No Hemlock this year

When I took my tree down and sent it out the sliding glass door about three days after Christmas last year, it was completely devoid of needles. Most of the needles had to be vacuumed up from the carpet. Those that did not get caught in presents found their way to comfy homes on the red skirt around the tree.

I still haven't sucked up all needle remnants from last year's tree. At least a hundred or so are still lodged along the track where the door slides. I'm too lazy to go look for the skinny suck-up hose attachment to take care of that. Maybe I'll go find it before we put up this year's tree. Maybe it's hiding in the same place where I put all the Christmas CD's.

On an outing to the woods last year, we picked out a hemlock (well, I picked it out) to add the necessary festive touch to our living room. We both knew when we selected the beautiful tree with its bluish green needles that it was a mistake. Bill knew better than to say anything, so we forged ahead on the plan to place the grand fir on the deck and the hemlock inside the house.

I guess you would call it the "hope" tree because I hoped that attractive, nicely shaped tree would defy all the odds of what I already knew about hemlocks. Their needles, though beautiful, are tenuous at best.

Once inside the house, this tree made no effort to defy the odds. It began shedding as soon as I had finished clipping and banding the string of ancient Christmas lights that had belonged to Bill's mother. Annie asked me last year why I didn't get some new lights for the tree.

After all, when 90 percent of the lights have no clips and have to be rubber-banded to the limbs, that may just be the first clue that new lights are in order.

And when the needles begin falling off the tree immediately after you've spent a stressful half hour banding on all those lights, that may be the second clue (besides a prior warning that hemlocks don't hold up inside the house) that the tree is gonna look fairly anorexic before Christ's birthday and will never hold up until the traditional "take down the tree" on New Year's Day.

The main reason the hemlock stayed in the house was that the other tree we picked was too tall, and, besides, it was already snowed in on the deck, set to stay there until spring which I think finally came in May this year.

Secondary to that is the fact that decorating the Christmas tree at our house tends to be one of the more stressful times of the year.

People leave---except for the decorator.

They leave because they know of the dangers that lie ahead if they happen to be within earshot of the decorator. The things that come out of her mouth when things go wrong with decorating would scare off the toughest of hard-core loggers.

And the decorator----once she's put stuff on the tree, that's how it's gonna remain. Main reason? The decorator has been a klutz at most everything dextrous she's ever attempted.

You shoulda seen how long it took her to make her hand do the Hawaiian "shaka" last week. Annie got lots of laughs and dished out lots of instruction, "No, put that finger down---just your thumb and your pinkie . . . wiggle them."

Well, I can do half a shaka now, still can't wiggle those two digits at the same time, so you can imagine how bad I am at trying to delicately decorate a tree, especially one where I know that even a hint of wind send most of the needles to the floor.

In a nutshell, when Bill and I go out on our nostalgic search for the perfect trees today (one for outside the house, one for inside) I resolve to firmly ignore any temptation of even looking at a hemlock. Hemlocks are best left in the forest.

He strongly suggests grand fir for both inside and out, and he seems to know where we can find them. As always, it will be an adventure, and, as always, once we bring the trees home, when he sees me start bringing the bags of decorations downstairs, he'll find something important to do down in the far corner of the woods.

Willie's here with us this year, and he hasn't heard or seen his mom's Christmas tree decorating wrath for several years, so it may take a while for him to decide it's time to go down to the school where it's safe.

I'll try two remedies to promote a stress-free decorating experience this year. First, will be the choice of tree; secondly, I'll go to town and purchase a new string of lights. Oh yeah, I think it will be wise to do some repair work on that angel which has stood atop Love family Christmas trees for three generations.

Her skirt kept separating from her top last year, and I'm sure that caused a few hemlock needles to hit the floor. Maybe I'll make her a duct tape waist band to take care of that problem.

Stay tuned. Now, where ARE those Christmas CD's?