Mom’s Little Tree

Today, December 6th is the 26th anniversary of Mom’s death but I promise this isn’t going to be a sad or sappy post. It really is hard to believe that it’s been 26 years. That’s a crazy amount of time, especially since my memories are still so fresh and vivid. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think of her or where something twigs a memory. This is especially the case around Christmas, and not just because she passed away three weeks before the holiday, but because she epitomized what Christmas was all about.

Mom was an incredibly kind and loving woman. She gave you everything she had and as a Mom of five kids all born within nine years of each other, I don’t think any of us really appreciated what she did and what she sacrificed until we were much older and had kids and responsibilities of our own. We never had much money, we weren’t poor, but we certainly weren’t rich, yet my parents, especially Mom made it work. She could calculate almost to the penny what the grocery bill would come out to, and in fact, I think it became a bit of sick game. I was usually the one who went grocery shopping with her, and I remember well the delighted smile that would slowly spread across her lips when the cashier would ring in the final item.

“One dollar and forty-five cents under! Those day-old pork chops were even a better bargain than I thought! We’ll just have them for dinner tonight with some homemade applesauce. How does that sound?”

Of course, it sounded great. I loved pork chops and applesauce and would inevitably spend the next four hours walking around the house doing my Peter Brady impression from the Brady Bunch. “Poorck Chawps and apple sauccce”. We’d go home and I’d help her put away all the groceries and we’d chat, and she’d answer all the questions my little five-year-old brain could throw at her. She never shooed me, or shooshed me, or told me to go find something else to do. Never. We were a great team my Mom and me.

As the youngest, she’d truck me along with her everywhere she went, especially when all the other kids were in school or not yet old enough to babysit. I never minded, and most times given the choice of running errands with her or staying home with my siblings, I’d choose to go with her. I enjoyed our alone time and besides, if I’d stayed home, my older brothers would have just bothered me and put my sister and I in a room and made us fight until one of us cried. I always cried first because my sister was three years older and much taller and would wrap her gangly legs around me and hold me down, and I hated being held down, so I would just lose my shit. My brothers would egg me on just so they could watch me lose my shit and when she did finally let go, I’d come up swinging like the Tasmanian Devil. So, you can understand why most often, I’d go with my Mom. Things were much calmer.

My Mom was a seamstress and had her own home-based business before home-based businesses were even a thing. One of my favourite places to go was our local fabric store, a hole in wall place atop the local bowling alley. The owner was of European decent and had a thick accent, which most times I could barely understand, so I just did a lot of nodding with my head. He reminded me of a tailor you’d see in a Disney movie, the ones with the tape measure draped around his neck, wearing suit pants and a vest, with a violet coloured dress shirt underneath. Cleanshaven, his thick black hair was combed straight back revealing a large forehead that danced up and down every time he smiled. I think his name was Fernando or something along those lines but I can’t quite remember.

Mom and I would go in, and he’d immediately swoop me up in his arms and give me a hug and a kiss on the top of my head, then set my little toddler butt on top of the gigantic cutting table in the middle of the store. (I’ve always had a crazy photographic memory when it comes to memories of places and things etc. and can recall events from way back when I was about sixteen months old. Names are a little bit harder). Anyways, I’d sit on the table while Mom would browse around the store looking at material for her latest projects. When she was done, they’d stack all the bolts on the table beside me and Fernando would get to work. Mom would tell him how many yards she needed, and he’d fling that bolt out to the other end of the table and start counting. It was fascinating to watch. My favorite part was cutting time. He’d get to the required length, then take the scissors and literally just run them along the fabric, not even closing the handles once. Mom would just look at me and smile. She knew it was my favorite part, and she also knew we’d be discussing it the entire way home. Once Mom had all she needed, Fernando would give me another hug then swoop me off the table and back to the ground. He’d hand Mom her bag of material, and we’d be out of the store and off to our next adventure. My Mom and me.

