That scrumptious Sunday dinner was beginning to wind down. My brother and I ate rapidly because our afternoon was just getting started. We were headed for the hills—okay, how about the “woods.” That’s what we called it when we went to the mountains east of our little town. And we were on a mission! Well, kind of like a mission. You see, our family was heading into the woods with our old Chevrolet truck to get trees. Now, I should probably tell you, that truck was quite the thing. It was old. How old? It was old enough that it had a small hole in the center of the front bumper. Some of you already know what that was for, don’t you? Sure, it was for the crank. But some of you are thinking: “Crank? What’s a crank? Isn’t that the old guy that lives next door to Grandma and Grandpa?”
Well, stick with me a bit. First off, cars and trucks weren’t quite as dependable at that time as they are now—and that included the batteries. Trucks, and even cars during those days, usually had a crank that was carried along, often under the seat. You didn’t start that truck by simply inserting the key into the ignition and turning it. In fact, I don’t know that this old truck even had a key. Nor was there even a button on the dash like Popular Mechanics magazine may have been talking about at that time that all the really “modern” vehicles had. No, what we called the “starter” was on the floor. Sure it was. You got into the truck, turned a switch on the dashboard to the “ON” position, and then you took your foot and pushed on the starter, which was located on the floor. It took a pretty good hard push, too, before you would hear and feel the starter begin to turn, and therefore the engine would begin to turn over. And if the charge in the battery was weak and didn’t have a good charge? Hey, that’s where you got the old crank out, put the end of it through the bumper and felt your way along with it till it engaged the hole in the wheel on the front of the engine made for it, and then you put your muscle into it—and I mean put your muscle into it—throwing your weight into turning the crank and starting the old truck. And I should tell you that we used that crank quite a bit, too, from what I remember.
By the way, as I think back on that old truck it reminds me of the turn signal. And it did have one. Pretty modern and “up town,” right? Well, hardly. It was a long piece of metal, shaped kind of like an arrow someone would point with, and it hung from the corner of the cab, on the outside, behind the driver’s head. Sure, some of you folks know just what I am talking about. You can remember reaching up over your head next to the door and pulling on the cable, or chain to make that signal move so that people behind you knew which direction you were about to turn. If any of you don’t know what I’m talking about, go ask your Grandma or Grandpa, or maybe your Mom or Dad. See if they can’t describe it to you.
Say, here I go again, getting way off track. Anyway, we were headed for the woods on a mission of sorts. A mission to get Christmas trees—lots of trees. Christmas trees for nearly everyone in our extended family, or so it seemed. And we were going to get tall trees, short trees, and trees in between!
This had become an annual event in our family. I had concluded that there must be very few trees fit to serve as a Christmas tree in the state of California. I had determined that fact because most of the trees we were cutting were for relatives and friends who lived in Southern California. For a little more than a dollar or two each, my parents would wrap freshly cut white fir trees securely in burlap bags (gunny sacks to my brother and me), attach mailing labels on the outside, and they would be hauled to the railroad stop in town where they would be shipped out along with all the other items the Postal Service was handling. When the relatives received the trees they would unwrap them, shake them a little bit to allow the branches to fold back out, and before long have one of the best looking Christmas trees on the block decorated cheerfully in their living room. They always seemed to appreciate the trees.
But that Sunday afternoon trip was more than just getting the relatives a Christmas tree. We always found one for our own family, too. My Mom and Dad, with plenty of helpful advice from my brother and me, would search through the forest until we found a tree that we knew would be just right for our living room. It had to be tall and bushy. In fact, we usually had to cut a portion off the bottom to get it into our living room, and sometimes even a piece off the top so a star could be placed at the very top of the tree right against the ceiling. We liked big Christmas trees!
While my parents were looking for trees for the relatives, cutting them and dragging them to the truck, my brother and I would be scouting around for our own trees. You see, each year when we went on this tree-cutting trip we found our own trees which went in our bedroom. Since we were each determined to have our very own tree, and we slept in the same room, our bedroom had two trees each Christmas. Each was decorated in a wild sort of way and even had lights on them, as I remember. Now, these trees we picked for ourselves were never more than 2-3 feet tall. We liked them a little on the small side so we could get both of them in the room, for one thing.
It seemed like it was no time at all before the old truck was loaded with trees and it was time to head back to town, driving a bit slower as we bounced over the rough mountain roads, getting home just about the time the late winter sun was sinking below the horizon. We “men” unloaded the trees, standing them up in a corner of the yard alongside the house. They were going to be making some folks mighty happy before long. Mom stoked up the two wood stoves in the house and before long we were pulling off our mittens, stocking caps, boots and heavy clothing we had been wearing to keep the winter chill away. And then, before we headed out the door for church once again, it was time for hot chocolate. And it wasn’t the “instant” kind, you understand. They did not have instant hot chocolate in those days, as far as I can remember. It took time to heat and prepare but hey, was it ever good—lip-smacking good! And then, like I said, it was off to church again. We had church on Sunday nights in that little town—hard wooden benches and all. But those church benches being hard didn’t stop two young boys from catching some much deserved rest after a hard day getting the Christmas trees in.
You know, those trees no doubt helped some of our friends and relatives have a happier Christmas. But have you ever thought of trees being “happy”? In Psalm 96 beginning with verse 11, we find these word: “Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad; let the sea resound, and all that is in it; let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them. Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy; they will sing before the Lord, for he comes, he comes to judge the earth.”
Almost sounds as if creation was getting ready for Christmas!
Prayer: Father, help us to see a fresh, new reason for praise as we look at creation all about us. You have blessed us with so much and yet we often fail to really see it and understand all that You have done for us. Thank you, Father. Amen.
Pastor Bill
Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.
