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OKAY, SAID MY WOODSMAN YESTERDAY, WE CAN GO FOR THE TREE at three o'clock tomorrow.

And I said, "Not a moment later! It gets dark so early, and it could be snowing!"


(The weather forecast was heavily hinting at the possibility).

At one o'clock today, my woodsman called me from his office and asked me if I was still planning on going for a tree, considering the snow and rain mixture falling from the sky. He's always taken the tiniest bit of a bah-humbuggy attitude about this whole yule-tree fetching process. Or let's just say he's not so enamored of tramping all over the entire tree farm, finding a perfectly shaped tree of the perfect height and perfect width with a perfectly straight tip-top branch and the greenest and thickest needles and no odd gaps in the branches. Oh, good grief, I'm not that persnickity about the tree. But, yes, I told him yes, we should get it today. You know that the tree farm is only open weekends.

So off we went at just a few moments past three o'clock, and now the precipitation was all lovely snow. By the time we arrived at the tree farm, it had lavishly decorated the trees, covering up flaws and making them all seem enchantingly beautiful. But the friendly man who had raised these trees, lovingly pruned and shaped them and joyfully offered them to customers each year had passed away just months ago. His widow was leaving the house as we arrived and told us this. "The farm is closed," she said sorrowfully. "I trimmed a few of the trees, but my heart just wasn't in it."

But then she added, "You're welcome to go ahead and look. If you find one you like, you can leave the money on the porch."

Well, I knew that if my woodsman walked down to look the trees over, we wouldn't be leaving there without one. And especially now that I thought of the trees as slightly orphaned, I was sure that I, too, could find one I'd be willing to take along home.



And in record time that woodsman was crying, "Timber!" Or perhaps he was saying, "Will you grab that side of the tree and pull it toward you, so it falls that way?"


Considering how his woodsmanly duties are performed not much more than one time per year, he did a fantastic job wielding that saw.

And then the dragging and loading went rather well, as well.







And before you know it, we had ourselves a Christmas tree standing freshly and greenly in our living room. Although, you weren't here to hear the woodsman say, "What?!! If I bring it inside now, you're going to have a real mess on your hands! This thing is wet! And I'm going to have to trim off a lot of the lower branches!"


So in reality it was several hours later when the tree was actually hoisted upright into the stand...fresh and green, but not so perfectly shaped. And that's when someone was heard to say, "Hmm...how did I miss seeing that the top branch veers off at such an odd angle? Uh, keep turning the tree--look at that great big gap in the branches. I think there's only one good side!"

Well, it's a lovely tree! The snow may have covered up its flaws, but it also speeded up the Christmas-tree garnering process (pleasing the woodsman), and it gave the whole expedition a very Christmasy touch (pleasing me immensely). In fact...I think it may be true...it seems a bit strange, but, hmm...yes, I believe the snow may have covered up some of the flaws of the woodsman and me, too. How enchanting is that?

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