A Beautiful Sight, We're Happy Tonight...

The back deck

Rem readies for warfare

Walking as the snow falls

The park by the pool

Santa lives here. Well, sometimes. With a nod to the season, Rem now includes Santa and the Grinch among the various personalities that he espouses in a given day. Rem will wake from a dead sleep, sit up in bed (usually between Craig and me) and belt out a resounding “Ho Ho Ho”. This typically wakes us from our dead sleep and we half-heartedly bid Santa a good morning.

“I smell something,” the Rem-Santa grins. I sniff, hoping to ease into the day without having to start with major diaper duty. “It’s cookies! Santa eats cookies,” Santa says with hope. And adds another “ho ho ho” for good measure. Relieved, I get out of bed and suggest that we get the girls up for school without acknowledging the request for early morning treats.

“The elves,” Santa corrects, leading the way down the stairs, his blond hair sticking up in places.

“Wake up sleepy head elves,” Santa shouts from between the twin beds before rushing into his own room to find the snow boots and jean jacket that will announce to everyone his identity.

“Feel my fluff,” Santa encourages at the breakfast table. Unwilling elves wave their hands near Santa’s face.

“Nice beard,” one of them musters. Rem nods proudly.

Later, I wander into the living room to find Rem throwing toys under the tree. “What are you doing?” I ask in a raised voice.

“You better watch out," Rem replies rushing out of the room and back in with a basket full of Duplo blocks.

“Don’t!” I warn but to no avail. The myriad of colorful plastic rains on top of the trucks and cardboard houses, the stethoscope and hammer. “Start picking this up right now, young man.”

“Ho ho ho,” Rem answers nonchalantly. “I’m Santa.” He skirts around me and returns with a stack of books. He tosses them onto the pile. Most of them hit ornaments and they spin and wave disorderedly. Rem laughs. He looks up at me.

“I’m Santa,” he says again. “And Santa puts toys under the tree.”

“Not like this,” I begin. “This is a mess. Rem, Santa, whoever you are this has to get cleaned up.”
“Ask the elves,” Santa suggests. “I don’t pick up toys.”

Rem doesn’t like the idea of Santa using the chimney. He wants Santa knocking on the door. He’d like the reindeer to land on the porch, not on the roof. And the jolly fat man must come in through the door. We are often encouraged to reinforce the use of the door.

“As I drew in my head and was turning around,” I read, “Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.”

“Ah, ah, ah,” Rem interrupts. “He came in the door. Read it right next time.”

When he sings Santa Claus is Coming to Town, (and he can sing the entire song), he sings “Santa Claus is coming in the door”. Just in case we didn’t get it.

We visited the Grove Park Inn last week to enviously admire the gingerbread masterpieces and wonder how we can fail so miserably with our graham cracker houses. Rem wasn’t impressed with the candy that no one could eat and preferred running down the wide hallways at the hotel until he spied the sleigh at the far end of the festive lobby. He could hardly contain himself as he sprinted to the sleigh, climbed aboard and grasped the reigns.

I rushed into action and sent the girls onto the sleigh for a Christmas picture. I snapped a few but Rem, busy guiding the reindeer and “ho ho ho-ing” at every passerby prevented any really nice shots. He insisted we call him Santa as we encouraged him to look my way, Miren and Lise doing their best to draw his attention away from the reindeer. People started gathering, waiting patiently for their own photo ops but Santa dug in his heels.

“Let’s go look at some more gingerbread houses,” Miren suggested, taking Rem’s arm to guide him.

“No.” He shook her off.

Lise stepped in. “Do you see all of the people waiting for their turn? They want to get on the sleigh, too.”

“This is my sleigh,” he retorted condescendingly. “They can’t get on my sleigh.”
I had to pull Santa off, kicking and screaming.

He enjoys having us sit on his lap and tell him what we want for Christmas. He reminds us that he’ll have to check his list but otherwise he is a kind Santa and pats our shoulders encouragingly. But when we broach the subject of going to see Santa he merely shrugs and answers, “Ha ha ha – I am Santa, silly.”

The Grinch is easy. All of the work goes into coaxing a sister or parent into playing the part of Cindy Lou Who or Max. Once accomplished, Rem leads his unwilling fellow thespian through various scenes from the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Rem’s finger drumming is unmatched and his study of Dr. Seuss’s illustrations render a convincing villain even if his costars’ cooing like a dove resonates with aggravated pre-teen impatience as the little Who, who is not more than two finds the merry-go-round staging frustrating after playing a scene for the fifth consecutive time. The season arrives, doesn’t it? Whatever is playing out in life, it comes. And thank God for that.

