Letter: Column reminds reader of Christmas story

Imperfect Christmas trees twice have been the subject of a Dolly Viscardi column.
Dolly’s trees bring to mind a story told by my mother, Margaret Smith Isaac. Mother was 9 when this took place.
“For Christmas of 1918, Clarence Lockhart and I went to find a Christmas tree across the river on the hillside there.
“Dad and Aunt May (his sister) had gone to Fort Collins to be with Uncle Burnham after Aunt Anna had died from the flu. Before he left, dad hired 17-year-old Clarence Lockhart to come feed the cattle and do the chores while he was gone.
“I was to choose the tree that Christmas, and Clarence was to cut it. We were to bring it home on the hayrack, which was on sled runners.
“I had a terrible time selecting — deciding on a tree. A terrible, terrible time. I would choose one and Clarence would get ready to cut, and I’d change my mind and run to another tree and select it, only to decide on yet another one. Finally, Clarence said, “This is the last” — and cut the tree.
“I had decided against many more shapely and more beautiful trees — so my final tree, a cedar, was poorly shaped with two parts coming up from the base and very difficult to make stand when attached to a base. Mother and Clara Buchanan and I tied it together and sort of propped it in the southeast corner of what was the dining-living room of the house.
“I remember feeling attached to the tree — maybe because I had selected it. Or, it is remembered as so imperfect — it ‘needed to be liked!’
“I played under that tree for ever so long.”
John R. Isaac
Littleton