One Christmas morning the family went skiing (this was our tradition) and my mom stayed behind to “clean up Christmas.” That was code for I’m going to put it all away. As in, when we returned, any indication of Christmas was put away in storage. (She has always been a woman of action.)
With all the décor stored, the only thing remaining was the tree.
She had a brilliant idea. “I could just feed this tree slowly into the fireplace and then EVERYTHING from Christmas would be put away.” She maneuvered the tree into position and started to slowly feed the tree into the fireplace. It seemed like the plan was working. But then, in an instant, she realized the plan was NOT going to work AT ALL. There was a moment of panic and a moment of decision.
You see, the dry needles on the tree were burning faster than the trunk of the tree and the fire was burning the tree faster than she could push it into the fireplace. The details are sketchy – but in the end there were only 3 quarter-sized burns in the carpet.
Thank you mom for being exactly you. Happy Mother’s Day!