The Tree That Ate Our Apartment
Image by Michael Bartlett from Unsplash
I still felt like decorating when we came home after the holidays, so we stopped by the Christmas tree farm to see what was left. The guys found one leaning against the fence, all wrapped in burlap except for the long, thick trunk at its base. They gave it to us for free and even loaded it onto the top of our car for us as snow began to fall.
At home, we realized the tree weighed more than we expected. We couldn’t lift it through the common stairwell from the parking lot, and instead dragged it around to the back of the building in the icy snow, where there was an entrance on our unit’s level.
Inside, we whittled the thick base down with a coping saw to fit into a stand, then stood it up only to find it was too tall for the ceiling. So we whittled it down some more until several fat slices of trunk lay scattered about. Then, when taking off the burlap, we had to jump back quickly as the bushy tree unfurled. We left it overnight to let it get comfortable.
The next morning it had expanded even more, filling the floor-to-ceiling window on the front wall of our tiny apartment. We used every ornament in the box, and made new ones to fill in the more bare parts. Once we hung some lights it looked great from the outside. But, over the next few days, as it warmed up and dried out, the tree began dropping needles.
A lot of needles. We began to find needles nestled in our clothes, on the couch, even in our shoes, waiting to annoy us at any moment.
Over the years, our plan has always been to keep a tree up until my husband’s birthday in early January, and we hoped this tree would hold on that long. Surprisingly, it did. We took the lights and ornaments down and started inching it toward the door. Needles dropped by the handful and our cat was delighted, chasing them all over the place.
Now, expanded to many times its original width, the tree no longer fit in the narrow hallway leading to our door. We would have had to lift it over the kitchen island to take it out — that was assuming we could lift it at all.
Improvising a Plan B, we brought back the coping saw. With needles flying everywhere, we sawed away until only the smallest, twig-like branches remained.
When we moved a decade later, we were still finding needles around the house.
The year after the big tree, I bought a little artificial one at the drugstore. That is the one we use to this day. It fits on a stereo speaker and when not in use, we store it in a shoe box.
Looking for more like this? Try these:
- Taking Down the Tree – Boxing Day Poetry
- A Christmas Love – Christmas Poetry
- Positivity Corner: Decorate Early for Christmas – Christmas Moods
- A Matter of Tradition – Christmas Essay
Penny Nolte
Penny Nolte is an author, artist, and educator who creates gentle, often quirky, narratives of family and place. After a decades-long break from storytelling, her new work is beginning to appear in print and online. It is included in The Avalon Literary Review and Dorothy Parker's Ashes.
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