Oh, Christmas Tree!

I hit the sauce three Sunday nights ago. After upending an entire box of ornaments on the floor, I knew the wrong Christmas spirit had gotten to me. Normally a family tree-trimming party wouldn't drive me to drink, but it just so happened that this one took place without ornament hangers, and those ancient, taken-for-granted, rusty ornament hangers - wherever they may be, God rest their souls - refused to show up for the occasion, like the Van Trapp family singers in "The Sound of Music".

I ended up in high dudgeon, ferreting through closets, cabinets, and storage boxes with increasing negative energy. The more I searched futilely, the more my heart shrunk a few sizes too small until I was tempted to tell my kids to grab some glitter, stale cookies and silly string and have at the tree.

With all the insanity that I heaped upon myself just within those first days of December, I - very predictably - began to reminisce about the "good old days", the "simpler times" of yore: my childhood Christmases.

How lovely those tree-trimming days were, how organized and how traditional in rural Tennessee! I thought. But as I watched Matthew and Berto, my oldest son, wrapping and unwrapping and rewrapping out artificial tree in lights, fussing all the way, I had similar visions of my dad uttering choice words under his breath as he battled strings of old lights and a metal tree stand with a profound preference for a tilted tree.

Most years in my childhood, we walked across the field behind our house and into our own woods a couple of weeks into December, Dad's loyal Lab Rueben carrying an ax in his mouth. Mama was the evergreen aficionado, so she had no qualms about turning down cold our suggestions for trees with "character", instead marching us through that forest until we found the fullest, tallest, most evenly branched tree that would fit into our humble living room. Hauling it home was a snap; Dad did all the work while we kids crowded behind, trying to jump over its tip-top. When we reached the porch, we stood back - except for the poor kid assigned to keep the door flat against the wall - while he and Nate shoved that big tree in the house and leaned it in the far corner.

Next we ascended up to and then rummaged through that dimly lit lair of poisonous spiders, our attic. Mom and Dad did most of the reconnoitering while we kids supported them by digging industriously through boxes of abandoned, broken toys. When they finally found the Christmas boxes, Dad hauled them down the rickety, fold-up stairs.

That evening he wrangled first with the temperamental tree stand, sometimes nailing it loudly to the floor, and then with the bunched lights, muttering sweet nothings under his breath at every tangle and busted bulb while we kids giggled into our sleeves, sometimes using those sleeves to wipe our mouths of the hot cocoa Mama had made.

Every year there was the same debate between Mom and Dad: to flock or not to flock. I'm pretty sure Mom kept hidden canisters of flocking in the dark recesses of the attic to conjure up when she got her way. She loved a white tree. It must have reminded her of  growing up in Idaho. Dad was against anything unnatural, and a snowy tree was hardly likely in Tennessee - even in winter - indoors. Plus like all of us, I think he hated the fake-snow initiation, for as Mom busily flocked that poor tree with a wicked smile of delight upon her face, the rest of us were standing twenty yards back, coughing and waving our hands in the air to move the cloud of chemicals off to our neighbors. It was a toxic holiday experience. Sure the tree looked nice and snowy, but when we had adorned the tree with miscellaneous decorations, white residue abided on our fingers for weeks, evidence of Mom's dastardly deed to that poor evergreen tree...

Finally, when prep work was done and Dad and Mom sat on the couch, reconciled, they began to pass out the decorations to us kids. The colored balls came first, and a color was assigned to each child.

"Blue for my firstborn," Dad said to Vinca as he handed her the first ornament.

"Gold for my golden-haired girl," he said to Annie with her long, blonde hair.

"Red for my only son." That one for Nate, born on Dad's birthday.

Lastly, he handed me a green ball. "And green for my nature girl." I was his only bonafide tree-hugger.

After that we each took turns coming to the couch for the next ornament, treasured ornaments like Natie's little baseball player and my felt snowman and a suncatcher unicorn of Annie's. I guess it was because of that yearly ritual that I remembered our Christmases being calmer, more traditional. Our ornaments were always the same year to year, the only additions being any baubles we made in school, like clothespin soldiers. Our tree topper never varied and was always welcomed excitedly each December. She was a smaller paper angel with short, gold curls and a plastic hoop and face, humble like our home. We four kids took turns putting her atop that tree, her little hymnal bent in her tiny fingers. She had blonde hair and had been purchased after Vinca was born. Vinca and Annie both were towheaded as babies and toddlers, and the angel reminded my dark-haired parents of their first baby girl.

