“Serving overseas as a small-town boy from America has been intense, stressful and humorous! Enjoy a light-hearted story with me from our last twenty years overseas!”
—Matt
Potted, Artificial or Live
After finishing up college, I got my first job not in a small town, but in Chicago and lived in the house of an elderly lady as her boarder. When Christmas was approaching she asked if I would go to her basement to bring up her artificial Christmas tree. I expected to find a heavy box with a picture of a pine tree on it and then lug the heavy box up the narrow steps. Instead I found a large, completely decorated Christmas tree in the corner of the basement with dusty plastic on it. After a lot of effort and scratches, I jammed the fully decorated tree up the narrow steps and shoved it through the doorway as ornaments fell off the tree. I had never thought to store a Christmas tree with the decorations left on it.
As our first Christmas overseas approached, we lived in a place where the tradition of Christmas trees didn’t really exist. The most common option to get a Christmas tree was to go to a florist and buy a little potted pine tree and decorate the 2ft twig they called a tree. When we heard that the large department store in the city center would be selling artificial trees, we got the bus and traveled there as there was no parking. We were delighted to find that they did indeed sell artificial trees and had a 6ft tall chubby one. The box was very heavy and bulky. Not until we got to the bus stop to travel back home did we wonder how to get it on the city bus. The bus finally arrived, already full of Christmas shoppers. The bus driver didn’t look happy to see us trying to get the Christmas tree box through his doorway, past him and the ticket machine and then find a seat for it. However, we managed it, and the tree had its own bench seat for the ride home. The other passengers looked perplexed, if not shocked, to see a box with an artificial tree traveling home with them. The tree lasted 20 Christmas seasons, but only had that one bus trip – thankfully!
When we are back in the States around the Christmas season we go to a local tree farm and cut our own. We prefer a large live cut tree, instead of a small potted one from a florist or an artificial one, but the important part is to remember the reason why we celebrate the season to begin with.
Something similar ever happen to you? Contact me and let me hear your story!
mattsmishaps@gmail.com Matt’s Mishaps, PO BOX 114, Grabill, IN 46741
