The Perfect Christmas Tree

In our house in Middle Cove, Newfoundland, the tradition was to find the perfect tree before Christmas Eve. And this year, my brother Gilbert and I were being trusted to do it entirely on our own. And we took the challenge very seriously. So, axe in Gilbert’s hand, saw in mine, we set out for all the spots we imagined we might find a magnificent fir (冷杉树).

We were young, but we knew the rules. Trees could not be taken from personal land and not near any road.

We started out with the best of intentions. We were on Pine River Lane, and looking at the firs in the fields, but none of them looked quite good enough. It was getting dark but we still had no luck. On the way home, it was Gilbert who stopped, grabbed my arm and said, “I see it!”

“You see what?” I said.

“Right there, look. It’s perfect.”

And he was right. It was a young tree, two metres tall, standing alone. It was the classic Christmas tree. In all my years, I had never seen such a perfect one.

Perfect except for one small problem. The tree was pretty close to the road. Also, it was behind a fence, so the tree was in someone’s yard. And not just any someone. It was in the yard of Timmy Green, my best friend.

“You stand guard,” Gilbert said. And with that, we were over the fence and on our bellies crawling toward the target. I lay in the snow and put the Greens’ house under surveillance (监视). I was to whistle or cough if I saw anyone coming.

Within a few minutes, it fell.

“Grab the end,” Gilbert said, and we lifted it over the fence. Now we were on the road.

Suddenly Gilbert’s eyes widened. “Our footprints!” he said.

So it shocked me when I found Mr. Green in our house with my parents, drinking tea on Christmas Eve.

A week before Halloween, my young children wild with great happiness were walking and running around our home in their Halloween costumes. Just then the babysitter called, telling me that she was extremely sorry for asking for a day off. I knew that emergencies did occur, and I told her that I completely understood. But what was actually going through my mind were feelings of frustration and self-pity. And I had to pack my three kids into the car, and then drove to the hospital.

On the way, numerous things flooded into my mind, and I especially thought about how life should be going. I was thirty years old, a mother of three girls-five-year-old twins and a one-year-old baby. At this moment, I should be playing with them in the park or visiting the library together. But I was, once again, going to see the doctor. It had been a year since I was diagnosed with cancer. I knew that I was one of the lucky ones. I was grateful that surgery and chemotherapy (化疗) were over, and this was just a routine blood test. As always, there was the remaining fear that the cancer would come back. To be honest, my family and friends were great during the past year when I was in bad condition, but they were also busy with their lives. Therefore, I did not want to burden them with my feelings of unhappiness. What I just wanted to see were the positive things in life and I really wanted to express my heartfelt gratitude to them.

When we finally arrived, we sat in a crowded waiting room. Nothing special occurred until my youngest daughter, dressed up as an angel, walked up to a woman who was in a wheelchair and accompanied by her caregiver. My daughter looked at the woman and pointed to the vending (售货) machine next to her, saying sweetly, “Tweet.” This was how she said “Trick or Treat”, who had been coached previously by her twin sisters.

Surprisingly, the woman, a complete stranger to us, knew exactly what my daughter meant.

My daughters thanked everyone who gave them treats.