Ah, those were the days! And yet I think that perhaps - just perhaps - those days were simpler because we were poorer; we had less to fuss over and about. Nevertheless, as my parents hunted with four rowdy rascals for a tree, dug through a dirty, spider-infested attic, and wrangled with lights and an heirloom stand, they probably had some stressful Christmas moments. But - God bless them - they were good at keeping traditions, even the tradition of arguing over flocking.

As for my family? After replacing those AWOL hangers with a package of flashy fresh gold ones for a whopping 79 cents, I practically threw my kids' special ornaments at them the moment they woke up; whoever awoke first got to attack their ornaments in mass before school. It was a race to see how quickly in spare moments we could deck the tree, because all the boxes piled in my tiny living room were freaking me out and causing me to OCDrink. There was no rhyme or ritual, I'm afraid. And, yet, my children's excitement over favorite ornaments, many from Aunt Vinca, was not abated by my slapdash approach to decorating.

And this year my son Berto just happened to find our first angel for the top of the tree. For years I've looked for her. She had to be simpler and considerably smaller than many I saw in stores with elaborate and wildly different attire. Berto found her one happy Sunday afternoon in a discount store as we waited for takeout pizza. Unlike the angel of my childhood, she is fragile. But as our lights reflect off her simple white porcelain, she has, along with our abundance of eclectic ornaments, helped me to reclaim that good, old-fashioned Christmas spirit I sometimes think I left behind with that little girl in Tennessee.

A Fall Tradition

I have not written lately, but I have excuses. This week I was making eucalyptus wreaths and baskets with my children. The wreaths are a yearly tradition. We usually make our first one in October.

The baskets I first dreamed of this year. Yes, neither wreath nor basket is perfect. They are not classically beautiful. They're, shall we say, interesting. Nevertheless, when I completed that first basket above, I giggled like a little girl as I bragged to my husband, "Can you believe I made a basket? A basket! And I almost gave up so many times!"

That is so very true. It cramped my fingers, stained their tips sage green, and strained my upper arm muscles as I attempted to jam supple, slender branches through the stacked wreaths to weave them. The lattice work on the bottom was pitiful, not properly patterned at all, but I believe it will hold.

And then we made another one today, my children and I. We sat on a picnic blanket between the two huge Eucalyptus trees in the front yard, and we trimmed young, green branches from the tree, stripped their leaves gently, and then rolled them into several small wreaths. After that concentrated effort of an hour or so, most of my children left the communal quilt to seek the relaxation of television indoors. Analisa and I stayed. She collected Bermuda hay for a witch's broom she had designed from a sturdy, gnarled branch. I broke the poor fingers of our generous Eucalyptus again and again as I weaved and fumed. Yet I prevailed. Our completed, collaborative basket is the one on the left. Not too bad, if I do say so myself.

Ah, Waikiki...

We stayed in the Waikiki area while on the Island of Oahu for a family wedding. It is the perfect place to stay if you are energetic; thrive in crowds; love shopping at Gucci, Tiffany & Co or Prada retail stores; and if you are an avid walker. However, with a young family and a rented minivan for which to find perpetual parking, well…it wasn’t quite ideal.

I said to my husband one day as we walked the two blocks from our hotel to the parking garage, “It feels like the buildings here are torturing the plants.” – all those high rises and their tiny entrance lawns with flowering bushes and palm trees. I wondered what the island had looked like, how wild and free, before the advent of city life and tourism.

Still, I appreciated the relatively peaceful stroll to the parking garage, believe me. Driving Waikiki is no fun. My poor, brave husband! All you see is the six-inch wide, winding lanes on crazy, congested one-way streets with houses and businesses pressing on one another. There is no parking anywhere except the zoo, it seems, and that fills up at 9am.

