I Hate Artificial Christmas Trees
and why they're wrong.
People who put up Christmas trees made of plastic or aluminum should be
dragged from their homes and beaten with the very "tree" they dare pass
off as a Christmas decoration. It is wrong, lazy, and I'm sure
punishable by eternal damnation. At least, if I were Jesus, I
wouldn't let anyone get away with putting up a half-assed knock-off
tree in their living room to celebrate my birth, despite the fact that
it makes no sense.
And come on, it doesn't make any sense. We go to the woods and chop down trees, set them up in our living rooms, and decorate them with colored lights and little botanical earrings only to abandon them anonymously in the street one month later (or, if your family is like mine, usually about three months later, when the possibility of heat from the electric lights setting fire to the now brown and dried tree becomes too hazardous). I don't see what bringing a tree into your house and decorating it has to do with Jesus, gift giving, or even the commercial "Christmas spirit" we're subjected to every year. I admit, it's a goofy tradition.
Being that it's a goofy tradition, you have to wonder what people who put up phony trees can possibly be thinking. If you're not going to get a real tree to put in your living room and dress up like a doll, just for the sake of tradition, why bother? The only reason we do it in the first place is the age-old "just because," so if you don't have the time, energy, or desire to go out and get a real tree, why is it so important that you have something resembling a tree set up? That's even goofier than the tradition itself.
The reason I love Christmas trees is the outing - the actual trip up to the woods in the snow to pick out, chop down, tag, and bag that perfect specimen of nature's majesty. The only thing that could bring me more satisfaction than chopping down a perfectly good piece of wildlife to take home and watch slowly die before throwing it away and forgetting about it, would have to be something like killing and eating endangered Giant Pandas, "even though they don't taste very good." Should I ever have a family of my own, I am definitely taking them out to get our own Christmas tree from the woods every year, even if for no other reason than it'd give me an excuse to operate a chainsaw.
Not only is there much joy to be found in owning a real Christmas tree at the beginning of the season, but also at the end. One of the most profound memories from my childhood is from the time my grandfather gathered me and all my cousins together out behind the house to show us just how fast a dead, dried up old Christmas tree could catch fire. I'm not sure what his reasons were for doing this, as the trees we always brought into our homes were green, moist, and stuck stump-first in a dish of water to quench its Christmas tree thirst, and none of us (to my knowledge) were in the habit of playing with matches around the Christmas tree (safety was of utmost importance around the presents), but not a day has gone by since that I've not dropped to my knees and thanked the baby Jesus for the wonderful sight that saintly old man bestowed on us kids that winter day. I'm still not completely convinced that he didn't sneak out before-hand and douse that tree in gasoline, because the second he flicked that single match toward it, it immediately burst into flames of a magnitude I've rarely seen since. It lit up like a... well, like a Christmas tree. It was beautiful - the most glorious thing I've ever beheld with mine mortal eyes.
So you see, Christmas trees are wonderful, funderful, magical things, but not because you fling tinsel and all the crappy ornaments your kids made in second grade all over them. Christmas trees are about the extravagance of beautiful nonsense, and dazzling destruction. Artificial trees take all this away from you, and leave you with nothing but a stupid decoration. They're ruining the holiday spirit. Take away our wastefulness, and our need to be entertained, and we might as well be left with a holiday that celebrates the birth of Jesus, or something lame like that.
And come on, it doesn't make any sense. We go to the woods and chop down trees, set them up in our living rooms, and decorate them with colored lights and little botanical earrings only to abandon them anonymously in the street one month later (or, if your family is like mine, usually about three months later, when the possibility of heat from the electric lights setting fire to the now brown and dried tree becomes too hazardous). I don't see what bringing a tree into your house and decorating it has to do with Jesus, gift giving, or even the commercial "Christmas spirit" we're subjected to every year. I admit, it's a goofy tradition.
Being that it's a goofy tradition, you have to wonder what people who put up phony trees can possibly be thinking. If you're not going to get a real tree to put in your living room and dress up like a doll, just for the sake of tradition, why bother? The only reason we do it in the first place is the age-old "just because," so if you don't have the time, energy, or desire to go out and get a real tree, why is it so important that you have something resembling a tree set up? That's even goofier than the tradition itself.
The reason I love Christmas trees is the outing - the actual trip up to the woods in the snow to pick out, chop down, tag, and bag that perfect specimen of nature's majesty. The only thing that could bring me more satisfaction than chopping down a perfectly good piece of wildlife to take home and watch slowly die before throwing it away and forgetting about it, would have to be something like killing and eating endangered Giant Pandas, "even though they don't taste very good." Should I ever have a family of my own, I am definitely taking them out to get our own Christmas tree from the woods every year, even if for no other reason than it'd give me an excuse to operate a chainsaw.
Not only is there much joy to be found in owning a real Christmas tree at the beginning of the season, but also at the end. One of the most profound memories from my childhood is from the time my grandfather gathered me and all my cousins together out behind the house to show us just how fast a dead, dried up old Christmas tree could catch fire. I'm not sure what his reasons were for doing this, as the trees we always brought into our homes were green, moist, and stuck stump-first in a dish of water to quench its Christmas tree thirst, and none of us (to my knowledge) were in the habit of playing with matches around the Christmas tree (safety was of utmost importance around the presents), but not a day has gone by since that I've not dropped to my knees and thanked the baby Jesus for the wonderful sight that saintly old man bestowed on us kids that winter day. I'm still not completely convinced that he didn't sneak out before-hand and douse that tree in gasoline, because the second he flicked that single match toward it, it immediately burst into flames of a magnitude I've rarely seen since. It lit up like a... well, like a Christmas tree. It was beautiful - the most glorious thing I've ever beheld with mine mortal eyes.
So you see, Christmas trees are wonderful, funderful, magical things, but not because you fling tinsel and all the crappy ornaments your kids made in second grade all over them. Christmas trees are about the extravagance of beautiful nonsense, and dazzling destruction. Artificial trees take all this away from you, and leave you with nothing but a stupid decoration. They're ruining the holiday spirit. Take away our wastefulness, and our need to be entertained, and we might as well be left with a holiday that celebrates the birth of Jesus, or something lame like that.