The Christmas Tree

by Salamon, Julie; Weber, Jill;

  We listened to the creek bubble along; suddenly it seemed very loud.

  “Melting snow,” said Sister Anthony absently.

  “You know,” she said, “I’ve always turned to Tree when something important was on my mind. Funny, I can’t go to him now.”

  She stood up abruptly and waited for me to do the same. On the way back to the convent, she made it seem as if the only care she had in the world was whether her new roses were going to bloom.

  ❄ ❄ ❄

  It snowed early that year. The fields were white the day my men and I went to get the tree. I hadn’t seen Sister Anthony since spring, but my guys told me she was out there every day, watching them truss Tree’s branches.

  And now the time had come.

  I knocked on the door of the convent. One of the younger nuns answered the door, and invited me inside to wait for Sister Frances.

  I was shocked when I saw her. It had been quite a few years, now that I thought of it, since I had first met her and asked her about the tree. On my later visits, I’d generally made my way right out to the clearing.

  The fullness had fallen from her frame. Her habit seemed to swallow her up. She moved very slowly, as if each step cost her something dear. I realized she must be close to ninety by now.

  When she shook my hand, though, her grip was still strong.

  “Good to see you,” she said heartily, though her voice was thinner than I remembered.

  “Sister Anthony’s told me you two have had some nice talks over the years,” she said. “I’m glad of that.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “Can you wait just a few minutes?” she asked. “All the nuns want to come out to give the tree a final blessing, if that won’t hold you up too much?”

  “Of course,” I mumbled, holding onto my cap for dear life.

  I saw the young nun who had answered the door go outside and disappear into a little stone building I hadn’t noticed before. And suddenly the sound of bells ringing filled the air.

  They all came.

  Within minutes the yard was full of black habits. I hadn’t realized so many nuns were staying at Brush Creek, though Sister Anthony told me there were always more than it seemed. In the middle was Sister Anthony, arm in arm with Sister Frances. They nodded at me and began to walk toward the clearing.

  I went out front and told my men I’d meet them by the tree, then followed the nuns, staying just a little behind them. I felt like an intruder, but I couldn’t help myself. I was drawn to their procession like a bird to a flock.

  It was something I’ll never forget, watching them walk through the fields, the hems of their habits turning white from the light dusting of snow on the ground.

  The men had driven the trailer around and were waiting for us when we arrived. They were being a little rowdy, but when they saw the nuns approaching they quieted down real fast. You could see on their faces that they were moved by these nuns walking out there in the snow to say good-bye to their tree—especially since a lot of them were pretty old.

  They stood aside respectifully while the nuns said a prayer and sprinkled the tree with water. There were no speeches or anything like that. They just stood still for a few minutes and then gently began to sing with voices as clear and sweet as cold spring water.

  As the last note died away, Sister Frances looked over at me and nodded.

  “We’re going to leave now,” she said.

  I saw her put her arm around Sister Anthony and say, “Let’s go inside.”

  Sister Anthony shook her head. “You go. I have to stay.”

  The other nuns had already started to walk back to the convent. I could see that Sister Frances really didn’t want to leave Sister Anthony behind. She glanced over at me, but I just shrugged. Like I said, I’m better with trees than with people.

  Sister Frances stood there, looking worried and suddenly very frail. She had quite a few years on Sister Anthony. In fact, they could have been mother and daughter, the current between them was so strong.

  “It’s cold,” said Sister Anthony, smiling. “I’ll stay by myself. I’ll be all right.”

  Sister Frances looked at her closely and must have seen she was telling the truth. She gave her hand a little squeeze and left.

  For someone who’s never seen it, the way we cut down the trees is both amazing and awful at the same time. After all the weeks of preparation, the actual sawing only takes about two minutes, but, as I realized that day, that’s a terribly long time to hear something you love getting cut open. The weird thing is that you can’t really tell right away that anything has happened. The tree is suspended from a tall crane beforehand, so even after it’s been cut it looks as if it’s still standing.

  I should have warned Sister Anthony. I saw the flash of hope on her face after the saw stopped and Tree didn’t fall and I saw that hope disappear when we moved the tree from its stump and lowered it onto the trailer.

  It was the moment when I traditionally count the rings on the stump to get an accurate idea of the tree’s age.

  I told Sister Anthony what I was about to do.

  “Would you like to help me count?” I asked her.

  Together we counted the rings. There were sixty-two.

  “Just as I thought,” said Sister Anthony. “Tree was just a little bit younger than me.”

  “You’ve both worn well,” I said, not knowing what else to say.

  Meanwhile, the men were measuring Tree’s length.

  “Eighty-two feet!” one of them called out.

  Sister Anthony was starting to look weary, but she was still game. “Only eighty-two feet!” she said. “And I was sure he’d be the tallest tree there ever was.”

  She took a deep breath. “Well,” she said, “He’ll be the most beautiful, of that I’m sure.”

