Column: Bev Jackson Cotter, Art Is…

A recent visitor to the Albert Lea Art Center said, “This year’s display is the best one I think you have ever done. I really like the floating decorations in the Herfindahl Gallery.” If you have not stopped in the Albert Lea Art Center yet this month, be sure to do so before Dec. 31. The Festival of Trees is outstanding.

Each year I wonder what the various Christmas tree themes will be and who will participate in the event that has been an annual tradition for more than 20 years. Everyone had fun decorating with the Totally Tartan theme. Be sure to fill out the favorite tree form and then stop to enjoy a cookie.

What color is your Christmas tree?

Is it red and green remembering poinsettias and pine trees, or blue and white and gold with the celebration of Christ’s birth, or multi-colored with tradition and love?

I grew up with trees that were decorated traditionally with a fiberglass angel and celluloid balls and lights and tinsel that was used year after year. Their familiarity brought a comfort and peace to the Christmas season. I still have the angel and box she came in with the price tag of 39 cents. I have the original tinsel too. It’s heavier and wider than today’s tinsel, and dates back to the early 1940s. Each year I tell myself that I will not bother with it, but I do it anyway.

In the 1960s when silver trees with a single colored ornament were popular, I began fantasizing about a theme tree and how neat it would be to do a more sophisticated Christmas setting. However, by that time, my children began bringing home decorations they had made in school and Sunday School which would never fit any theme but “family.”

Consequently, my Christmas tree still contains the original fiberglass angel and tinsel from my parents and homemade items, souvenirs and gifts that have accumulated ever since my children were small. I guess my theme will always be family, and I cannot think of a better one.

There have been a couple of blips along the way. One year, my daughter received a doll buggy from Santa, and she tucked it safely behind the tree. The next morning, when she pulled it out, some branches and then the entire tree came tumbling down, breaking several ornaments. Our tree was up four days that year.

Golden Labrador swinging tails also raised havoc with the tinsel, so there’s not as much of that left as there used to be. One year our German Shepherd decided to chew on some of the ornaments. Even though he was not allowed in the living room, when I came home the entry was littered with chewed up feathers, Styrofoam balls and hand-painted ornaments that I had spent many painstakingly long hours working on. I guess if Christmas means family, that includes the dogs too.

Then there was the year, when I was still living alone, that I undecorated my tree mid- January, carried the shedding trunk and branches out to my car, put it in the hatchback and then backed out of the garage. Almost. Something caught on the garage door with enough force to shatter the glass in the large rear window and drop a zillion tiny glass crystals into the car to blend with all of the dried needles that were already there.

I pulled forward, turned off the car and said to myself, “This did not happen,” and then went into the house, closing the door. After a while I worked up the courage to look again, and guess what? The crystals and needles were all still there.

You’d think this would have broken my annual tradition of selecting a tree on a wintry, cold, windy day from an outdoor lot and then later cleaning up the dried needle clutter. But I think my Christmas traditions are so important that, as long as the good Lord’s willing, and my husband is willing to help, I will always have a real tree with all its colorful decorations of caring family and good memories.

Have a wonderful and blessed holiday season! Merry, Merry Christmas!

 

Bev Jackson Cotter is a member of the Albert Lea Art Center where the Festival of Trees will be on display through Dec. 31. Art Center hours are 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. The Art on Broadway store carries art supplies and the works of area artists — a good place to do your Christmas shopping.