Traditions ... And Bears

(Source)

Though the ornaments in the picture above are all the same color, my mother had glass ornaments of many colors, the picture reminds me of when I was nobbut a lad. You'd also have to take away the little lights and just leave the bigger ones, which would again be multiple colors, but it's close.

We always had a real tree when I was young. It was always interesting to see my father attempt to set the tree up in a corner of the living room so that the fullest side was forward and so that the tree itself was straight. This usually involved my Dad crawling under the tree to move the base while my Mom directed him. Straightening the tree involved string and nails.

The string would be tied to the top of the tree (or near it) and then the string would be tied to nails which would then be nailed to strategic locations just below the ceiling in order to get the tree to stand up straight enough for Mom's approval. Usually this would take at least two lengths of string.

Now you might think that may have looked a bit odd to have this string going from the tree to various locations at ceiling height. Not really, Mom would use the string to hang Christmas cards from. So you'd walk into our living room to see the Christmas tree in the corner with Christmas cards displayed hanging from the string. It presented a most festive aspect. At least it seemed so to me.

Another of Dad's jobs was hauling all the boxes containing the tree decorations down from the attic. From said boxes he would extract the strings of lights for the tree, which always had to be untangled. Then tested for burnt out bulbs, which in those days could be quite an adventure, if one bulb went, none of them would light up. So each bulb had to be tapped, twisted, then replaced until the entire string was lit. Then Dad would put them in the tree. Which also had to be to Mom's exacting specifications as to placement, colors, and distribution. All very important things.

Once that was all done, I believe Dad would retire to the kitchen and have a beer, or three. All the while muttering dark imprecations about the onset of the holidays, etc., etc. While he did that, my brothers and I would "help" Mom decorate the tree. But not before Mom had placed garlands on the tree which went in front of the lights and behind the ornaments. This could take some time as Mom would adjust the garland, adjust the light strands, then step back to see what it looked like.

As you might imagine the lower part of the tree received the bulk of the decorations as we weren't tall enough to reach the upper branches. We also tended to place them poorly so that the branch would droop under the weight of the ornament or simply fall off and smash itself on the floor. This always seemed to draw a sigh from Mom, we often assumed that we had just smashed some precious family heirloom when that happened. Often that assumption was correct.

Once the ornaments were all on, it was time to festoon the tree with tinsel. Again my brothers and I rather sucked at tinsel placement. Too much, too little, too close together, too far apart, we never seemed to get it right. By the time we were done it looked fine to us.

The next morning we'd get up, excited to see the tree in the living room. It always looked so much better the morning after it was decorated. What I didn't realize was that Mom would stay up half the night adjusting, moving, and redistributing the stuff my brothers and I had hung from the tree.

I learned that much later in life when The Missus Herself would do what my mother used to do. She made sure to inform me of the never-ending work that mothers do to make life that much better. At some level I know this, but I'm a guy so of course I take it for granted. It's what we men do, I suppose.

We also had window candles which, as near as I can recall, Mom would put in each window, except for those in the back of the house which faced the forest. My brothers and I would argue that we should have lights back there as well. Of course, the parental units pointed out the fact that there was no one back in the forest to see those lights except the deer, the squirrels, and the occasional bear.

Yes, I said bear.

We did eventually get the lights in the back of the house as The Olde Vermonter and I shared a room in the back corner of the house which had two windows. The window on the side of the house had a candle, we felt that the window in the back should also have a candle. Two brothers, two candles, it just seemed right. Not to mention that we'd fight over who the single candle belonged to, I claimed it as the oldest, he claimed it as it was closer to his bed. Installing a second candle obviated the need for my Dad to shout up the stairs "Would you two boys shut up and go to sleep!" Well, we'd stop arguing about the candles anyway. We found other things to jabber about when we were supposed to be sleeping.

Now, about that bear ...

One late November, early December, we were preparing to decorate for Christmas. Dad would usually go up into the forest and cut some fresh pine/fir boughs to decorate the exterior of the house. That year was no different. I do believe that I was in high school at the time.

Anyhoo, my brothers and I and were out in the yard doing something, kid things no doubt, when all of a sudden, Dad comes running down out of the woods as if his hair is on fire. And he's yelling, "BEAR!"

Now we three brothers all looked up into the woods, figuring that the bear must be chasing Dad. Nope, nothing, nada.

We all kinda looked at him and he began to tell us of the bear he claimed to have seen. At that point my Mom came out to see what all the ruckus was about.

"I was walking up through the woods where there is this downed tree, and up pops this big black furry thing. It was a bear." Dad was still panting from his ursine encounter and his run down through the woods. I knew the downed tree he spoke of, he must have ran a good three hundred yards.

Mom just kind of looked at him and said, "Probably just a big dog, geez, you make a big deal of everything."

Dad wasn't too happy that we all kinda doubted his story.

In the weeks that followed I had occasion to be up in the woods, so I checked around that downed tree. Of course, it had been a while so there were no tracks. But I did see some bear scat. Dad had indeed seen a bear.

Mom didn't believe him until she saw a newspaper article telling of the "bear seen on Craig Hill," which was just behind our house.

Wow. He had seen a bear.