As I said, Christmas was a special time at our house. Mom wasn’t one to decorate the entire house, but we did have a real tree each year and a long list of traditions. Cinnamon buns and coffee cakes, all homemade of course, lots of cookies and Nuts and Bolts. I just remember the two of us in the kitchen baking away or being in her bedroom wrapping presents. She’d hand me an unwrapped present in a box or a plastic grocery bag, and I’d wrap it and then ask what to put on the tag. And she’d say, “To Tricia, Love Mom and Dad”. Yes, my mother got away with getting her youngest child to wrap her own presents. Genius.

One of the best traditions came to life when we moved from our childhood home to the home I live in right now. The living room sits up quite high and it was Mom’s idea to get a little three foot or so artificial Christmas tree to put in the window. She wanted to model it after the Christmas trees they use to decorate at our old church. The church itself dates from the late-1800s and has these gorgeous stained glassed windows, and thick wooden pews that show the wear of many a bottom being sat there every Sunday – mine included. Needless to say, it was a beautiful space.

The “Little Tree”

On Christmas Eve, they would adhere tall candles to the ends of each pew and besides the white lights of the Christmas tree, the whole service was conducted by candlelight. It’s hard to describe the absolute beauty and magical feeling of the Christmas Eve candlelight service, but that’s what Mom was going for when she created her “Little Tree”. Just like the tree at church, her tree would have white lights and white decorations with a few splashes of red in the form of cranberry bunches and apple decorations. No tinsel, no bows, or ribbon. Nothing fancy, just the beauty of an old time Christmas.

And boy did she nail the magic. I remember the first time we turned it on in the dark, we both started to cry a little because there was just a transcendence in its beauty. Traditionally, the tree would go up on December 1st no matter what. We had a larger tree downstairs as well, but it never went up until closer to Christmas as well as all the other decorations. Many nights before bed, Mom, Dad and I would just sit in the living room and stare at the Little Tree. Sometimes we didn’t even speak, we just enjoyed the spirit of the season and the wonderous charm of this little beauty.

Mom went into the hospital on November 26, 1994. She’d been sick for so long by then and she was supposed to just be going for a blood transfusion but looking back, I think she knew she’d never be back. I took her that day and I remember as we went out the front door and walked down our front pathway, she paused a little and looked back at the house, as if to say goodbye. Her walk was slow and deliberate, a body battled way beyond her 53 years.

“You’ll put up my Little Tree, right? Promise?” she said as I helped her into the car.

“You’ll be home in plenty of time to help me Mom.”

“Just promise me you’ll put up it up, no matter what.”

“I promise.”

She didn’t say anything more and at the time, I didn’t think anything of it. I remember every single one of those days she was in the hospital. It is agonizing to watch your hero, your most precious person, slowly drift towards death, one minute at a time. After the first few days, it was clear that she wasn’t coming home again. She was tired. She was done. She sat my Dad, sister, and I down in her hospital room and asked us if it was okay if she didn’t fight anymore. That she had given it her best, but that she just didn’t have the strength to fight anymore. That was probably one of the hardest days of my life, and at twenty-four years old, I’d already had my share of hard days.

Of course, we said yes, she could stop fighting. What else could we say? We all just sat there and hugged and told each her how much we loved her. We came home that night, and I knew it was time to call my brothers, who all lived out of town, and let them know that this was it. Mom wasn’t going to make it until Christmas. Days passed and she drifted into a coma as we took turns sitting by her side. The house was a blur of people and casseroles and tears. December 1st passed, and her Little Tree still sat in its box in the basement. I just couldn’t do it.

She died on a Tuesday at 4pm. I wasn’t there to hear her last breaths, but my brother was. He’s often wondered why it was him that was there and not me, just being that I had been there so much for everything else. I have no answers, but I think Mom spared me and my Dad that pain on purpose. Our journey together had already been so long and difficult, so much pain and sorrow, and I think she knew the road ahead was going to be rough. She was right on that count.

Her funeral was on the Saturday and by Sunday night, everyone has cleared out, and there was just my Dad and I left at home. God it was quiet. I sat in the living room on the couch she’d spent so many days resting on and just stared out the window, tears streaming down my face. I was angry. I was heartbroken, and nothing anyone can say or do could console me. Things were not going to be okay. Things would never be the same. Mom was gone. There was no more “Mom and me”, it was just me. And I had no idea how I was going to move forward.

