Un-decorating a tree is sort of like that accounting term, LIFO (last in, first out). The last decorations to go on the tree have to come off first. For us, that's always been the tinsel.
As far back as I can remember, tinsel was considered a disposable decoration. Before Christmas, you bought a box or two of the very inexpensive thin silvery strips; had the usual argument over tossing handfuls at the tree versus carefully placing it one strip at a time; then, when the holiday was over, pulled off the tinsel and dropped the tangled mess in the trash before carefully removing the "real" decorations and packing them away for next year.
Until a couple years ago... when I went out to buy tinsel and couldn't find any. No one was stocking it. No one seems to know why. Had it fallen out of favor with the younger crowd? Been declared a health risk? Could only be imported from some country we'd stopped speaking to? No answer. So we decorated the tree without tinsel that year, and it never seemed quite finished to me.
Some of you may remember, we lost my dear mum-in-law, Eleanora, in the fall of 2010. Mama was a woman who had known real hardship and she never took having anything for granted. She was the lady who washed and re-used aluminum foil, saved the wrapping paper off gifts she received, and usually tucked away the gift for "someday".
As her only family, everything that was hers came to us. This included her Christmas decorations, most of which she'd not put up in years. Last Christmas, we divided the fragile glass ornaments between our home and her grandchildrens', so everyone could have memories of her on their tree. Then we found a long, thin, soft, wrapping of tissue paper. Inside, carefully laid out so it wouldn't tangle, was a lovely pile of tinsel. Mama hadn't bought a new box every year like the rest of us. As always, she saved what she had and used it again.
So that's what we did. Last year, Mama's tinsel graced our tree, and was carefully packed away again when Christmas was over. And it was Mama's tinsel I was carefully removing last night.
Eleanora Leszczuk knew that you took care of what you had, instead of blinding assuming there would always be more.
She was a very smart lady, don't you think?
Groaner of the Day: A man rushes into a vet's office, carrying the limp and lifeless body of his beloved pet gopher.
The vet takes the animal and puts it on an examination table. After examining the limp form, the doctor tells the man that his pet, regrettably is dead.
The man, clearly upset and not willing to accept the obvious, demands a second opinion. So the vet goes into the back room and comes out with a Black Labrador.
The dog sniffs the body, walks from head to tail, and finally looks at the vet and barks. The vet looks at the man and says, "I'm sorry, but the Lab thinks he's is dead too."
The man is still unwilling to accept that his beloved pet is dead. So the vet brings in a Siamese cat and puts the cat down next to the gopher's body.
The Siamese sniffs the body, walks from head to tail, poking and sniffing the gopher's body and finally looks at the vet and meows. The vet looks at the man and says, "I'm sorry, but the Siamese thinks he's dead, too."
The man, finally resigned to the diagnosis, thanks the vet and asks how much he owes. The vet answers,
$650.00."
"$650.00 just to tell me that he's dead?!" exclaims the man.
"Well," the vet replies, "I would only have charged you $50.00 for my initial diagnosis. The additional $600.00 was for the Cat Scan and the Lab Tests."
(ouch)