  “No question about it,” I said. There was so much I wanted to say to her, to thank her, to tell her we would take care of Tree. I just didn’t know how. So I simply shook her hand and climbed into one of the trucks. As we drove away I could see her in the rearview mirror, a small lone figure waving good-bye.

  Chapter Eight

  The Journey

  I made sure the powers that be at Rockefeller Center sent a special invitation to the Sisters­ of Brush Creek. It began, We would be honored to have you present at the annual Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony, and was printed on a thick, cream-colored card, lettered in red and green type. Pretty classy.

  Sister Frances called me a few days after she received it, full of excitement and thanks. She told me she’d set the card on the little table in the vestibule and put out a sign-up sheet, to find out how many of the nuns wanted to go, and that it filled up with names in a day. Not only that, word had spread about the tree and the trip to the city—and many people wanted to come along, people who remembered the happy times they had spent under Sister Anthony’s tree when they were young.

  When Sister Frances added up the names of everyone who wanted to go, she realized there were far too many people for the convent van to carry. That didn’t stop her, though. The convent had funds for special occasions, and she thought this was as good an occasion as she could imagine to spend some of that money. So she chartered a caravan of buses. She wanted to find out if I could arrange parking for them. No problem, I told her.

  Then, two weeks later, she called again.

  “I’m sorry to bother you,” she said, “but I have a problem. I’ve been so busy running around preparing for the trip I didn’t really notice how quiet Sister Anthony has been lately. Then, yesterday, I was looking over the list to see who had signed up and I realized someone was missing.”

  I interrupted. “She isn’t coming?”

  “Don’t rush me, young man,” said Sister Frances.

  Obviously she was going to tell the story her way.


  “The minute I realized she hadn’t signed up I found her in the library and, I’m ashamed to say, spoke rather sharply to her.”

  I couldn’t help smiling, imagining the showdown between these two.

  “She asked me if something was wrong and I said, ‘Yes, indeed there is. Why aren’t you coming to Rockefeller Center with us?’

  “I already knew the answer, of course. I must say, my heart went out to her, but I told her, ‘There’s a time to say good-bye.’

  “You know what she said to me? ‘I’ve already said good-bye.’

  “At that moment she seemed like that sad little girl I’d seen almost sixty years ago, looking so lost and alone.

  “‘Are you sure?’ I asked her. Well, I could just see from the look on her face that I wasn’t going to change her mind.”

  There was silence.

  “Sister Frances?” I said.

  “Yes,” she said, sounding somewhat startled. “Oh, yes. That’s why I’m calling. I need you to come out to Brush Creek the day of the tree lighting and bring Sister Anthony to Rockefeller Center yourself. You’re the only one who can do it. I’m counting on you.”

  And then she hung up.

  At first I wanted to call her back and tell her it was impossible. How could I spend the biggest day of my year driving all the way out to the middle of New Jersey and back? But my next thought was, how could I not?

  When I arrived at Brush Creek the buses were already there. It was a long way into the city and the weather was poor for traveling. The temperature hovered around freezing, and the light snow that had begun to fall was wet and sloppy.

  Despite the gloom outside, inside the convent felt festive. The main room was full of nuns, the townspeople who were going along and a huge number of children, some of whom I recognized as Sister Anthony’s­ students.

  Sister Frances was in her element, lining people up and telling them which bus to get on. You could see she was happiest when she held a clipboard in her hand.

  When she saw me she didn’t even say hello. She just nodded toward the back. “She’s out in the greenhouse,” she said. “She doesn’t know you’re coming.”

  “That’s just great,” I said to myself, kicking myself for coming on this fool’s errand. What made me—or Sister Frances, for that matter—think I could change Sister Anthony’s mind? And why should we try? Was it our place to decide how Sister Anthony should deal with the end of the most meaningful friendship she’d ever had? We couldn’t even begin to understand the connection between her and Tree, and what it meant to have it broken.

  I wanted to turn around and drive right back to New York, where I belonged. I didn’t have it in me to be anyone’s spiritual advisor—least of all a nun’s.

  While all of this was going through my mind Sister Frances was still tending to her list. When she saw I hadn’t budged, she waved me away. “Go on,” she said impatiently. “There isn’t much time.”

  There was no answer when I knocked on the door of the greenhouse so I just went right on in. I could hear Sister Anthony in the back, bustling about, humming to herself. As I started in her direction I knocked over a watering can.

  Sister Anthony looked up with a start.

  “What are you doing here?” she greeted me. “Isn’t this your big day?”

  “Nah,” I said. “I’m already onto the next thing. I’m in the middle of planning the Spring Flower Show. As far as the tree goes, I’m more or less finished. There are a lot of other people who take over now.”

  I wasn’t exactly lying, then again I wasn’t exactly telling the truth either. It was true that the tree was in the hands of the electricians and the public relations people by now. But this was the first time I had ever been somewhere else on the big day: I was usually there prowling around, making sure everything was running smoothly.

  She just looked at me, waiting.

  “So, I heard you weren’t coming,” I said.

  “That’s right.”

