Wilsonville Spokesman Online

Surviving (another) Christmas catastrophe

Patrick Johnson maims Mary and Joseph, but lives to tell about it

• By: Patrick Johnson  
• Published: 12/22/2009 3:05:47 PM

Patrick Johnson

Each of us have burdens in life. Some are born into insane families. Others spend their lives trying to fix other people. I married a Chronic Christmas Connoisseur.

My wife loves Christmas. She plays Christmas music all year long. For two years the indoor Christmas decorations, except the tree, were up year-round.  She even bought a $500 nativity scene carved in wood with kerosene lamps built in, which sits on our mantle, right next to my Oakland Raiders helmet during football season.

Every year I try — I really do — to make it the best Christmas ever for her.

When we got engaged, I proposed right before Christmas and then waited a year so she could have the Christmas wedding she always wanted.

Another year, we entered Canby’s chamber outdoor light contest. That one ended with five stitches on my left cheek (no the other one) after sitting on a light string and a tetanus shot because I had stapled my hand to the roof. I would also like to say that falling from the roof, into mud, really doesn’t hurt that bad when two areas of your body are suffering from puncture wounds.

So far, even with two little kids, I haven’t felt added pressure at Christmas. Until this year.

All my effort is going into the Christmas tree (because I still walk from a limp from the Christmas light debacle of ’03).

Last week, we took both girls to the Christmas tree stand, and walked around, kicking the “tires” of different trees. We are Noble fir people, but this year the selection was rather slim.

“Wow, that one is tall,” my Mrs. Claus said, carrying one kid with another singing the same verse of “Oh Christmas Tree” over and over and over and over and over.

I, being a husband, took that to mean, “Pat, that’s the best tree ever, I must have it.”

So without even measuring, the Grand Fir tree was strapped to the top of our van like the Grinch stealing Christmas.

My first hint that the tree was too big came when I realized the tree was dragging on the ground in front of the van. But it was a light tree, which I had proved by picking it up. Plus, I have vaulted ceilings, so I drove home thinking it would work just fine.

When we got home, I broke out the stand, sawed off the base of the tree, trimmed some branches and grabbed the tree, heading for my front door. It would be just moments before the evergreen scent would fill our home.

We normally get a 6-foot-tree, a nice, manageable size that one person can handle. This was the first year I have gone for the “mack daddy” of trees, which is why I wasn’t really taking the length of the tree into consideration as I brought it into the house.

No sooner had tree entered the house when I stabbed my wife’s carved wooden wise man No.2 right through the crystal lamp.

Now before I go any further, you have to understand that each year reporters are invited to a local fire station, where a Christmas tree is set ablaze, demonstrating the dangers of basically having kindling covered with lights in your living room. They go up like Roman candles.

Which is why, when the wise men, Joseph, Mary and, yes, baby Jesus were falling to their doom, I wasn’t thinking of my spiritual future, but how glad I was the lamps weren’t lit.

My second thought was, “Great, I have now just covered my very expensive dead, dry tree with kerosene.”
I quickly raised the top of the tree skyward, hitting the ceiling and leaving a nice, long, green line along the white paint, pine needles, branches and nativity characters flying everywhere.

Amazingly, nothing broke: A Christmas miracle.

And as luck would have it, the top third of the tree, which was doused in flammable liquid, had to be lopped off anyway, because 25-foot trees don’t fit in rooms with 15-foot ceilings (Yes, we try to give helpful advice in the paper every now and then).

As I sit here, looking at my naked tree, I think I gave my daughters a lesson about Christmas tonight.
Think Easter. It’s easier. Plus, who doesn’t like chocolate bunnies?
 

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