BY JOELLEN COLLINS
By the time this column is published, turkey leftovers will be composted and a deluge of Christmas information will be filling the media and our minds.
Because I live far away from most of my family, because I no longer have the memorabilia of my childhood Christmases, celebrated in good Swedish fashion, because it is the busiest time of the year in Sun Valley for my restaurateur daughter and son-in-law and, really, because I live alone and find festivities more minimal each year, I haven’t thought much about my Christmas tree decorations.
However, in honoring the greatest gift I have received since last Christmas, the discovery of and welcome from my biological family, spread out between Maryland, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas, Colorado and California, I found a way to feel a part of them through my stored ornaments.
I have carefully collected ornaments over the years, since 1970, when I lost my family trove in a huge brushfire where my husband, my 2-year-old daughter and I had lived in our first purchased home for only three weeks.
As I take out each ornament, I am thankful for the years since I survived that disaster. I was lucky enough to find my car keys and get myself and my daughter in our Volkswagen, out of harm’s way, just 15 minutes before the house imploded. I am haunted by the pain I imagine for those recent victims of more severe fires caught in cars while trying to escape.
At any rate, I have now wrapped and sent several of my favorite ornaments, along with notes about their origins, to my newfound brother and his wife and family in Oklahoma City. One is the first ornament my then 3-year-old daughter and I made when we moved in for our first holiday in the home rebuilt on the ashes of our first one. It is a painted white circle cut out with primary color markings in triangular inserts. It is shabby but meaningful. Along with that are other handmade stars, a brass depiction of skiers on Sun Valley slopes, and shiny red apples.
When I worked at the Sun Valley Community School for many years, dozens of sweet elementary students greeted me every morning. Most of the children called me the Elephant Lady because when I had lived in Thailand I intensified my love for those pachyderms. My office walls were festooned with colorful paper Dumbos. One December, a third-grade boy gave me a red silk elephant ready to hang on my tree. His mother explained that it was his favorite ornament, but he told her he wanted to give it to me because I would love it even more.
So, this year, as I put the remaining bits on my small tree, I will feel the presence of my families, both the long-gone one who raised me in a rich environment of love, and my new one, who may, magically, sense the life of their new member.
What could be a better way to celebrate the honor of invigorated life this season?
