Shallow Relationship

Each Christmas, The Boy complains that I put up short, scraggly Christmas trees. I justify it by saying our house is small, we can't have a big tree. But subconsciously, maybe I had been choosing that neglected Charlie Brown tree.

This year, I decided to get a Christmas tree-looking tree. Without decorations, it already filled up our tree corner. I eye it suspiciously because the needles have started to fall. I've had to vacuum as soon as I put it up. It stands just a little tilted and I can't right it. I'm not sure I feel the piney smell that coniferous trees are supposed to have. I accuse it of not cooperating with me despite being good looking, but I admit, now that I have rearranged the furniture, its full tree-ness rather pleases me. It's just that I'm not sure I love it more than my spindly trees of Christmases past.

Is this sounding familiar? It's like having a handsome boyfriend who's high maintenance and not quite right for you. You do everything to accommodate him and he just doesn't behave. But you still kind of like to look at him, though you're not quite having fun with him.

So I decorate the tree, and it does look better and better. I just keep vacuuming and vacuuming its needles away. In the end, I am glad whether this is a good looking tree or a scraggly looking one, they all end up in the city compost after Christmas, mulched to indistinguishable bits that feed our spring and summer plants the following year.

Can't say the same for that handsome, useless boyfriend.