Acquiring the Tree

I’ve grown to love the indigenous Frasier firs that find their way into our home every December and dot the landscape of Western North Carolina throughout the rest of the year. Small family farms along rural roads boast rows of carefully tended trees in modest patches on steep slopes while large farms, their uniformly bold greens in various stages of growth, sweep up and over the hilly landscape. The children point out the sprinkling of “Christmas” trees on hikes in high elevations that bear the scars of hard winds and frigid temperatures pausing to imagine them adorned with lights.

We usually drive deep into Madison County on the weekend after Thanksgiving to a small, picturesque farm nestled beside a rushing stream at the bottom of the steep slope of a mountain. Amazed each time that we successfully retraced our annual tracks (always after a missed turn or two) we find the place as magical as it loomed in our memory throughout the year. Rob and Mary, donning heavy jackets and work gloves, emerge from the tiny log cabin and warmly greet us by name. The exuberant dogs that followed them from the house circle the cars ready to play. The caravan unloads: my parents are often with us and my brothers and their families sometimes follow behind. My brother, Kyle, and his family eagerly drive the four hours from Atlanta to drive two more hours to this farm – the place is that special. The children disappear into the familiar landscape, some to the rushing creek or to the small, wooden bridge that sits above it. Lise searches for a stick and begins playing with the dogs. Peanut, her favorite, receives more affection than the others when the retrieved sticks fall at her feet.

After catching up on the year and SEC football, the adults begin the gentle climb to the scattered trees along the slopes. Rob and Mary share an interest in fly fishing with Craig and we usually pause on the bridge to scout for trout and listen to detailed accounts of recent trips that often trigger memories of Craig’s similar experiences. One year Dad discovered that Rob lived in the same small town in Alabama that my parents lived when first married. We continually interrupted their tales of Enterprise -past to ask for the tall pvc pipe used to measure the trees or for assistance in felling the tree. Mary once pulled out her wreath making equipment and patiently guided the interested children and my sister-in-law, Julie, through the process. She showed the children where, on the property, they could find the holly and cedar that she weaves into the fir boughs for the wreaths.

Rob remembers that Craig and I like our Christmas trees tall and skinny and guides us to the more unkempt trees that are our favorites. The children eventually follow and the little ones get lost in the lower needled branches or in the dormant bramble of berry bushes often surprising and being surprised by rabbits. We leave birds’ nests, cheerfully discovered, in the tree and decorate around them, saving them on the mantle after Christmas as a reminder of our happy jaunt weeks after the tree is picked up by the recyclers.

This storybook place never disappoints. Once, we ignored our better judgment and risked icy roads to get to the farm during a heavy snowfall. Rob, waiting for us, helped the girls out of the car and onto a real sled with rudders (not the plastic kind that we use) and pulled them up slopes in pristine, untouched snow and ran alongside them with the dogs as they rushed down, the girls wide-eyed and laughing tiny puffs of smoke. Mary’s snow boots created a path toward the Christmas trees that Craig and I followed, awed by the depth of the mountains revealed by the snow’s presence as the bare trees on the distant rise created a 3 D affect with the contrasting white background. We lingered in the winter wonderland fantasy until, as the temperature began to drop, we remembered the roads and tied the naturally flocked tree onto the car and packed red-cheeked girls into the back seat. They waved long after the farm disappeared behind us.

The years revealed the future disappointment that would eventually befall on us. We began choosing trees that in previous years were overlooked. Rob cut for us the tops of trees too tall for anyone to want as the patch of trees that he and Mary carefully tended for years evolved into rows of stumps. We took hopeful glances at the opposite slope where the new saplings grew and asked again about the maturation rate of Frasier firs. Rob explained to Craig on the phone this year that they had nothing left of the old stand of trees and the new ones still needed to grow for a couple of years. Craig’s revelation left us feeling gloomy but not surprised.
None of my family even flirted with the idea of finding a new farm. We knew that other places would be anticlimactic and forever press a scarlet B (for betrayers) onto our breasts. Even my visiting brother’s family, after requesting a trip to the farm and receiving the devastating news, suggested a gas station parking lot as an appropriate alternative. We settled on the farmer’s market. The choice allowed us to patronize another local farm without the possibility of enjoying ourselves or not in its mountain setting.

And although our experience with the Yancey county farmer and his son proved easy and lovely, in typical Chenevert fashion, the bar sits high on its pedestal. It wasn’t until the tree stood in its corner of the living room, bright with lights and offering from its aromatic limbs the many ornaments we handcrafted over the years, did we fill with Christmas spirit and satisfaction. By the time Rem finished hanging and re-hanging ornaments and Miren and Lise carefully placed their favorites on the tree, Craig, as always, declared with conviction the tree our best tree ever. And with full hearts we all agreed.