  That was it. She wasn’t going to make this easy. I took a deep breath.

  “Look,” I said, “I know it may be none of my business but I really think you should go see Tree.”

  She looked surprised. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you call him Tree before,” she said.

  I knew I had to keep going before I lost my nerve. Then it just all came out. “Sister Anthony, I don’t know how to say this, exactly. I’ve spent most of my adult life trying to create beauty. I mean, that’s my job—to create an impression, to wow people. Plants and trees are my tools, I use them like my computer and my Rolodex. At least that’s what I’ve always told myself.”

  I couldn’t think of what to say next. I felt like such a jerk. What was I doing?

  Sister Anthony’s eyes were sympathetic. And as she waited patiently for me to get my thoughts together, it occurred to me that she was helping me out once again, though I was the one who was supposed to be helping her.

  “I guess what I’m trying to say is, well, that it’s all a lie.”

  She looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean it’s not just a job, they’re not just tools and I really do love what I do—and you’ve helped me see that. You and Tree. So please come with me. I’d like you to see where Tree has gone. It’s important.”

  I stopped. I didn’t know what else I could say.

  Sister Anthony was silent.

  “Please,” I said.

  ❄ ❄ ❄

  We didn’t talk much on the drive into the city. I could see Sister Anthony taking in all of the ugliness as the beautiful countryside of rural New Jersey gave way to shopping malls and giant oil tanks and chimneys billowing smoke. It was all new since she had made her trip to Brush Creek so many years before.

  Finally, we could see the city in the distance, but just barely. The air was thick with a frozen haze.

  “On clear days the skyline just seems to sparkle,” I said trying my best to sound cheerful.

  Sister Anthony nodded politely.

  “Is it familiar at all?” I asked her.

  She shook her head. “Not at all.”

  I was thinking we should just turn around and go back. This was a terrible mistake. What would she make of all the hoopla which was part of the tree-lighting­ ceremony, with its big-name performers and politicians and TV cameras. I was afraid that if the crowds didn’t overwhelm her, the entertainment would.

  The traffic was murderous. We crawled across town. She kept shaking her head. “I don’t remember anything,” she said. “Nothing.”

  Then in a sad voice, she said, “This is what I feared most of all, you know.”

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “I’ve always had a good feeling about New York, something I’ve never been able to put my finger on. Just a general kind of warmth,” she said. “But this—this isn’t it!”

  I looked out of the window and tried to imagine how it looked to her: It was all gray—gray people huddled over as they made their way across gray streets that were bordered by gray buildings. The only thing that wasn’t gray was the noise—big red blasts of horns blowing and walkers and drivers cursing at one another and of course the ever-present sirens.

  I wished that we could have driven down Fifth Avenue. At least then she’d have a chance to see the Christmas decorations and the angels lighting the path to the tree. But I knew the traffic would be a nightmare so we stopped near Sixth Avenue and made our way across Fiftieth Street, pushing through the mob that surrounded the area that we’d roped off for the nuns. Sister Anthony didn’t complain but she looked miserable—tiny and frail in the crush and the cold. For the first time since I’d met her, she seemed old.

  “It’ll be great when we get there, you’ll see,” I said, elbowing people aside to make a path for her.

  We finally made it. I got a
glimpse of Sister Frances and her group but before I had a chance to look up, to see if the tree was actually there, one of my guys grabbed me by the arm.

  “We’ve been looking all over for you,” he yelled and took me with him.

  By the time I’d taken care of whatever it was, I couldn’t make my way back to Sister Anthony. I caught her eye from a distance and waved at her helplessly as the ceremony began. She smiled and waved back, a bit too heartily to be convincing.

  It all happened so quickly. There were the speeches and the singing and the tree was lit.

  I didn’t pay attention to any of it. I kept my eyes on Sister Anthony, trying to make out what she was thinking. At first she looked troubled.

  “She shouldn’t have come,” I muttered to myself.

  Then something happened. Her face lit up and she looked years younger, almost like a child. She was smiling as she lifted her hand toward the tree and her lips moved. I’m pretty sure she said, “Good-bye my friend.”

  When it was over I tried to reach her. But the crowd closed in on me and by the time I made my way over to where the nuns had stood they were gone.

  Chapter Nine

  The Christmas Tree

  Over the next few weeks I kept meaning to get out to Brush Creek for a visit. But things caught up with me, the way they always do. As usual I was busy growling about next year’s Christmas tree and what a pain in the neck the whole thing was.

  Then I got her letter. It arrived at the office one day when I was in a particularly bad mood. When my secretary buzzed me to let me know the helicopter pilot was waiting for me, I barked at her. “Let him wait!” I said.

  I closed the door and began to read.

  ❄ ❄ ❄

  I was right. The crowds and the entertainment had all seemed overwhelming. She was wishing she hadn’t come. She was frightened. Worst of all, she didn’t recognize her tree in that place, surrounded by huge buildings instead of the sky, its branches weighed down with a brightness that all seemed false.