Christmas

Dear Santa,

How are things where you are? I know it’s been a while since I last wrote to you, but I have run out of options and I am turning to you and your elves to make this little gardener’s Christmas wish list become a reality.

I don’t know if you’ve had a chance to keep up with your reading, but a few posts ago, I wrote about the lack of G on HGTV. Far be it from me to tell you how to do your job, but you may want to consider a stocking full of coal for the network’s naughty executives. They have not been kind to the gardening population — and, in fact, they have not responded to my letter requesting more G shows.

But if you would like to avoid coal, might I suggest sprinkling them with some inspiring Christmas magic so they may wake on Christmas morning like a renewed Ebenezer Scrooge? To help you, here are a few ideas for gardening shows that I, for one, would love to watch on a snowy winter morning.

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Part of the blogging experience is visiting other blogs – for advice, for ideas, and in the case of this post, for inspiration. I recently visited Visionary Gleam, where Jim Lewis posted “O Tanenbox, O Tanenbox,” a humorous and poignant look at his family’s Christmas tree tradition and the story of the ornaments.

I am a bit of a Scrooge when it comes to this most wonderful time of year, a fact that seems to worsen as I age. Jim’s well-written post, however, has left me thinking. A lot.

No matter how cynical I have become, the Christmas tree has always remained my favorite part of the holiday. Now, as I drive around town and peek into the windows of my neighbors and see their decorated trees, I wonder about their stories – and I reflect on the ghosts of my own Christmas trees past – long past and recent past.

There’s a handwritten sentence in the baby book my mother started for me when I was first born. There, in her cursive writing, is a brief sentence about the moment when the love affair began: “2 1/2 years old . Really knows what it’s all about . . . He says the tree has meatballs and a star.”

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