Quest For Tree

There used to be this Christmas tree farm. Every year about this time our family joined my sister-in-law’s family to drive out into the country and cut down our tree. We got a wagon ride out to the cutting area. There was a warming barn with hot beverages waiting for us when we got back with our freshly cut tree. Santa even visited for the kids. It was a great time. Then it closed. That was over five years ago.

Ever since, we’ve been on a quest to find the perfect Christmas tree farm. Just like the one that closed. We’re still looking.

Oh, there was this one place that was quite popular. They had horse drawn wagon rides out to the cutting farm. But our wagon was one drawn by a mule. Our driver commented on how mules were so much smarter than horses. In fact, he said that’s why mules were the preferred pack animal at the Grand Canyon . . . because a horse would run off a cliff rather than stop a gallop. A mule was smart enough to stop.

While the driver talked, the mule suddenly stopped. For the record, there was no cliff. While the horse drawn wagons went merrily on their way, we waited while our driver tried to get the mule to move. Maybe mules would be okay if your Christmas tree farm were at the Grand Canyon. But . . .

Still, the ride was nice, until we arrived at the "cutting area." These were the devil’s rejects of Christmas trees. Mutants all. Trees with crooked trunks or big dead spots, scraggly monsters that might have been subjects for some kind of radiation experiments, and a few that were too big for Rockefeller Plaza. No wonder that mule stopped. He was smart enough to know that we’d just want to turn around and come back to the parking lot.

Other farms have produced similar outcomes. I remember thinking once that we had to find SOMETHING. So we picked out this tree filled with dry needles, dead bugs, bits of ice, bat nests, etc. Some gentleman helped me put it on the "shaker," a vibrating machine which would shake it clean. I let go of the tree to put on my gloves as the machine kicked into gear, unfortunately showering tree debris all over my helper.

"I don’t work here, ya know!" he said angrily, letting go my tree. He was just doing a favor helping me to get it on the machine, he thought. Well, they say no good deed goes unpunished. Sorry about that.

Tomorrow we’re supposed to try yet another tree farm in the Ann Arbor area. I’m trying to talk my sister-in-law into just getting together and going out to Bob Evans instead. Maybe we’ll just hang a wreath this year.