As I Kicked Off My Flip Flops

Look at that. Look at that! Is that not a feast for December eyes? This is what came in my CSA bag yesterday (the last one until next May). It was so heavy that, out of curiosity, I came right home and weighed it. Fourteen pounds. Cost me 25 bucks. That averages out to $1.78 per pound, for fresh, local, organic, seasonal food. And folks say eating this way is unaffordable?

I left this basket on my kitchen table all day yesterday, like a still life, and I tell ya', no red and green display of holiday lore could have made me happier. Or so I thought.

But then, last night we got our Christmas tree (and it is the first time in my life that I got a Christmas tree while wearing flip flops, I might add), and no, we didn't chop down a Leyland Cypress at a local tree farm this year (as we have the past two years). But as we were driving home with our Douglas Fir, no doubt from clear across the country in Oregon (where 80% of all U.S. Christmas trees originate), my kids reminded me of how we also cut down a little Charlie Brown tree the last two years, really nothing more than a tiny shoot with a few tufts of needles, and frankly, that they missed it this year.

And so you know, of course, what we did next. We pulled over at the first site of scrub brush on the side of the road. By the power lines. Where we had found the wild blackberries and morning glories during our two-part harmony walks to camp this past summer. And we spread out among the little tiny saplings until we found the one that "talked to us." And we pulled it up by its roots and brought it home and planted it in a pot and sat it on a coffee table in the living room.

While I was stringing lights on the big tree, my kids disappeared. They returned about twenty minutes later, with a song they had written, and they performed it for me. My older daughter was the Big Tree. My younger one was the Little Tree. The words went like this:

(Little Tree)

I am just a little tree
Some even call me scrawny
I might be small
But that ain't all
I got spirit

(Big Tree)

Back in my prestigious land
Where all the best decor is planned
I am the true heir
To the best holiday lair
I got more than you

It goes on and on, with the trees arguing back and forth until they finally work together, in the spirit of Christmas.

As I kicked off my flip flops, chomped on an apple from the CSA box and basked in the glow of the Christmas lights, I had to agree. It all somehow works together. In the spirit of Christmas.

As I Kicked Off My Flip Flops