The Special Tree

For the last four days, I simply have not been able to muster the enthusiasm to post anything, and certainly not continue my Disney trip report.  It’s hard to write about happy, positive things when something as unbelievable and horrifying as Friday’s event is on the minds of so many, including me.

Like everyone else, I reacted in my own way when I learned of the news, but I really can’t think of any way to describe my feelings that doesn’t sound insignificant compared to the feelings of those parents, friends, and family members who have had to live through it.

So, instead, I will just tell you what I did on Friday night.

After I couldn’t take anymore news and finally shut my computer off (I don’t actually watch news on TV), I went into the living room, where my six-year-old son asked me, for about the tenth time since we returned from Disneyworld, if I was going to decorate “the special tree.”  The “special tree” is a second Christmas tree that we have put up each year, in addition to our “family tree,” for the last five or six years.  This tree holds all the Lenox ornaments I’ve been blessed to receive as gifts over the last 16 or so years.

The first ornament I received was the original Lenox “Snowflake Fantasies” snowflake from 1996, a gift from a dear friend, long before either of us knew that they would put one out annually for the next 16+ years.

I love Lenox items, and when my family and friends found this out, they saw a prime opportunity for easy Christmas gifts for me.

For the first several years, I just put the Lenox ornaments on my normal Christmas tree, but eventually, I got so many, I finally had to admit that they needed their own tree.

Along with all the other Lenox ornaments I received, my friend continued to buy me the annual snowflake every year, at about $20 each, and it wasn’t until about 5 years ago that I came to realize just how valuable they were, especially the original ones.  I suspect a lot of folks began collecting them a few years after they were introduced, and then, because you know how collectors can’t stand to be missing any item from a collection, they began to look for the originals, thus causing them to increase in value.  I discovered this in January 2007, when I dropped one of the early ones while taking down the tree.  🙁  Like the lemming I am, I couldn’t not have the whole set intact, so I spent about $140 via eBay to replace that ornament that had originally cost $20. :S

And yet, that’s cheap compared to the first one, which regularly goes for $350+ on eBay!

After that experience, I became insanely protective of my Lenox tree.  Everyone in the house knew to stay far, far away when I was putting up and taking down the tree each year.  Especially young children!

This long build-up story brings me to Friday night.  Although I was not feeling much holiday cheer, I thought that it might do me some good to take my mind off sad things by putting up my Lenox tree.  So when DS#2 asked me if I was going to put up “the special tree,” I told him yes, I would.  He looked at me with his big eyes and shyly asked, “Can I help?”

I looked at him and instead of thinking about what damage he could inflict upon my ornaments, all I could think about was how beautiful and precious he was.  I answered without a second’s hesitation: “Absolutely, buddy.  Let’s put up the Lenox tree!”

He was so happy. 🙂  For the next hour, he pulled each ornament out of the box, organized them on the table, put hooks on each one, and then he very carefully put them on the tree.  He would gingerly put the hook on the tree and then tell me, “Okay, twist, mama!” (This was my cue to perform my annual ritual of twisting each hook around the branch until it was hermetically sealed for the utmost protection from the cats, who love to play underneath the tree.)

As we put up each ornament, he asked questions about them, wanting to know when they were purchased, who gave them to me, or what their significance was.  He was especially impressed with the one from 1997, when his dad and I were first married, and of course he took special pride in putting up the two ornaments dated 2006, one with baby booties and the other with a carousel horse, both indicating baby’s first Christmas.  (There are two matching ornaments to those dated 2002 for his brother.)

As we worked, he sang me Christmas carols that he was learning for his school Christmas concert just a few days away.  When he exhausted all the Christmas carols he knew, he made up his own, to the tune of Partridge in a Pear tree, only this one included things like chocolate cupcakes, Beyblades, and hockey pucks instead of the usual items. 😉

When we were done, we stepped back and admired our tree, and he was so proud of himself for being given the responsibility of putting up the “special tree.”  And all I could think of was to wonder why I had waited so long to let him help.

I know I’m not the only person hugging my loved ones tighter tonight and every night these days.  My thoughts and prayers are with those who lost their family members, and especially their precious little angels, last week.  May God grant them comfort and give them peace.