The first afternoon was a rough awakening, an adjustment of expectations. Then in the evening we went to my husband’s brother and sister-in-law’s house, out of Waikiki. There was a bright rainbow in the sky on the drive there. When we arrived at the welcoming home of our relatives, we saw a miniature lawn, a beautiful tropical garden, a stream tumbling under a culvert and a (for that city) huge green park across the street in which stood a massive and ancient tree. And we breathed, exhaling all the stress of a family that had just been dropped out of the wide southwest into contained island life. I took the kids to the park to run as soon as possible, and my brother-in-law took us all for a drive to a lookout above their home from which we could see the vast ocean and iconic Diamond Head State Monument and, alas, the city sprawling to the edges of both those natural wonders. The rainbow was still there, arcing in friendly clarity above the vivid landscape of this strange, diverse place.

Our gratitude for that drive amid mostly uninhibited plant life and for that caper in the park was also due in part to the great relief we felt in being somewhere other than our hotel - so great a relief, in fact, that I hugged that ginormous, old tree.

 

treehugger

 

Now I have always said that when you’re staying in a beautiful locale, the hotel room is just a place to sleep before you go exploring. But the moment my husband and I walked into our suite, our mouths dropped and our shoulders sagged. I swear never again to look at a hotel that advertises kitchenettes for families, because it also means - without a doubt - that the carpets will be sticky, the futon mattress will consist of metal rods and old newspapers, the shower will be scary and poorly lit, and the railings on the six-floor balcony will be at least 15 inches apart to accommodate your four-year-old’s dardevil spirit.

The hotel suite had five doors leading to the general walkway and the balconies. All the latches on the sliding glass doors were coming apart from the flaking walls and one was completely broken. That first night my husband and I slept apart to guard the children against anyone who might pry their way in from the walkway or against any Dracula-like being who might decide to scale the exterior walls and balcony partitions. It was an irrational fear, but Oahu had rattled me.

I needed some perspective, and I got it that night when I found my oldest boy crying into his stale white pillow.

“Berto, what is it?”

“This stupid hotel room is going to ruin our vacation of a lifetime!”

Or his stupid mommy might. My belly dropped. Someone – and I knew who – needed to stop complaining about the rooms that were, in fact, just for sleeping and start concentrating on all the wonderful things her family was going to experience in the next few days. Besides, there are people in this world who spend their whole lives in slums. I could certainly survive a short time in a dump on beautiful Oahu.

After that Waikiki grew on us. We started walking most places, and I realized just how clean that part of the city was with all its fancy storefronts and crowded but still inviting beaches. At one of those beaches, our children and their many cousins had a blast swimming with aunts and uncles, collecting shells and burying each other in the sand. Our family began to frequent the ABC Store on the corner where a tourist can get just about any vacation essential her heart desires. And I stopped thinking the trees and other plant life were being tortured by people and their tall buildings; they seemed to have adjusted to the frenetic environment.

One of my favorite memories of Waikiki began when my son and I decided to leave the rest of our tired family vegging in the hotel room and go exploring on our own, not wanting to miss the chance at any new experience. On a street corner we found a beautiful tree - one of the special things about the Hawaiian climate being its huge trees with broad, happy leaves - that had enormous branches growing into and winding around each other in a mind-blowing arrangement. We also discovered two nicely manicured city parks. We ate chocolate and yogurt on a bench, chatted as we people watched and then learned a bit of local history from the parks’ many statues, monuments and plaques – just my son and I.

And I didn’t complain anymore – hardly ever. I was too busy having fun.



Today you can also find my piece, LOST: A Hawaiian Family Vacation, at humorwriters.org. Thank you for publishing me again, Erma Bombeck Writer's Workshop, and thank you for supporting me, my friends and readers!

 

Dreams can come true. It can happen to you...

There are a few things I've always wanted to do...or be a part of. Some I imagined as a kid and have yet to fulfill in even the smallest measure. Some I realized as an adult and have pursued rather imperfectly to some success. Here are a few of them:

1. Play the banjo.

When my dad pursued songwriting in Nashville, TN, he knew some very talented studio musicians, and one of these gentleman played the banjo. Dad thought he was a virtuoso, and when he brought home a record of this banjo player, I knew I loved the instrument.

