Christmas Adventures at My House – Too Good to Forget

Kathy Duty Harris

November 8, 2016 ·

I BOUGHT A $50 ROLL OF CHRISTMAS RIBBON! (Probably a bargain price this year)

I am sure I have said this many times before. I suffer from a genetic disorder. Most of you probably thought I suffered from many disorders and those can all be topics for another day. This particular disorder in our family is called the Christmas gene. At one time we thought perhaps it skipped a generation. My Granny Johnson had it and embraced it. My Mother hates it, every Christmas tree, every little twinkling light, dreads it almost as much as she used to dread fair day when she had to take all 4 of us to the county fair. Another story for another day. And then there were the four of us and we all love it. I am not sure any of the others as much as me but perhaps it is because Gene enables me. Ha! So far all of my children who have reached independence love it too. I have told Gene for years if I am ever terminally ill, I want the house decorated for Christmas, even the 14′ live tree. So every year about New Year’s he begins to ask me how I am feeling. He always hopes he can kill two birds with one stone. I am sure I will meet my demise in those two dreaded months of July and August from a heat stroke and there will be no long drug out suffering with Gene stringing lights. Last year if you remember I was down with the worn out knee and didn’t even decorate a tree. All my red and green boxes stayed in the basement with the long snake skin that deterred Gene early on in the process. Every year I have forgotten half of what I have. It is similar to having Alzheimer’s and making new friends every day. I get acquainted with my Christmas stuff anew each year. Recognizing that I skipped a Christmas, I know I have forgotten what I have and it will all be new so no reason to shop for more new stuff, right? And I did behave pretty well at the Mistletoe Market with Emily on Sunday. One outrageous purchase from Easterly Coleman, some new pewter pendants for my necklace, snowman, Santa, etc. And one picture for the lavender powder room because it is so hard to find Christmas stuff that looks good in a lavender powder room. And then it happened! Yesterday, I stopped at Northwest Hardware in Dublin to look for bedding for the baby chicks. Wouldn’t you think I was safe in the Hardware store. What caught my eye to the right? Christmas trees. Decorated Christmas trees. And one of them had the perfect ribbon on it. And I have a tree that goes on the landing with red ceramic Christmas balls that just needs this ribbon. Is there another roll of ribbon in that store like what is on the tree? No, so that means I have to buy it off the tree. But there is no tag and the lady up front said another lady from another store came and did the decorating so she may have brought it with her but it should be for sale if it is in the store. So she calls someone from the back. A rather large man with that look in his eye that Gene keeps from now until all the tinsel is hung and I have quit saying let’s try these lights on this tree. This man had the job of helping the lady decorate the trees. Oh I bet that was his favorite work day so far until yesterday. But, he knew she hid the roll in the middle of the tree so he took it to the register and it was $50 for 10 yards but since it was on the tree, he would sell it to me for 25% off, $37 or by the yard. By then his young assistant has taken the ribbon off the tree and rolled it up and we have discovered there is another piece of ribbon on the tree but not a full roll. I left it until I can get home put up the tree and get it decorated. I am counting on no one else buying the other piece at $5 per yard. I checked out and brought it home. And then I sent Gene to the basement to bring up one of the pencil trees…………………………I will have to tell you that story another day. Let’s just say it started with that all too familiar phrase, “You don’t have a clue how much Christmas stuff you have down here”

Ok, since we all need to think about something besides the election, here is the second part of the story. And I have orders to only work as hard as I want to until the leg hurts and then I have to rest. So, I can rest and type.

Last night, I told Gene, not that he had to jump up and go immediately because I had bought ribbon, to please before he went to work this morning to bring up the pencil Christmas tree that I use on the landing with the pretty red balls. (That I paid too much for once upon a time and bought every one they had on the tree). Shortly there after, he disappeared and the basement door was open and I realized he had gone to look for my tree. Please understand I might have a lot of Christmas stuff but that man has a lot of organizational skills and there is a system. Which is why I just ask for what I want and he goes and gets it. My Mother calls him Hub Raines for any of you Russell County people because I ask for it or need it and he can go get it. Well Hub failed last night. I am blaming it on me being down for the entire season last year and he got off his game. Anyway, he never came back from the basement to the point I thought perhaps the snake that shed its skin last year might have gotten him this year. He finally comes to the top of the stairs and says I do not have a pencil tree and he proceeds to name every Christmas tree I have. And I keep saying but it goes on the landing and has those pretty red balls on it. He swears he doesn’t know what tree was on the landing or have a memory of any red balls. And then I say to him, there are actually 2 pencil trees down there, one I bought last year and has never been out of the box. He goes back and returns with a box for one of them and it is empty. Please understand the original packing is kept for every one of these trees and they are returned to their boxes and stacked. He then decides that it must be in the fancy Christmas bag he bought last year to try out for the future. No I said there is no way you wasted that bag on that skinny tree. That must be the Kitchen tree with the bent top. It is an alpine tree. to which he responds he has no idea what the difference is between an alpine tree and a pencil tree but that has to be where the pencil tree is . So I go down to the basement, practicing with my new knee. And he has moved every red and green box because he keeps the trees in the back. I actually felt sorry for him. And then he proceeds to name every tree in every box and then he shows me a new tree in a new box that must be the other pencil tree I think I bought last year. And it is 4.5 feet tall and I have no idea where it came from but it has never been opened. This is not a 4.5 foot Christmas tree house. This is a 7.5 to 16 foot Christmas tree house. So then I decided I was in so much pain last year I must have bought this tree and not bought another pencil tree and even though I have no plans to use it, I need to go buy a replacement for the one I thought I bought. But in the meantime, quit talking to me about a short tree and find my pencil tree, 7.5 feet. Just like it says on my empty box. Then I find my stash of Alpine trees and he tried to convince me one of them is my kitchen tree but they are not tall enough, one is the one I bought at Cranberry Lane and it goes in the foyer in the big basket. He finally realizes what an alpine tree is at this point. But this is when it happened. I proceeded to do a “I’m a Little Teapot” demonstration, trying to show him that the top of the kitchen tree is bent over. Now why pointing my spout to the side demonstrates the top of my tree I have no idea except I am still on pain meds for when I over do it and swell up my knee. My kitchen tree has a bent over top because I bought a tree too tall for my kitchen so I bend the top one foot over and hang a red wooden star on it and some people think it is a decorating genius but it is really just a too tall tree. Then he says, but the box from Cranberry Lane is here and he opened it to find my Pencil tree. Now why my pencil tree is in the Cranberry Lane box we may never know. Gene is obviously flawed. Then we open the fancy Christmas tree bag and there is my Kitchen tree. But remember I still think I bought another pencil tree. And I cannot leave that basement without peeking in at least one red and green box so I can ooh and aah and forget that Gene is flawed. He packed the wrong tree in the wrong box and I cannot forget it. And then among the red and green boxes, there is the brown cardboard box with the brand new pencil tree I bought last year. So I did buy another one. But I swear I didn’t buy the 4.5 foot one and I have no idea where I will put it. Maybe in the chicken mansion but only if I can find some pretty chicken ribbon for it.