Learn the different ways people feel about Christmas traditions, even those in the same family
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| Christmas Decorating |
| My husband was sullen. |
| "It's seventy-five degrees," he said. |
| I sat on the porch of my brother's home in Southern California, basking in the afternoon sun. |
| "It's supposed to be cold," he said. |
| I nodded."It's California," I said. |
| My husband is from eastern North Carolina, and to him, Christmas should involve a jacket and gloves, not shorts and t-shirts. |
| "And they don't even have a tree," he said. |
| I nodded. |
| In addition to it being warm outside on Christmas Eve, when we arrived at my brother and sister-in-law's house that morning, we were greeted by what appeared to be a dead tree in a pot with a few plastic ornaments hanging from it. They do not celebrate Christmas, but they wanted to make my husband feel comfortable. Being practical, they bought a monkey puzzle tree that they would later plant in the yard and decorated that. |
| "No point in buying a dead tree that's just going to go to the landfill," my brother said when my husband pointed, gaping at their "Christmas tree." |
| I knew what my husband was thinking. His family would, at that very moment, be sitting around a gigantic pine tree decked out in matching white and red ornaments and thousands of tiny white lights. Their coats would be hanging from the coat rack at the front door. |
| At my brother's front door, there were several pairs of flip-flops. |
| Our own tree was fully decorated and probably being climbed by our cat. |
| "We're leaving the tree up until after New Year's, right?" he asked. |
| I nodded, smiling. |
| What holiday do you associate with this time of year? |
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