Do I play? Nah. But I did take one small step toward the goal of doing so when I picked up my dad's guitar at age 18 and asked him to teach me. I drove my parents nuts playing the melancholy western tune Red River Valley over and over and over. I play better these many years later - mostly Christmas songs - but don't play as well as my dad or Uncle Reuben, certainly not well enough to pick up the fancy finger-picking style necessary to tickle the banjo strings....but someday, I hope.

2. Hike the Camino de Santiago

I didn't at first learn of this awesome trek because I am Catholic. I learned about it from the fun PBS show Spain...On The Road Again that explores the cuisine, culture, and history of Spain. It's a quirky travel/food show hosted by chefs and actresses. In one episode Mario Batali taught Gwyneth Paltrow about the Camino de Santiago as they walked part of it, and I was enchanted. A dream was born to hike the Camino, eat the rich food of Spain on the way, and lose myself in the glorious history of such a journey.

I recently saw the movie The Way with Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez, and I loved the part where the father (Sheen) sees his dead son (Estevez), smiling and pulling the ropes with monks to swing the huge incense censer over the heads of those kneeling in Santiago de Compostelo cathedral.

3. Visit Gettysburg

Wow, I can say I did this - and in the 150th anniversary year of the battle. How did this happen? Well, I wrote on Facebook several months earlier that I wished to go and invited others to join me, told my husband we should go, and then my fabulous big sister Vinca suggested we drive to Pennsylvania when we visited her in Virginia last summer. Gotta love that woman!

I do wish, however, that I had read Michael Shaara's novel, Killer Angels, before I went. I would have been able to visualize the positions of the men, generals, and the lay of the battle in my head as I gazed across that wide, verdant space much better. But, honestly, I really feel I would have to live in the pretty town of Gettysburg and hike the trails through the fields, woods, graveyards and hollows every day in order to attempt to get a proper feel of it. Nevertheless, I am so very grateful to Vinca, my brother Dave and my husband Matthew for going with me to such a hallowed place. What an opportunity - the experience of which I will always, always cherish.

4. Get paid to be a writer

Five bucks. Anything.

I've wanted to be a writer ever since I was eight-years-old.

The delusional thing is that, unlike more reasonable people, I imagine I am a writer even though I am not paid for my work. My humor pieces have been published regularly - just not for payment. Sheesh! I don't want to talk about it.

No, really. I will not be accepting questions, jeers or commiseration at this time.

5. Surround myself with a Bonsai Garden that I clip with agonizing precision and talk to when no one is looking

Gosh, I love trees. I don't just hug them; I talk to them, too. My love has grown for them even more since moving to a desert city. Spend one day at a sporting event in 115 degree temps and tell me how much you appreciate the kind shade of a palo verde or eucalyptus.  Sure, it might be 110 in the shade, as John Fogerty sang, but it's better than the alternative.

But as for Bonsai, we all know these beautiful, ancient-looking living things cannot provide shade or habitat, but I have wanted one since seeing an episode of CBS Sunday Morning in which people talked about their serene Bonsai lifestyles, surrounded by dozens of the artistic little trees. Again a dream was born, and now I can say I have begun to live it:

While my husband was out of town last week, I received a package in the mail. At first I assumed a relative had sent a gift to my daughter Ana, or it was something my man had ordered off Amazon. But the package was strange and Berto pointed to a sticker that said, "Open Immediately! Live plant."

Well, I was not going to open that package, my friends, in case Anthrax spores was what was meant by "live plant". I sure as heck was not expecting any such package alive with goodness knows what. I raked the box over with my eyes to find an address, and sure as anything it was meant for me. Curiosity climaxing, I ripped the thing open and saw a beautiful little tree wrapped in a plastic bag - Bonsaaaiiii!

It was a 13th wedding anniversary gift. The card with it read, "I Am The Man...."

I knew then it was from my guy, and the card was stating how awesome he was for giving his woman the realization of her dream.

Only when he came home did he inform me that by his card he was referencing our song: Peter Cetera's The Glory of Love, the theme song from Karate Kid II. (Yes, we did grow up in the 80s, and we feel quite nostalgic watching Ferris Beuller's Day Off, thank you.)

