Month: August 2021

THE AFTER CHRISTMAS CHRISTMAS TREE

All the stockings are empty; all the batteries dead; the candy canes eaten; all hungry mouths fed...
It's the morning after Christmas at Number Fifty-Eight!
We'd finished with Christmas before it was eight,
but I said to Jess, "Hon' is it too late
     to put up our Christmas tree?"

"What?" exclaimed Jess.  As he walked out the door
(to go bowling with buddies), he queried "What for?"
"It was a gift", said I, "and we can't just ignore...
     so let's put up our Christmas tree!"

There are beautiful ornaments up in the attic,
not dragging them out, not being dramatic,
It's not worth the effort, just being pragmatic
     About doing a Christmas tree!

'No tree, and no in-attic crawling;
no up and down stairs with bags a-hauling;
no more pine needles falling.
     Nope, no Christmas tree!

This year we'd decided, "NO TREE"!
'cause our space was so crowded we just couldn't see
where a Christmas tree could reasonable be,
     but family, NO, Son, said "They need a tree."

So when space was cleared after doing the cards,
I said to Jess, "It won't be too hard
to set up the tree; it's been dragged from the yard
     to the house." "Yeah, we'll see," said he!"

"You find me the stand and while you go bowling
I'll set up the tree and start the ball rolling.
I'll muster up spirit, put my heart and my soul in
     to 'doing' the Christmas tree".

"Why are we doing this after the fact?
Christmas was yesterday, did you forget that?"
"Well the kids will be over and I don't want to act
     like we just 'dissed' the gift Christmas tree."

Jess left to have fun, left me to have mine
I cleared out some space, arranged for some time
to figure out starting the assembly line
     to put up the Christmas tree.

I dragged the tree up four steps from "THE ROOM"
grabbed the doorknob behind me and pulled it to,
but the latch didn't catch and the next thing I knew
     I was heels over head in Christmas tree!

Thank goodness it was a net-covered tree;
I wasn't hurt, so I sprang to my knees;
In a second attempt I found I could see
     my way to the living room with the tree.

Stuffed it into the stand, screwed in the holding screw
but when I'd let go it would suddenly spew
like a drunken sailor and that's when I knew
     that one too many branches were on the tree.

So I pulled out my saw and started to whack
first one, then another, until looking back
I could see most of the branches had now been hacked
     off our day-after Christmas tree.

What to do now, with this pile of green?
Biggest mess I'd ever seen!
I created a beautiful wreath of green
     boughs from the Christmas tree.

I then took the broom, cleaned up the mess;
When Jess came home I was relieving my stress
with a glass of NOG and preparing to confess
     to what had happened to the Christmas tree.

I don't remember what the kids said
when they came over and found the tree dead;
I do recall rationalizing, in my head
     "Christmas was over, no need for a tree".

We cleared a table and drew chairs up,
poured some eggnog in everyone's cup.
We sipped and laughed and agreed that, "Yup...
     we'd begin now to think about next year's tree!"

JESS AND IMA ON HONESTY

JESS: Hey, Ima, I’ve been noticing that the word “honesty” isn’t being spoken of much lately.

IMA: No? I hadn’t paid much attention.

JESS: Well, in our run up to the last election, and ever since then, I haven’t heard the candidates speak about honesty or integrity in themselves, or their opponents. And since the last election no one seems to be using that term, not even the ‘TV talkers’. I wonder why?

IMA: Do you think that honesty is less important these days than it used to be? I remember, as a child, being told that I should be honest and truthful; that “honesty was the best policy”; of course that was before there was such a thing as “alternative truths”.

JESS: Yep, honesty was so important a long time ago that the country even lied about how important it was.

IMA: What are you talking about, Jess?

JESS: Don’t you remember the lies told about Abraham Lincoln and the penny, and George Washington and the cherry tree? They were part of our history lessons…only to learn later in life that because somebody thought that honesty was such a great character asset it was necessary to lie about how “honest” those two presidents were.

IMA: Oh, yes, I remember when the true stories were reported. And I remember, too, that honesty had lost some respect when Jimmy Carter was vilified for admitting “honestly” about ‘lusting in his heart’.

JESS: Yeah! Well, even though today “honesty” may have lost its place in terms of positive character traits, maybe one day it will be important enough again so that our current politicos and ‘importants’ will have lies told about them too.