Lumberjacks with a Debit Card

                “Amy, Jenny wants to get our Christmas tree tomorrow, but I have to take Nama to the doctor. Can you two take my debit card and go pick one out? Oh, and take a load to Goodwill on your way.”

                “Sure, Mom,” I answered. I love taking Mom’s debit card. 

                “And try not to spend over $50. $30 is good, and $40 is ok.”

                No problem.

                My little sister and I decided to make it a sister-date. And since all good sister-dates involve matching outfits, we both wore our flannel shirts and our fake UGGs. Never was a pair of more ravishing sisters ever spotted at Goodwill in their cherry red truck. The Goodwill boy accepted our 7 bags of clothes and CDs eagerly. 

                “Hey let’s get coffee at Cutter’s!” Jenny offered. “Oh…but I don’t really have money…”

                “Neither do I,” I said, “But I have Mom’s debit card!” 

                “Yes!”

                I gave Mom a ring and yelled 5 times, increasing in volume every time, “CAN WE USE YOUR MONEY TO BUY COFFEE?” because she happened to be in a parking garage. She acquiesced with cheer and goodwill, once she understood. 

                With our double tall eggnog lattes soon in hand, Jenny drove the little red truck to the local country market and I documented our date. We parked next to the fence surrounding dozens and dozens of beautiful trees, one of which was destined to be in our living room. Our boots crunched across the parking lot as we neared the Christmas-tree pen, pine and chainsaw filling our frozen noses and reminding us that December has come. 

                A bearded man in a jumpsuit met us inside the fence and greeted us like a farm boy. We may have giggled. He began to follow us down the rows of slain firs and nobles, and I thought to myself, “Oh shoot. He won’t ever leave us to decide. Now I feel pressured.” I determined to take my time and make sure I picked a good one. 

                We had the farm man hold out some high-altitude nobles for us to examine before deciding we wanted to go fuller this year. So he led us to the well-fed nobles, and pulled out a six-foot beauty. “Oh, what’s the price on these?” I remembered to ask.

                “Nine dollars a foot.” 

                Jen and I both silently calculated in our heads, “Nine dollars a foot…six feet…That’s just a little bit over $50. What did Mom say again?”

                We sauntered down the row and stopped short when the Helen of all noble pine trees appeared on the fence in front of us. “Can you show us that one?” Farm man did our bidding.

                “Wow…” I thought. 

                “That one,” Jenny breathed.

                She was full-figured and fragrant with just enough character and blemish to keep her from looking plastic and factory-like. Tall, healthy, and dark green, she was made to stand on our ice blue carpet while a cousin of hers blazes in our red brick fireplace. 

“All right, we’ll do this one.”

                Farm man heaved her to the side and pulled out his chainsaw to give Gorgeous a fresh cut and to remove her lowest branches. It was only now as farm man’s partner came out and Jenny pulled up the truck that I realized Helen was a bit taller than that six-footer. I tried to calculate 9 times 7 as I followed the man in doors with Mom’s debit card. 

                He punched in the numbers on his register and added the tax, and it came to a whopping $68. Oh dear… 

                On the way home, feeling like super cute lumberjacks with our pine needle princess in the truck bed, Jenny and I talked through our crisis. 

                “Jen, we just spent almost $70 on a tree…”

                “Mom said no more than $50, didn’t she?”

                “Oh man…most of our friends go cut them and never pay this much.”

                “Oh maaaan…”

                “Oh, I’ll just pay the extra $20.”

                “It IS a beauty!”

                “And we’re having fun. Mom likes us to have fun together.”

                “…With her debit card.”

                After we pulled into our driveway we got the camera out to model with our tree and the red truck. Mom arrived just in time. 

 

                “Mom, Mom…so…we might have paid a little extra.”

                “The guy wouldn’t leave us alone and made me feel pressured.”

                “And you TOLD us to go THERE…”

                “Well, how much?” Mom asked.

                “…$68.” 

                Mom’s eyes got a little big and she repeated back to us our statement that we had indeed paid almost 70 dollars on a Christmas tree. Not to mention, we also bought ourselves double tall Eggnog lattes with her money. I offered to pay her a third of the price, when she sighed and laughed and said, “No, no, you’re ok. It was enough that I didn’t have to go do it!” That’s right, when you’re a mom, time is worth money. And then Jenny threw the icing on the cake when with a sparkle in her large doe eyes, she gave us this epiphany:

                “We didn’t even HAVE a tree last year! We were in San Diego!” 

                YES. You know what this means? By a simple equation of division and cancellation (or subtraction with a dash of deductive reasoning and hope) the Christmas tree of 2011 only cost us $34: the perfect price for a beautiful tree, hunted by two sisters in a little red truck.