking around at the local nurseries to find a tree but to my stress, nothing was to be found. I really wanted a good-looking, traditional blue Colorado spruce. When I moved to this property I was struck with how green our property was. (duh, Tim. Its called nature!) What I mean is, all of our trees are the same color green. Just straight-up, out-of-the-box, tree-green. So I’ve been trying to add some other colors onto the grounds and thought the blue spruce would be a good start.
Well, I even traveled south to Massachusetts looking for the little blue-green bugger and couldn’t even find one tree worth considering. The temperature here is dropping, with the nightly temps ranging in the 20’s, so this tree needs to get into the ground soon. I found two little evergreens that I planted on the beds behind the compost bin, but these were so tiny and scrawny (because I bought them on super-sale) that I couldn’t bare to tell my mother I had chose this queer, scrawny 18” Norwegian Weeping Spruce for my first Christmas tree. I could just hear the future snickering and mild ribbing for years to come. I should probably do this correctly at least the first year.
Cut to: next day. I am stressed about the tree situation. I notice the thin sheet of ice on top of the beaver pond didn’t melt from yesterday. It’s getting colder. I’ve gotta find this tree.
I was thinking about all of this while standing in my bathroom and happen to look outside. And there it is. My Christmas tree was being illuminated in a spotlight of sunshine on the edge of the forest just beyond the creek. Like Christ himself was for some reason concerned with my Christmas-tree-woes and cast a ray of light, a beam of solution, to my arborous conundrum. (I’d like to think Christ has better things to do even though we all know he was quite the stickler for coniferous decorations on his birthday even while he was traipsing around the deserts of the Middle East.)
Actually, the sunlight always does that and this wasn’t the first time I saw how nice the tree looked in the sunshine. But this was the first time I needed a tree. So, by the days end I had carefully and successfully dug up the tree, dragged it across the creek to its new home along the slope. It’s a pretty good-looking, well-balanced tree for a wild one. I’m taking a risk in this one dying because of the stress I caused its roots while moving it. The root ball was not a nice ball at all because the tree was growing next to a large rock but I think I got enough of them. I transplanted some other evergreens last summer that I took less care with and they survived last winter and showed signs of growth this summer.
I covered the roots with three bags of healthy soil and covered the whole area with tons of hay to protect the roots all winter. So, I cross my fingers and hope for the best, other wise I fear certain distant future snickering.
-Tim