“You’ll put up my Little Tree, right? Promise?”

The thought of putting up her Little Tree all by myself was gut-wrenching. We always did it together. There was no way I could do it. I just wasn’t strong enough. Maybe next year or maybe never again. At that point I had no idea.

“You’ll put up my Little Tree, right? Promise?”

Her voice just kept echoing in my head. She would understand if I didn’t do it wouldn’t she?

“You’ll put up my Little Tree, right? Promise?”

I saw her walking away from the house and looking back one last time.

“You’ll put up my Little Tree, right? Promise?”

Maybe I’d just go get the box and bring it upstairs and see how I felt.

“What cha’ you doing kid?” my Dad asked as he heard me rustling in the storage room.

“Getting out Mom’s Little Tree. I haven’t decided whether or not to put it up yet.”

“Want me to come up with you?”

“No,” I said. “If I do it, I think I just need to do it by myself.”

“Remember how picky she’d be about where all the lights should go. They had to be so even.”

Dad lit up when he talked about her, even in his tremendous grief. God, he loved that woman. I knew in that moment what I had to do, and it wasn’t about me and my pain, but about helping to ease the pain of that wonderful man and to continue the traditions we held so dearly as a family. There would be comfort there.

I put up her Little Tree that year and every single year since. I cry my eyes out every time, but I get it done. And as our family has expanded, each child or expanded family member is told the significance of that tree and how much it meant to Grandma and now Great-Grandma Joyce, and how much they all mean to her. That her love and her spirit lives within them. The twinkle of the lights against the night is the twinkle of her eyes saying I love you to each and everyone of them.

In her honour, I’ve done my very best to carry on the traditions that she instilled in our family. In many ways, I’ve sort of become the matriarch, stepping into her shoes. I do it all not only because I love to, but because I love them, and I want them to know what a special and wonderful lady she was, and how her and my Dad gave so much to all of us. We are one lucky bunch. Her spirit is everywhere.

This year, being what it is, I put up her Little Tree, but I wasn’t going to put up the big tree or decorate the downstairs like I normally do since our family Christmas weekend had to be cancelled because of the pandemic, and it was just going to be me here to see it. Then last Tuesday we had a snowstorm, and you all know I love a good snowstorm. I took the day off work because road conditions were terrible and to be honest, I just didn’t feel like working. I went up close to my big living room window to watch the snow and a flash of red caught my eye in the bush below. Here snuggled up close to the house, sheltering from the storm was a cardinal.

I’m not really a religious person but I am a spiritual one and I have no idea why I picked that moment to go look out the window, but I did. And there was the cardinal. Now, in the spiritual world a cardinal symbolizes a visit from heaven, and let’s you know that an angel is near. As soon as I saw it, I started to chuckle. Mom was paying me a visit and sending me a message, and I took that message to mean, get my butt downstairs, put up the big tree and decorate the rec room. We have traditions to keep.

So, I did. Because let’s be honest, you don’t want to mess with any messages from my Mother. And I’m so glad I did because the room is so full of warmth and love and Christmas spirit. It is full of my Mom. It is full of my Dad. It is full of the love they had for each other and the love they have for all of us. It’s a whole lot less lonely around the house right now. It amazing how memories can fill the void.

Today as I honour her memory and celebrate her, I will continue with traditions. I will bake some cookies and make her world-famous brownies. I will sing a few verses of Edelweiss (another story) and maybe even wrap a present to myself. Tonight, when the world goes dark, I will sit on the living room couch and stare at her “Little Tree”. I will cry and that’s okay. Because I love her, and my heart aches for her.

I will bask in the glow of her Little Tree and I will embrace the warm hug she sends in its radiance. The tears in my eyes will only enhance the twinkle of the lights and I know she’ll be looking down on me and smiling.

“You kept your promise. That’s my girl. I knew I could count on you. Thank you.”

No thank you Mom. Thank you.

Love you forever.

PS – I got some new glasses this week. You’d like them. They make me look sassy.