Packaging Christmas

Empty boxes with their lids open wait to be filled. My husband’s labels on the boxes show where each Christmas decorations should be placed. Instead of Christmas music I play oldies tunes on Pandora and start to attack the tree. It is still drinking water so I hesitate for a moment pondering the scent of evergreen.

The angel is first so I unplug her and search for her box.  Next I remove the assorted ornaments, each carrying a different memory of the past, and tuck them carefully in their box. My mind drifts to my childhood and I remember my father making sure that all the tinsel was carefully removed from the tree.  It had to be hung in its package in order to be used next year.  

My husband, finished rooting in the cold attic for more boxes, joins me to remove the lights.  I have no patience for putting each of the candle lights in their correct cardboard slot. Way too fiddly for me. He gladly performs the task.  Next I attack the garden under the tree. I take out each figurine box one at a time so that the puzzle of fitting them back in the storage box is easily solved. The old lead figure skaters, Grandma and Grandpa on the bench, skiers, postman, dog, horses, and baggage man have their own bin marked “lead people”.  The new figures have styrofoam molds in which to place them.  The old gold Marx train, which a friend gladly repaired, is running for the first time in many years.  It needs a new box. The old cardboard box disintegrated into dust.

Next the assortment of Santas and manger scenes and snow globes and an army of lead soldiers march to their containers.  I don’t know why my family displayed WWI lead soldiers at Christmas but I continue the tradition.  However, I have now pulled too many boxes from the larger box and they no longer fit.  My husband comes with a new marker to relabel and stack boxes in a new arrangement.  He shakes his head, but with a smile.  I offer him the last of the sugar cookies, but we have no egg nog. I scan the house for the odd decoration that is hiding.  It never fails; we miss one.

Getting the tree from its stand is last.  I hold the tree as my husband unscrews the bolts.  Then he tugs and I hold the stand.  Water inevitably spills as the tree is released suddenly from its hold.  I remind him the trunk goes first out the door to stop a spray of needles.  He places it by the curb.  I get the broom and sweep, but a few needles will escape to remind me of Christmas throughout the coming months. Then the procession of boxes begins.  Up, up, up to their dark corner in the cold attic for next year.  

We sit back on the sofa and survey the empty house.  I am facing the window with a view of the street.  Something on the tree is catching the afternoon sun.

“Did you check the tree carefully for ornaments?” I ask.