I got an email from Jill, who was my friend for years before I ever met and married her husband's brother, updating me on Miss Kitty's Christmas display. We all lived on the same street at one time, and Miss Kitty lived in the very first house on the street. She was one of those people you describe as "quite a character". When I first moved into my house, she came knocking on the door to welcome me to the neighborhood, bearing a fruit basket as a housewarming gift. Except it wasn't a fruit basket, it was a used greasy giant plastic bowl with a .99 cent price sticker holding a bunch of near-rotten bananas. Still, it was a kind gesture. She told me her name was Miss Kitty and she gave me the lowdown on all the neighbors. Mr. Kitty, for lack of a better name, fixed lawn mowers for a living in their driveway, in between the junk cars. They kept about 15 tiny and constantly barking dogs behind a fence. This fence was beautified by the addition of plastic vines with fake roses interwoven throughout the chain links.
Miss Kitty gained her fame from the Christmas decorating spectacular that she started working on every year in October. Of course she had the required manger scene. Hers featured Jesus in a pup tent surrounded by a couple of wise men that were somehow smaller in scale than baby Jesus. A few plastic illuminated snowman stood by with the wisemen and four-feet tall candy canes flanked the entrance to the manger/tent. Straight from the New Testament, for sure. In another corner of the yard was a large illuminated plastic Santa riding in his sleigh. Santa AND his sleigh were placed on top of an old bicycle. Really, there was too much to take in, with all the lights and cleverly juxtaposed religious and North Pole figurines. A piece of plywood had John 3:16 painted on it, lest you forget the reason for the season.
Now, I am not one who should be all superior acting about Christmas decorations. When I remember Christmas trees from my childhood, I recall them as being glorious. However, when I see actual old family pictures from holidays past, I see that we really had some scraggledy-ass Charlie Brown trees decorated with tacky homemade (and partially melted) marshmallow snowmen, macaroni wreaths, and cheap plastic ornaments. The worst was the year my dad lost his patience before he could get the uncooperative tree in the stand so he made an x out of 2x4s and just nailed the tree to it. We got it up and decorated easily enough after that, but a tree without a means to receive water doesn't look so evergreen after two weeks. That Christmas morning we opened presents in front of a bunch of ornaments dangling from dead twigs, hoping Mom and Dad would keep their cigarettes far, far away from this potential O Tannenbomb. Maybe that is why my Dad and his second wife went the artificial route. One year I was visiting and he said, "Do you want us to put the tree up while you're here?" Envisioning a warm family night singing carols and stringing lights, I said that would be great. Apparently though, each year they would merely unplug their tree and store it as is until the next year. He went to the storage room, carried out the fully assembled, pre-lit AND decorated tree, plugged it in, and said, "Here we are. Isn't this nice?"
When I became a "grown-up" and had my own trees to decorate, I wanted to make sure to distance myself from all the tackiness of my childhood Christmases. Decorating my tree was a serious matter to me. Everything was color coordinated, the ornaments were tasteful and matching, the lights were white, of course. I practically diagrammed the placement of each ornament. My trees looked like they were straight out of a magazine. But this changed the year after my dad died. Suddenly I got sentimental for those long-gone tacky trees and gaudy ornaments and lights from my childhood. So I became obsessed with buying vintage ornaments on Ebay. The older, tackier, and more abused the ornaments, the more I wanted them. For a several week period, I was receiving packages daily containing ornaments that some other family had worn down from years of use or neglect. I would gleefully open packages containing elves missing noses, Santas with arms falling off, and drummer boys minus their drums. That year my tree was packed with ornaments of every size, shape, color, and theme. It was glorious, though in future years I might see pictures and reconsider this assessment.
So Jill tells me that Miss Kitty doesn't have the full display going this year. The pup tent manger is dark. Maybe she is just getting too old to deal with the hassle. Probably the people in the neighborhood are sighing with relief at escaping what is generally considered an eyesore to any neighborhood. That is what I thought when I lived there. But now it makes me kinda sad to hear, because I know to someone, Miss Kitty's yard was glorious.