by Growing up, my father would wait until Christmas Eve to put the tree up. Everybody I knew had their tree up and decorated a week or two before Christmas. Why my father would wait until the last minute, I don’t know. He was brought up Southern Methodist, but when he met my mother he converted to the Anglican Church. I think he didn’t like the commerialization of Christmas. To him, it was a Holy day. After we put the tree up, my father would have the family sit around the tree, turn the colorful bulbs on, and he would read the Nativity story from the Bible.
Every Christmas I would beg my mother for a Barbie doll. But I wasn’t allowed to have one. My father forbid it. Finally, at the age of 11, I got my first Barbie doll. The following year, I grew out of dolls.
My family would have Christmas dinner at my father’s parents house. I liked visiting my grandparents home in Kentucky, especially in the winter. It was warm and cozy with a fire roaring in the fireplace. Lawrene Welk would be playing on the TV. They had an artifical Christmas tree that was silver aluminum with blue lights. I could never understand a fake tree. We always got a real tree. After a week or two, it would always dry out and fir needles would fall making a mess. It was always sad to see it dumped on the curb, silver tinsel clinging like a tattered reminder that it was once a Christmas tree.