The Tree Explained

This tree makes me think of a quote my mother repeated many times when my sister and I were growing up. “To thine own self be true.” I can still remember her saying that as she pulled a roast from the oven, although I’ve forgotten the context. She resorted to it when giving advice for most of my childhood and teenage dilemmas.

Maybe it was the elegance of the word “thine”. Perhaps it was the emphasis of “own” that appealed to my growing awareness of self. Then again it could be the presence of the final word, that Mt. Everest of adjectives, that diamond of concepts. I knew nothing of life mottoes, nothing of what this really meant, or its opposite. I just knew that my mother, who wasn’t given to much philosophizing other than with her friends over bourbon and Coke, was trying to impart something that identified her, that she wanted to live by.

Whether you think this tree is awful or beautiful, for those who know and love my mother, all we know is, “It’s perfect; it’s her.” In some ways, this tree is proof of a life lived by this Shakespearean line turned motto. For when a person lives that way, for good or ill, what results is a sterling personality, one of which people will remark, “Well, that’s Joanne for you.” Or, “That’s so Joanie.” Or, “You know how your mother is.”

Every year, my sister and I insisted that we have a real Christmas tree that touched the ceiling. My father would play the part of protesting the prices, threatening to buy an artificial tree, a smaller tree, finding a cedar to cut down. We played along, begging and pleading, arguing it just wouldn’t be Christmas without that smell, a tree that filled the corner of our living room, knowing all the while that he could never refuse us.

He made a big show of placing the lights just so, attaching individual lights to the branches. My mother, who can’t abide things in transition, was always saying, “Oh, hurry up, George. Just put lots of lights. It will be beautiful.”

The final touch, after yards of sparkly garland, after shiny and silken balls, was the icicles. My father would pronounce, “Now, girls, these have to be placed one at a time, very, very carefully.” While my father was strategically placing silver icicles and my sister and I were debating the existence of icicles in red, green, gold, and silver in the natural world, my mother ripped open another box, saying, “No, girls, this is how you do it.” With flourish, she threw handfuls of tinsel in the air at the tree, “Shoom! Shoom!”

The ensuing argument ended with them leaving the tree for my sister and me to finish while they returned to their gin and tonic.

As our tastes grew more sophisticated, we begged her to let us use white lights, chunk the balls, garland, and icicles, string popcorn, to which she said, “That’s no fun. I want lots of glitter, lots of color, lots of shiny stuff. It’s not Christmas without it.” Extravagant, slap-dash, generous, fun. The tree. Our mother.

As the years passed, the 8 foot real tree gave way to an artificial one, which was ultimately replaced by a series of table-top travesties, bringing us to the one you see here. "I had to put all that garb on there because your father just threw those lights on. I'm trying to cover up those white wires."

And yes, on December 26th, they unplug it, pull a lawn bag over it, and my father takes it up to the attic.