Ah, and the Decorating Continues ...
Two of the Christmas trees are up. The little trees in Patsy’s bedroom and mine are still huddled with their limbs folded about them in their boxes. But a good deal got done over the weekend. Patsy had the ubiquitous bronchitis or flu or whatever the fashionable word is right now for the common cold. She spent most of the decorating time languidly waving her lace-edged handkerchief to indicate where I had left a bare spot on the tree. Isn’t it wonderful how the onlooker can spot them immediately while the elf with her head in the tree has only scratches to show for her effort?
Now, I’m going to start on the creche. These are unglazed figures of the manger scene that Doug bought for me in Mexico years ago. I love them all, even though the largest figure in the grouping is El Toro, taller than St. Joseph, taller than the Wise Men. Ah well, whoever crafted these wanted to be sure future generations did not miss the majesty of the bull. We don’t. He looks as if he had wandered in from another grouping but, like everything at my house, he goes in.
As much fun as the finished decoration is opening the boxes and finding old friends. There are ornaments that have been in there as long as I can remember, carrying with them the freight of years, good ones, bad, long ones, short ones, but just before Christmas all of the ornaments reappear.
The star sweepers have been discovered. They aren’t up yet because Patsy has been too ill to climb the ladder, and I can’t with my knee. They look very spruce because Patsy made them new clothes this year. All those years of hanging from the ceiling in front of the fireplace had given them an advanced case of tattle-tale gray. They were bought for me for my 18th birthday by Galt Bell, who was the producer and director of “The Drunkard,” where I worked for 12 years. They are aged, endearing and really quite perky in their new overalls. They are dolls with yellow feathers for hair and stand about 7 inches tall.
As always, I broke a favorite ornament. This one was a snowman with a carrot nose and a shiny top hat. The trouble with breaking ornaments is twofold: in the first place, they are wickedly expensive but most importantly, they cannot be duplicated. I think they must make ornaments by computer now. (A nice young man from the computer company made a house call today. This is the first time I have ever seen the whites of the eyes of any of the relatives of this computer and that was nice. I tossed that in the midst of this Christmas tree column to remind myself that a new year is coming and with it the same old problems. Only this time, maybe one with a solution.)
All of the animals have their hats on, the ceramic cats, the dog, the goat, the polar bear and the bronze bear. They all look wonderful. Especially the Teddy Bears who seem to respond to new, bright wearing apparel more than the rest of them.
On top of the old organ, which came across the plains from Virginia with my great-grandmother’s sister, is the marble bust of the Madonna and Child, surrounded by holly swags and sparkling with votive lights.
The mistletoe ball is up in the front hall and so is the old Christmas tree from the kitchen in La Habra. This is the tree with just wooden ornaments on it. It looks marvelously at home in this hall even though it began life looking out over the swimming pool and clear down to Newport Bay, with the sun glancing off the water like golden swords in the clear winter light.
The old angel is out again. She wears a dress of glitter, sprinkled on to spray glue on the folds of her robe. Each year she tarnishes during her sojourn in the attic so she’ll have to be resprayed and silvered. I think she falls among evil companions up there. I put her away silver and she comes back black. And her hair seems thinner this year. She never had a luxuriant toss of hair but this barely covers her skull. Ah, time.
The reason we are trying to get everything up early this year is the shortness of the season but mostly because we didn’t get anything up until Dec. 20 last year and it’s so much work, we left it up until the middle of February. It did not bother us but it drove some of our friends crazy. These are the ones who know where everything is and have nothing stuffed under beds. Isn’t it nice there are so many of them so they can keep each other company? You’d think that would keep them busy enough without worrying about other people.
Face the fact that there are some things you will not get done. I gave up on red bows at every window about the time I discovered cake mixes. Both changed my life for the better.
There are only 3 1/2 weeks until Christmas. Enjoy. Do not get so caught up in addressing Christmas cards and wrapping presents that you forget what it is we’re all doing, celebrating the birthday of a little boy in a stable who never heard of gift wrap. Courage, bear down, don’t get a cold. Only three more weeks.