Oh Christmas Tree!

I know for certain that this card was 1984 because I dated it.

We always have a real tree. I know a lot of people have gone to using artificial trees and I understand all the reasons for doing that, but I'm just not there yet. One of the big objections to cut trees is the fuel it takes to truck them all over the country. Living right here in the land of Christmas trees (Oregon produces more Christmas trees for commercial sale than any other state) I don't feel any guilt about that. We usually try to go to a tree farm and cut our own tree, so we provide the transportation, and now we live very close to a lot of tree farms, so we don't need to carry it very far. This year our financial advisor gave each of his clients a tree. He owns a small tree farm. It's a beautiful tree—a noble fir. What a nice thing to do. I appreciate it much more than the calendars or pens he usually sends out.

When we lived in Ashland, when I made this card, we usually got a permit from the Forest Service to cut a tree on Forest Service land. This was generally up in the mountains in the snow and was a fun day for our family. We'd take X-country skis and sleds and a saw and sandwiches and thermoses of hot chocolate and head for the hills. Skiing into the silent forest was magical, especially if we were lucky enough to be out on a sunny day that made everything sparkle or if we were skiing through gently falling snow. Once we found our tree, digging down into the snow to be able to cut it close to the ground was work, as was hauling it back to the car. I was always surprised at how much bigger the tree looked inside our house than it did out in the forest!

The smell of a freshly cut douglas fir or noble fir instantly brings back memories of those snowy trips to the forest. Maybe that's why I resist the idea of an artificial tree. Besides those artificial trees are too perfect. I need a flat side to face the window.