"I can't believe you didn't get my card," he said.

I couldn't believe it, either, just as I can't believe I have my very own juniper Bonsai tree. I would love a new tiny tree every anniversary if my man is willing.

As a woman who has annihilated everything from mums, orchids, hydrangea to succulents and lantana, however, I pray I don't kill it. It should be the first of many, so that one day I can be a crazy old lady on her front porch, just picking her banjo like Steve Martin and singing to her beautiful bonsais.

Treasured Spaces

I wish my kids had a tree house. Heck! I wish I had a tree house.

A family friend built one for his daughters. It was quite simple but sturdy, properly made with a rope ladder going up through the floor and with windows on each side. He said he hoped that soon the tree's branches would engulf it, so it could be a hideaway.

We have an African Sumac tree in our backyard, a lovely creature with branches not at all stingy with their shade and expanse. A fungus is slowly stripping the bark from it, however, and will likely kill it, so I wonder if its branches are strong enough for such an abode of childhood.

Every Arizona summer the poor thing suffers in the afternoon sun. Would we dare add to its burden?

But, oh, the memories it does provide and the great potential to provide more!

In Tennessee, my siblings and I had a chicken coop for our playhouse. We didn't have to share it with the chickens, for there weren't any. It was a grey, weather-beaten old thing, a relic of a by-gone time. It stood in a hollow that served as the property's landfill (yes, we were that far out in the boonies). On the path into the hollow was a sassafras tree. I used to love to crush its leaves between my palms and then smell the wonderful aroma of them as I passed. The coop had two levels. The first had a dirt floor and was very boring, nothing to see but four dour walls unless you looked up to your right at the open second floor. The only way to reach this second level was to climb a very knobby support beam on the eastern wall. It was brutal, because your hands and legs would get jabbed and scrapped as you made your ascent, and splinters were a likely souvenir of your efforts. Still, once you grasped the lip of that second floor, you were able to stand and gaze out across the field to the woods or the house from behind a half wall. You still had a roof to make you feel as if you were in a secret space and to shield you from rain.

It took me years to climb that beam by myself. I was either stranded on that boring, bare, enclosed dirt floor, or I was hoisted up the beam with help from my siblings. When the day came that I could scramble up to that open, lovely space all by myself, it was a right of passage; I had achieved equality and freedom. Those were the days when my brother Natie and I would take his pop gun rifle up and play cowboys and Indians. Our imaginations were as open as the view from east to west, the view to the landfill thankfully blocked by the solid north-facing wall. Because the denizens of Nature were playing their games before us in the field, there was always something to inspire.

Each of us kids must have gone up to the old chicken coup by ourselves sometimes, too, seeking escape in solitude, in catching the breeze in our hair, in listening to the sounds of thousands of insects, in surveying our verdant Southern home.

I wish my kids had something like that. I've dreamed of what they might have. For instance, I've pictured a large, airy room with tables, chairs, paints, clay and bookshelves filled with all the great tales of childhood lining the wall - a playroom for them and their friends where the messy, adventurous pursuits of childhood reign supreme or where a quiet read can be had in a charming window seat. Such a space seems so much more likely than an abandoned-chicken-coop hideout in the city. Our house in this city is small, however. There is no such room, no room for such a space when our kids can barely navigate the bedrooms they share. And, really, isn't a place outdoors, in the bright light and fresher air, always better for adventure anyway?

Our enormous eucalyptus trees in the front yard offer some inspiration with their large drooping branches that nearly trail the ground now. Sitting between them you can look up and feel transported to somewhere secret and alone. Often my youngest two will go stand in the midst of their cascade of satiny, burgundy-trimmed leaves after I pick up the kids from school. They try to hide behind the wide trunks with their planks of peeling bark before I can exit the van. It never fails that I ask, "Where's Ella and Daniel?" before I think to look for the peek of tennis shoes there. It's the faintest whisper of a secret place, I suppose, but I wish they had something more.

With nary a chicken coop in sight, I do really wish they had a tree house.

