Christmas and Valentine's Day and Gifts of the Heart

It was December 1962, my first Christmas as a wife. My husband worked two jobs to support us while I finished my senior year at the University of Oregon. I had $25.00 a week to feed both of us three meals a day.

My husband's two best friends were drafted into the Christmas tree hunt on that first Saturday. We hiked through snowy fields to find the perfect tree. While my husband might have had an idea of what my idea of the perfect tree was, I know the two friends accompaning hadn't a clue.

I was looking for perfection.

We trekked over the hills through snow that in drifts was several feet deep their gentle teasing about being in the next county or maybe state constant after the first fifteen minutes.

Finally I found just the ‘right’ one. It grew out of the side of a hill (no, the one a few hundred yards away on the flat ground would not do). With effort they cut it down and we started the return trip back to the car which was an ordeal of its own.

It took all three of them to muscle my tree up the stairs and into our apartment. To my chagrin, what looked to be the right size out in the fields was not the right size for the living room. I’d figured wrong.

Again, they teased and joked about sending me out of the apartment until they got it set up (I was hovering, worrying that they'd cut off too much). Finally they hacked enough off to stand it up on the tree stand they fashioned from scrap wood. Furniture had to be moved, end tables stacked on top of each other as the tree took over the living room area.

I'm writing this 49 years later but still feel lighter, more joyful just writing about that perfect Christmas tree, remembering how the whole apartment smelled like a forest, how I sat and stared for hours at my tree. Decorations, while nice, weren't necessary because my perfect tree was spectacular in its natural splendor. I was in alt.

We'd budgeted carefully since September so we’d have a little extra for Christmas. After buying a box of candy for my family and sending a box of greens to his, we had $15.00 ‘extra’. My husband claimed it for himself. I had my tree. He wanted a bottle of Jim Beam.

The weekend before Christmas, my husband handed me a brown paper bag with a gruff ‘here’. I was perplexed. We’d agreed we couldn’t afford to give each other gifts and I did have my tree.

Curious, I opened the bag and in that moment I knew without a doubt, I was loved. My husband, a man of few words but a very hard worker, bought himself a pint of JB so I would have lights for my tree.

Valentine’s Day is coming up. It doesn’t take a lot of money to show someone you love them, that they are important, special people in your life.

I’d like to hear how you want that special someone to ‘show’ you how special you are, how loved you are. If you comment AND leave your email address so I can easily and effortlessly contact you, you’ll be entered in the drawing for a $10.00 gift certificate for Moonstruck chocolates.

Judith
www.JudithAshleyRomance.com
www.JudithAshley.blogspot.com

© Judith Ashley, 2012. All rights reserved.