The Christmas tree is a big deal at our house. It always has been. My family has ignored or underplayed a wide variety of Christmas traditions, up to and including a belief in the divinity of Christ, but go without a tree? Never happen.

Why this should be true is something of a mystery. Maybe it's our way of celebrating the seasonal cycle of life that becomes stark and visible when winter comes and everything but the evergreens seems to shut down completely. It's also the least directly religious of the various icons in our living room (no matter how you slice it, the creche and the menorahs are pretty darned theistic) and it's somewhat relaxing not to have to confront the many, varied, and occasionally downright contradictory religious beliefs that exist within the family. There's also the undeniable aesthetic appeal: Christmas trees smell good, they're an appealingly regular shape, and they provide a handy place to display beautiful colored lights and other decorations.

On the whole, however, I suspect that our tree is important because we say it's important. When I was a boy, it was something all four of us did together; Dad might be traveling for the office for most of December, and David and I might be overscheduled with basketball practices or play rehearsals, but we would by god reserve one night for all of us to go out, pick a tree, set it up, and decorate it. To emphasize this singular commitment, Mom got into the habit of buying each member of the family an ornament; it's a habit she indulges still, meaning that every year our tree is more crowded than the last. Most of these ornaments have our names on them, along with the year they first appeared on the tree, and each has some personal connection to the life of the recipient that year. In 1986, for example, Kelly and I received a joint ornament: two small figures snuggling in a bed bearing the legend "Our First Christmas Together." In 1991, I started my teaching career at Pine Forest Senior High School, where I was also the varsity (read: only) soccer coach; Mom therefore gave me a small Snoopy with a soccer ball. Taking such ornaments out of the box is therefore a ritual that takes us back to all the previous Christmases, and all the familial emotions we recall from the year before, and the year before, and the year before; the buildup of sentiment is not merely additive, but exponential.

Many of my ornaments are, naturally, birds. My first ornament, a silver wooden die-cut bird with "P.C. 1964" painted on it, always hangs near the top, where I can see it easily, because it carries so much sentimental value with it. My sons and my wife know how important it is to me to put that bird on the tree. I hope they also know how important it is that they be there to watch me do it.

There are relatively few solid foundations in our modern American life; I'm not one who can easily place trust in a government or a church. But I can, and do, reach to the top of the tree every year and hang my bird, secure in the knowledge that the people I love are around me, whether in the flesh or in spirit, as they stand before their own trees hanging their own ornaments. There I stand; I can do no otherwise.
12:14 PM

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