 



Parks, Trees and Love Carvings

As I panted and limped, climbed, slid and jumped on the play forts, I felt like the lame gazelle attracting the murderous attention of the lioness. There were two other people to chase, but I was picked on every time; I was an easy, too tempting target - caught again and again. My children thought it was great fun to have Mama joining playground tag, and even the four-year-old took advantage when my knee gave out.


But never mind. I enjoyed the exercise. I enjoyed feeling like a child, racing to the bottom of a slide ahead of my toddler or scaling the faux rock wall after him. I enjoyed trying to avoid my children's outstretched arms, though I failed miserably, but I did not enjoy being chased. I have a horror of being chased. It feels like the harder I push, the slower I go, so the only option is to turn and face my pursuer with palms out and giggle in a high, unnatural pitch like a crazy idiot. The hope is then that they'll back away slowly, shaking their heads. That doesn't work with my kids. They know Mama's a little strange and it no longer scares them. So they tag me, the little rapscallions, and I am forced to try to catch them - the more luck to me!

Despite my disappointing performance in playground tag and regardless of the heat, I relished being at the park with my children recently. I'm still, I must protest, a country girl at heart, and there are a few special parks in this city where if you turn your back to the road, you feel as if you might actually be somewhere far removed from concrete and artificial light (except for the jungle gyms, basketball and volleyball courts, of course) because of all the wide expanses of green, the little hills and the shade trees.

After tag and swing time, we went to watch my eldest ride his skateboard down a dirt hill, and we all tried this form of dry sledding - bottoms and feet on the slightly curved board as we barreled down, digging the wheels into the dirt with our weight. My son's wheels got all mucked up; he refused to let us ride more, so I invited the kids to sit with me beneath a giant eucalyptus. I leaned my back into the trunk, world's away from the city but within walking distance, and began to rest, perchance to dream.

A while later when I was standing and examining my friend, the tree, and wondering whether it was in fact a eucalyptus (the bark was right, the leaves were not), my son approached and said, "This would be a good tree for carving your name."

"There are names here. See." I pointed.

At least, I assumed they were names. They could have been bad words, but I like to think not. It's bad enough that those abound on the play equipment.

Then I thought about how I have always wanted to carve "H loves M" into a tree. I'm pretty sure my Man would scoff at the idea rather than be flattered, but what he wouldn't know wouldn't hurt him. Briefly, I fingered the car keys in my purse. Would they do the job, I wondered? It might require more labor on my part with no pocket knife. As I pondered this I recalled how as a teenager, my dad pointed out an expanse of forest near the now defunct Cougar Mountain Lodge on the road to Cascade, Idaho. He told how he had carved his and mom's names into a tree there when they were dating. Dad, Mom and I spent some little time trying to find the wooden edifice to Dad's ardor. All those years ago Dad could have added an addendum, "twenty-seven years and still going strong". Alas, we didn't find the old fellow, and the testament to young love was surely faded by then, anyway.

I zipped the purse back up. Today was not the day to scratch at this maybe eucalyptus in this city park. Was it really likely I'd come back years from now, tell the tale of a harrowing game of playground tag, and show the carving to my children or grandchildren? Besides, I didn't want to cause any harm to the bark of my friend in the heat of summer, and I didn't want to get caught by a parks and rec employee. I took my kids back to the playground, and we played in our little country haven until it was time to head back home in the city.

African Sumac and Maple Tree-Hugger

This tree reminds me of Tennessee. I sit in the glider beneath it of a morning and I look up, up, up into the tangle of its branches, and I feel a little closer to that ninety-eight acres in Tennessee where I grew up. I can just about imagine I'm there again. After all, when I'm peering up at the great blue sky between those boughs, I do not see my neighbors' houses just across the fence, do not hear the traffic on all the streets that surround me, and I don't contemplate what I need from the grocery store a mere five minutes' drive away. No, I see green, and in Tennessee there was so much green; there were so many trees.

