This is why we can't have nice things

Tears were shed. That's all I want to say about that.

The cat brought the tree down, of course. I wasn't in the room so I don't know what he did, but I don't think he'll ever do it again.

So yes, I was foolish to put the glass ornaments on the tree, but look on the bright side: most of them broke so now I don't have to worry about them breaking. Also, fewer ornaments to put up after Christmas.

Some of the ornaments that broke were very old, but some of the oldest ornaments came through without a scratch, like the porcelain bells that belonged to my great-grandmother* (and which I have moved to the mantel now). I guess they've been through toddlers, dogs, and cats before. Likewise, the tree is fine. It's made of wood and aluminum so it's pretty much indestructible unless you actually set it on fire. And I hid the matches so Jekyll couldn't do that.

The clean-up was not fun, especially since I was sobbing hysterically. I mean come on, who wouldn't? But as I swept and mopped and mopped again to get all the glass up, I contemplated the ephemeral nature of Christmas and glass ornaments, and reminded myself that it's just stuff. If the whole house had burnt down (it won't; I hid the matches, remember?) it would still be just stuff I'd lost. The memories live inside me.


It still wasn't any fun to clean up. But the floor is really clean now. And the tree is up again, although I need to do a better job distributing the remaining ornaments because it's kind of lopsided. Also, I will have to get the boxes of ornaments out of the garage again because there were a lot of them that wouldn't fit on my little tree, and now they will.

*or my mom found them in an antique store, hard to remember