The Search For A Perfect Christmas Tree

The magnificent special blue of the Newfoundland sky, the bright sun making the carpet of white snow seem like a glistering expanse of crystals and diamonds, and the two young men standing beside the ‘Christmas Trees for Sale’ sign, gave the afternoon scene before me a feeling that I had walked into the middle of a Charles Dickens Christmas story. One of the young men had chosen a small fir tree and was balancing it on his hand as if it were a basketball, making it twirl and spin, causing his audience of small brightly clad children to laugh and squeal in delight.

Obviously the parents of the children were somewhere within the circle of trees. The scent of fir, pine and spruce trees floated on the cold air. Then from within the mass of trees I heard a young woman s’ pleasant voice.

"No, not that one dear," she pleaded earnestly, "I want an absolutely perfect tree this year!"

The sound of her voice, the appeal for a ‘perfect tree’ reminded me of a story my friend used to tell about her parents from a Christmas long ago. It was a story that was told every year, and every year we still laughed and were as amused as the year before.

It seems that at some point in her early childhood, her mother, who often befriended us student nurses and was adored by us all, decided she had to have a ‘perfect’ tree for Christmas that year. So on a particularly sunny Saturday a week o before Christmas, her mother sent her father to find the tree that she so coveted. There were three small children in the family and Mrs. C. wanted them to have the best. So when Mr. C. arrived home in an hour or so with a tree she was overjoyed. But only until she appraised it standing beside the family station wagon.

"No, that will never do," she announced, declaring it too big.

So Mr. C. put the tree back into the vehicle and set off on a quest for a better specimen. The morning passed and by noon time the tree-hunter had returned. With a flourish he presented to his wife what he proclaimed to be ‘a perfect tree’. But this one was declared ‘too sparse’ and after lunch he was sent on his way again. He was astonishingly cheerful, not seeming to mind his failure to find the elusive tree his wife so badly desired.

By mid afternoon he had arrived home again. Surely this time the ‘perfect’ tree was the one hanging from the back of the station wagon. But no, this one was declared too short, and if he would just try one more time, Mrs. C. said ‘you will get it right. I just know it’.

So off he went, smiling and humming a Christmas tune. The afternoon grew dark and supper was ready. The children and their mother were anxiously awaiting the arrival of the headlights and Father with the Perfect Christmas Tree.

Just as they were all beginning to fret, they saw the car, with the top of a tree hanging out the back and bobbing up and down as it entered their line of vision under a street light.

Yes, oh, Yes, this was ‘PERFECT’! Mrs. C. gave her stamp of approval and the tree was brought inside, where the kids were in awe of having a real outdoor tree in their home. The smell of the fir tree settled over the whole house. Everyone was ecstatic, Mr. C. got tremendous accolades for a job well done and graciously accepted the praise he was given. Later on the tree was stood in the corner and decorated beautifully. Everyone agreed it was indeed a divine Christmas Tree.

So, what of it you ask? Well, the behind the scene’s tale of the tree surfaced a short time later. Mr. C. had maintained his pleasant manner and all around good natured persona, because he had only cut one tree. It was found out by the clever young mother in days to come that each time he was dispatched to find another tree, he went to his favorite pub and enjoyed a Christmas toddy with his mates. The trees she had inspected and declared wrong for many and various reasons were all the same tree! Four trips, one tree, and finally it was a ‘perfect’ tree.

Mr. C had pulled off the biggest prank of his life to date at that time. But Mrs. C. forgave as she always did, her laughter tinkling in the air with each telling of the story over the years.

They have both left us now. Christmas is coming, and I have no doubt whatsoever, that where they are, they have a splendid, glorious, beautiful PERFECT TREE! And we have the memories that make us laugh, and in so doing remember them, and how much they meant to us.

And as Mrs. C was known to say, "All the trees are perfect, what they symbolize makes’ it so!"

 Bonnie Jarvis-Lowe

"When you hold resentment toward another, you are bound to that person or condition by an emotional link that is stronger than steel. Forgiveness is the only way to dissolve that link and get free." Catherine Ponder