Trees are the stuff of life - literally for us humans - and in a very poetic sense for me. One of my earliest memories of loving a tree in Tennessee is of my dad lifting me up into the branches of a maple's canopy. This maple stood just outside the yard fence on a small slope above a hollow. It was the focal point of the view from the north-facing window in the living room, and it has been the focal point of some of my dreams since we left that little square house. My siblings, of course, were more than tall and strong enough to grab and climb the lowest branch of this tree and swing themselves up. For so long I never could quite get myself up behind them, though I always attempted it. My dad pushed me up, and Mama came, too. Then we spread out in that maple's boughs, the six of us, as Dad told us a story. I don't remember the tales he told on our picnics in that tree, but I can hear his baritone voice and hear Mama telling me not to venture out any farther on my chosen branch.

I haven't told my kids stories beneath this tree, but we've whispered and pointed from the glider at the sudden spying of a lizard, dragonfly or hummingbird. We've fled laughing beneath it from the spray of the sprinklers in the yard. I've lifted my oldest ones up countless times into the crook between its branches, or sat my kids in a row on its lowest limb, and I've held my babies and toddlers aloft to feel its sticky leaves. I've even dangled my own self, arms and legs limp, across a low-lying branch, pretending that I had been deposited there by a storm the night before. It hurt my tummy, and I'm sad to say, I got few laughs for my efforts and at least one definite rolling of the eyes.

You can see from the picture that the tree is sick. We've been advised to cut it down, because a fungal infection or some such thing is killing it slowly, splicing the bark from its limbs and opening it up to more disease. I won't let it go; it's the only tree in our backyard, and a backyard without a large tree in it is nowhere I want to be. We paid to thin its branches, so it wouldn't break so easily in the monsoon winds, and we've paid to have it fertilized and trimmed again, so we could invigorate it and shave off its lifeless extremities. This summer, it's been valiantly marching on. Except for its bark that scales off with any rough touch like sunburned skin, its branches are full and leafy, and if it doesn't look exactly healthy, it is still present and looks as if it means to be for a while.

And I mean to sit beneath it of a morning...as I always do.

Just Trees and a Treehugger

These two towering eucalyptus trees are those that I spoke of in my post about the monumental dust storm that passed through the Phoenix valley a couple weeks ago. Every year during the summer, at least once, I sit awake at night and listen to the wind lashing them and wonder if they will give up the ghost and end up on the house.

But they are beautiful. And exotic. They call to mind visions of Australia, and that land, I think, is not so unlike this area in terms of scorching heat and desert vistas. Oh, some people say no; eucalyptus trees are a pain, not beautiful at all, because they make a great mess out of one's yard; the bark and twigs shred so easily in the wind.

"So, are you going to cut down those trees?" our next door neighbor asked the first time we met her. The demand came after several minutes friendly conversation when I suppose she felt she'd buttered us up.

Never mind that it would cost us hundreds of dollars to do so, or that our air conditioning bills would soar without the massive shade of those giant eucalyptus; they made a mess of her carefully manicured lawn, and she wanted them gone. So I've spent plenty of time in our years at this house walking about the front of our home collecting strips of red-brown bark from the gravel in the morning or evening after any good wind. Heck, I've often collected the trees' debris from my neighbor's yard, but I don't hold the exercise against the towering beauties. I even feel a certain pride that we have the tallest trees on our street.

Lately, I've killed two birds with one stone - taking my kids out before 7am many mornings to ride their bikes, pulling my toddler in the Radio Flyer wagon, so he can have some wheels, too. He clutches his Elmo doll and smiles as I off-road the wagon across the gravel of our semi-xeriscaped yard, scooping up nature's castoffs as we go.  

Come December I'll be stepping out with a pair of pliers, picking out supple new branches to clip off in order to roll up a Christmas wreath or two. I like the feel of the satiny leaves between my fingers, the gorgeous rosy tinge at the tips of the new growth like an exotic flower. As I roll the branches in my hands, mourning every splinter when I must begin anew, I enjoy remembering those days in Tennessee when my parents rolled grapevine wreaths for a living. Matthew won't let me bring the wreaths inside, though - won't let me fill vases with freshly hewn eucalyptus branches, because the smell, to him, is overpowering. I think it's lovely, but no matter, I can at least hang my creation outside on the front door, a small tribute to the unique qualities of the eucalyptus.