Driving home through Toronto I found it amazing how
many people still had Christmas light out and on. We then pulled into our
driveway only for me to remember we have not taken ours down. Well, where we
live we have an abundance of snow and removal is difficult during the winter
months. What an excuse. Christmas was over two plus months ago.
I then glanced at our neighbours home with their
lights not only up but on as well. I looked around the street only to see that
we were the only two homes with lights still glowing as if it were the season.
I giggled to myself as I looked for the buried plug to unplug our lights. No
such luck, the cord was iced in and the plug itself a mystery to find. I
figured as much for my neighbour as well.
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I began to think how nice these lights may look with
the leaves on the tree and have toiled with the idea of leaving them on and now
calling them seasonal lights. When the snow melts and the buds begin to push
through I think they might just look pretty. But what is it with us leaving the
lights on for so long?
As I pondered this question I came up with answers
that I found to be a justifiable excuses for this down right insidious behaviour.
First of all as I mentioned earlier I could not unearth the cord to my lights
and therefore I will need to wait until the snow and ice melt to perform the
task of shut down. The lights are plugged into the socket that is under the soffit
and I cannot reach it without a ladder. I do not particularly like ladders so I
might just find an excuse for that one too. My last excuse is that it looks
pretty.
I then began to think that pretty or not I am
pushing it here. We are trying to move into spring and it seems as if my
household is holding on to the last vestiges of winter. Why in the world would
we want to do that? It has been the coldest February in history in our fair
country and I am ready to let that go but yet when I turn on our exterior
lights on come, the dreaded Christmas lights. I might add that I still have the
swag wreath and three sparkled birds still hanging in the tree as well. They
hang there mocking me and my inability to remove them as they swing in cold
north winds. It is as if they somehow know that I cannot reach them quite yet
and so they swing and look at me with their tiny bejeweled eyes glowing in the
white light of the bulbs just taunting my every thought about taking them down.
The swag gently dusted with snow quivers in these
winds as well. Frozen to its mount and not going anywhere for a while longer. The
shiny fake poinsettia flowers and the glittered silver balls that drape down
towards the snow bank yet again appear to mock me without words. The wire
holding the swag to the tree is incased in ice, unmovable ice. I look one more
time at the swag, the flowers animated by the wind appear to be laughing with
their centres glowing, still, in the white of the Christmas lights.
I have dreamed of tiny purple and yellow crocuses
pocking out of the final melting snow and daffodils to follow with tulips
bursting open in succession with little fruition from Mother Nature. The snow
keeps coming and the winds keep blowing and we continue to done our heavy
winter coats and boots until the day that with the warmth of the sun and the
grace of nature I will be able to take down my exterior Christmas decorations.
To all of you stuck in the same frozen situation it
is in my best advisement that next year we all make some preparations to keep
plugs above the freezing and snow level so they are ready to be pulled at the
end of Christmas. And for the sake of all of us gardeners out there, take the
lights out of the trees as soon and you can, please. Even by any another name
these lights still say Christmas.
Note: The picture at the top of this blog is an actual photo of the tree discussed in this article. It was taken during the early parts of February 2015.
See my other blog: Lisa Anne
