I was thinking about a few other Christmases. One time when we lived in a project house in Oakland, Calif. Lester Bert, Cappy's oldest boy, came home from Germany where he had been in the Air Force and Cappy decided that he should get some "Churching" and so took him to a Morman Church that Grandpa had taken him to a few times when he was visiting. (The only time Cappy ever went to his Church was when his Father came to visit!) Anyway, he, Cappy, thought it was his "duty" I guess to take L.B. to Church. Lester Bert went to one of the Youth Group meetings and there met a girl who he married within a few weeks. I really liked Joanne and she seemed to like me! We, Cappy and I had bought a Christmas tree and decorated it, not thinking how old the thing was when we bought it!!! Anyway, L.B. and his new wife were living with her Mother who was a widow, and came over for dinner on Christmas Eve. Joanne said to me, "Is that tree dying or is it my eyesight? It seems like all the branches are hanging down." I looked at it and it was really a sorry sight! I asked Cappy and L.B. to go and see if they could find a tree that had some "life" in it. In the meantime, Joanne and I started to strip the tree. The kids, Bob, Dick and Bill were all in bed waiting for Santa Claus. The men got back and had a "fairly" green tree which we proceeded to redecorate!!! I asked them how much they had to pay for the tree and they said the guy was shutting down the lot and had told them to pick out any one they wanted and it wouldn't cost them anything!!! So when morning came and Santa had been there, I wasn't too ashamed of my tree!!! And not so much for Santa but my in-laws were coming for dinner!!!! We sure had a good laugh over that poor "dead" tree! and of course all it's needles were all over the floor!!! Which meant running the vacuum cleaner before we went to Church Christmas morning.
.B
