I find it very amusing that stores are selling Charlie Brown Christmas Trees. I mean, artificial trees that look like the one old Chuck drug in to the festivities, right before he was once again ridiculed for his ineptness. Oh, believe me I realize what the draw is to the little tree. It represents a more simple time and the purity of a childlike spirit we have to search deep inside to find these days.

I remember the first Christmas tree my husband picked out. I laughed. He had gone out in the woods with a friend to “hunt a tree.” From his selection, I figured he must have joined up with Charlie; he actually cut the top out of a scrawny pine. It had about five limbs stretching out in every direction. He reasoned that our apartment wasn’t big enough to justify a regular size tree. We put our twelve ornaments on the little twig and a string of twenty five lights. It was suddenly magical. I told my mama about it over the phone but when the semester ended and we loaded up the car to head home for a visit I threw it in too. I have pictures of it in my parents’ house right next to their six and a half foot Frasier fir.