I鈥檝e been stringing this year鈥檚 Christmas lights.
This is always a joyous time of year 鈥� a time of exploring new and colourful ways to express ourselves.
The lights in our artistic arsenal are mostly red, green, and yellow.
The words I fire under my breath are mostly blue.
The language I needed to get me though the task of stringing Christmas lights didn鈥檛 used to be so subdued. For some reason, grandchildren seem to have muted the shades from that robust royal blue to something more reminiscent of a robin鈥檚 egg.
I can remember when a loudly expostulated 鈥淢y goodness!鈥� or 鈥淕oodness gracious!鈥� just didn鈥檛 cut it. Even 鈥淔or goodness sake!鈥� wasn鈥檛 able to mitigate a useful amount of frustration, regardless of volume or bass-line growl.
But the need for expletive interpretation of this part of the annual Christmas story doesn鈥檛 seem to have changed much.
There鈥檚 still the tree.
Consequent to the discovery of an allergy to pine sap within the family circle, the tree has been coming out of a box for years now.
You鈥檇 think that hauling a cardboard box out of the attic wouldn鈥檛 be as burdensome a chore as traipsing through the woods at the back of the farm, hunting for the 鈥減erfect鈥� fir sapling, often knee-deep in snow, more often burdened by a heavy mackinaw jacket growing heavier under the absorptive weight of incessant cold rain.
I grew up in the Alberni Valley.
I鈥檓 sure there were years when the sun was shining brightly and the forest wall reflected an unseasonable warmth.
There had to be times when the tree was easy to find, and it truly was perfect.
But I don鈥檛 remember those times鈥� just as I don鈥檛 remember any time in more recent years when the fake tree slid easily out of the attic and came together on the stand without serious incident 鈥� a pinched finger, a smashed elbow, an eye nearly poked out of its socket, a plastic fir needle embedded in the back of my heel鈥� every year, I venture into that dark place above us in anticipation of a new adventure.
And I鈥檓 sure that, at least once in all those years of interpreting the joy of Christmas for the wonderment of visitors and passersby, all the lights lit up the first time I plugged them in.
Surely, at least once!
Well鈥� maybe next year, then.
