Or was it the fact that I had a imaginary dog that should be considered? (He was a awesome dog by the way.) And how much does this scare the average parents?
Did creativity show up along with my curls when I hit puberty? Or did I have to survive high school before letting it emerge?
I do remember throwing our dog a series of five birthday parties starting when I was nine that probably caused some people to wonder about me.
My first Christmas after college, I found myself getting ready for Christmas and wondering how my tree would look hanging upside down from the ceiling.
Of course at that time, NO ONE had ever done this. But why not? After all, look how much more space there is to put presents under it! And it also seemed rather Dr Seuss like to me.
So, I sat down to figure out how I could rig that little "sucka" to stay up there. Needing inspiration, I went to the hardware store and wandered around until I found stuff to work. Nothing a lag bolt and nuts, along with a couple turnbuckles couldn't solve.
Then it was off to Home Depot to find a tree. There were dozens of couples there all doing the same thing. The man would take his knife and cut the tree open, fluff out all the branches and show it to the wife who would say it just isn't perfect.
They would seem to go through at least 5 to 10 trees before the husband would either give up or his head would explode and the wife would go back and pick one of the first ones he had opened.
The good news for me was that there were plenty of opened trees to consider. That first year, I spent quite a bit of time there just watching this all go on. Then I kept bending over and looking up at a tree trying to see how it would look hanging upside down. The Home Depot employee finally asked me what in the world I was doing.
I explained the hanging the tree upside down thing and watched him roll his eyes. He did chuckle and carry my tree out to my car for me. Even better though is the fact that for the next 12 years whenever I went into that Home Depot at any time of the year, the same gentleman would always seem to find me and ask about the tree and help me with whatever I was looking for.
And when is the last time you actually got someone to help you in a Home Depot?
The next year, I got the crazy idea of cutting down my own christmas tree. This is easier said than done living if you live in LA. My friend Geoff and I went to "a cut your own tree lot" on the edge of LA.
They touted any tree for $25. So, I swore that we were buying the biggest one there. Yes, I was young, stupid and... stupid.
We found a fabulous tree and Geoff crawled under it with a saw to cut it down. He asked if I would hold something and stuck his hand out - yes, he handed me his Rolex watch. I knew I was in LA.
The tree was so tall that it stuck out of his Forerunner by 5 feet.
What did I learn from this?
A really big tree is really heavy while lifting it to the ceiling. A really big tree is really funny. And finally, a really big tree really has lots of needles.
During the early years, I tried to rig elaborate ways to water the tree. I assumed it really needed it to survive. I tried digging a trough into the base once, an elaborate drip system another year and finally climbing up there every day to soak rags a different year.. I soon found that it wasn't needed.
It didn't work and just soaked the carpet below the tree. Since the tree is upside down, it naturally pulls its moisture into itself and it has the same life span with no water added as a regular tree sitting in water. Amazing what you learn here, huh?
Fast forward to last Christmas. I decided to let my niece and nephews decorate my tree. They had never seen an upide down Christmas tree hanging from the ceiling.
It was all worth it when my nephew walked in, stopped in his tracks and with complete sincerity asked "Where in the world do you put the star - on the top or the bottom?"
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