EVERGREEN

Each year if we are not relying on the artifice of a paper, plastic or metal tree, we are consumed with the quest for the perfect tree.

Annually you can hear couples in tree lots across North America disagreeing upon which tree is fuller, artier, prettier and how big it will actually be when it unfurls in the warmth of our homes.

My experiences for many years involved harvesting my own trees. As a child my father and our family would head to the woods, size up the best conifer and drink warm tea from a thermos as my dad felled the tree.

When I moved to the West End of Vancouver after first arriving in BC, I found the trees expensive, so again decided to ramble out to the forest with friends. We found chubby little trees that were perfect for apartments, and which filled our places with a heavenly pine scent. This was not similar to a car air freshener’s parfum.

When I worked in the North, I remember hopping into my lime green van, packing up some children and  chopping down my own prize tree.  I had never wielded an axe, and it was heavy and unyielding.  Our tree was a joy to decorate and fell out lush and green in my living room

In Vancouver the lighting of the Bentall Tree was a great highlight, and its beautiful lights sparked the night. Now that that great tree is gone, we have the beautiful Bidwell Tree by English Bay that hangs like a thousand stars against the frosty sky. One of the other long gone Vancouver events was the lighting of the Kitsilano Tree of Peace. A hundred organizations sipped eggnog and the Mayor of Vancouver turned the switch. The ceremony was to celebrate community and sharing.

The evergreen tree and its various reasonable facsimiles represent a time of the year, and the constant renewal of our hearts during the holidays.  Whatever is anxious fades, whatever gloomy forecast is made, becomes an echo, and we are for a time protected by the love and tidings of the season.