A Free Christmas Tree Story

Last year two of my neighbors drove to the neighborhood Weigel's gas station about a half mile from our house, parked the car and walked over to the adjacent empty lot and cut down two somewhat shabby evergreens for Christmas trees. I loved them! A superb Charlie Brown tree and free to boot. I so wanted a tree like that for our family, despite the fact that my kids were not as overjoyed about the idea as I was. Plus it is true that I am not really a risk taker, and I envisioned someone calling the police and fining us hundreds of dollars for trespassing and stealing. But the idea of a free Charlie Brown tree stayed in the back of my mind all year, and often when I drove by the empty lot, I noticed a number of likely prospects.

In early December we called Mary and ask her if she wanted us to wait to get the Christmas tree till she got home just a week before Christmas, or go ahead and get it early. She wanted us to wait. So I nobly tabled my ideas about the "free" tree so we could do our usual drive north for a tree hunt with pictures, videos--interviews of trees and the tree hunters, and hot spiced apple cider or hot chocolate after the hunt. (Walking over to a vacant lot on a busy street and cutting down a tree was definitely not a Mary kind of activity.)

The day after Mary arrived, we drove off to the tree farm complete with video camera, digital camera, gloves, scarves, water bottles, extra coats just in case, ropes and Christmas CDs. And Stephen started to cough and wheeze. I said to him in my not-very-happy voice, "Have you been taking your Singular? Do you have some at home? Have you completely run out? Because if you don't have any we are going to the doctor's since I don't plan on you dying of an asthma attack this Christmas, thank you very much!" I asked all these questions at once in a rather shrill voice to preempt his usual evasive answers. Turns out he did not have any at home and so had not been taking any for several days, but he did have some at his apartment, which was on our way to the tree farm. So we detoured off the interstate over to 17th Street and Forest Ave.

As we turned onto Forest Ave, there were a bunch of Christmas trees thrown by the side of the road directly in front of Stephen's apartment. My heart started to beat rapidly, and I exclaimed wildly, "There are Christmas trees!" I wanted desperately to run over and grab one or possibly two and throw them on the car, but I restrained myself thinking that we must do the traditional tree hunt because that is what Mary would want to do. Stephen said they weren't actually Christmas trees, but the tops of some very tall pines that the city had topped. We went into the apartment, and after a modest amount of picking up and straightening Stephen's room and enjoining him to be more neat we headed out the door with the Singular. And there, much to my surprise, were Mary and Dad tying one of the trees on the top of the car!! And I was so happy.

So we joyfully headed back home wondering if there were somewhere we should stop to blow the $40 we just saved. I was all for keeping our forty bucks, but then noticed the new Earth Fare that had recently opened in the east part of Knoxville. I love Earth Fare. So we veered on over. We walked in to the produce section and found the usual little open trays of free samples: pineapple, apples, and–apple cider! So we all got our (several) little cups of free apple cider feeling like surely the world was tilting to just the right angle that day. We picked up some bottles of Tazo pomegranate green tea, some dried cranberries, huge delicious dates, and crispy pea pods, and we tried out a variety of yummy lotions and potions for our dry winter hands.

When we arrived home, we put up the tree only to find that it was the best Christmas tree ever.