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Show came out to clear away what was left. The boxes, the broken wreaths, the empty barrels, and our tree with one or two others that hadnt been sold, all were thrown through the side door into the cellar. The door was locked, and he lay there in the dark. One of his branches, doubled under him in the fall, ached so he thought it must be broken. So this is Christmas, he said. All that day it was very still in the cellar. There was an occasional creak as one of the bruised trees tried to stretch itself. Feet went along the pavement overhead, and there was a booming of church bells; but everything had a slow disappointed sound. Christmas is always a little sad, after such busy preparations. The unwanted trees lay on the stone floor, watching the furnace light flicker on a hatchet that had been left there. The day after Christmas a man came in who wanted some green boughs to decorate a cemetery. The grocer took the hatchet and seized the trees without ceremony. They were too disheartened to care. Chop, chop, chop went the blade, and the branches were carried away. The naked trunks were thrown into a comer. And now our tree, what was left of him, had plenty of time to think. He no longer could feel anything, for trees feel with their branches, but they think with their trunks. What did he think sweet-smelli- ng V quick tendrils of the vines climb up them, and presently they are decorated with the red blossoms of the bean or the little blue globes of the grape, just as pretty as any Christmas trinkets. So one day the naked, dusty were taken out of the a thrown with truck into cellar, many others, and made a rattling land. farmer unloaded them and was out the The into journey his vs ife came out to watch him. when them the barn by up stacking 'There! she said. Thats just what I want, a nice long pole with a fork in it. Jim, put that one over there iu hold up the clothesline. It was the first time that anyone had praised our heart swelled with a tingle of forgotten tree, and his dried-u- p him one end of the clothesline, with his near sap. They put close bed. flower a to The fork that had been despised for stump a Christmas star was just the thing to hold up a clothesline. It was washday, and soon the farmers wife began bringing out some wet garments to swing and freshen in the clean, bright air. And the very first thing that hung near the top of the Christmas pole was a cluster of children's stockings. That isnt quite the end of the story, as the old fir trees whisper it in the breeze. The Tree That Didn't Get Trimmed was so cheerful watching the stockings and other gay little clothes that plumped out in the wind as though waiting to be spanked that he didnt notice what was going on or going up below him. fir-pol- es T" (lustration about as he grew dry and stiff? He thought that it had been silly of him to imagine such a fine, gay career for himself, and he was sorry for other young trees, still growing in the fresh hilly country, who were enjoying the same fantastic dreams. Now perhaps you dont know what happens to the trunks of Christmas trees. You could never guess. Farmers come in from the suburbs and buy them at five cents each for bean poles and grape arbors. So perhaps (here begins the encouraging part of this story) they are really happier, in the end, than the trees that get trimmed for Santa Claus. They go back into the fresh, moist earth of spring, and when the sun grows hot the left-ov- er by David Stoaa Marti, A vine had caught hold of his trunk and was steadily twisting upward. And one morning, when the farmers wife came out intending to shift him, she stopped. Why, I mustnt move this pole, she said. The morning glory has run right up it. So it had, and our bare pole was blue and crimson with color. Something nice, the old firs believe, always happens to the trees that dont get trimmed. They even believe that someday one of the Christmas-tre- e bean poles will be the starting point for another Magic Beanstalk, as in the fairy tale of the boy who climbed up the bean-tre- e and killed the giant.' When that happens, fairy tales will begin all over again. Family Weekly, December U courtesy of Home 22, 1957 U & Highway Magazine |