Seething and Wreathing

Christmas DIY and Father/Son Wars in the 1980's

A Disclaimer: With my Sumi Brush I drew this delightful “Wreathed Krampus” and thought I was going to make a ghost story out of it- as it happened a memory came up that I am sharing instead. But I’m sharing this artwork because it inspired the whole thing. So this is not a Krampus Story… in the traditional sense. And with that, the housekeeping concludes.

There are Christmases and then there are Krampuses. When I am keeping the spirit in my heart- I need not fear the emergence of that most feared Yule time Disciplinarian. A Krampus is like a Christmas that seems not to go your way. Try as you might- it keeps going wrong. Well I don’t know about you but that has me looking for a cup of cozy comfort…

Visual artist and Ghost-Storyteller that I am- decorating the tree and the home always deepens experiencially for me. Every year it seems to be more alive and creative. A favorite bi-product of this is that it puts a smile on faces around me and it is an automatically fulfilling endeavor. Now four decades into it, Christmas cheer is a real tangible uplifting thing. Lighted trees at office parties, ugly sweaters, eggnog, Pumpkin Pie, Christmas Dinner with family and friends, and volunteer work at the food drive with family are proof to me that we can make magic out of the principals of goodwill towards all.

The Krampus type holidays seem to be past me. Those were the days where I wanted my way or I expected things- mostly as a very small child and a couple in the pre and early teens. Over the years there was a very special humility of being alone, faraway from family in New York City, during Christmas. That humility held me in it’s arms, teaching me about myself and the meditation of this time of year. I don’t fight it like many spiritually challenge people do. I go with it- wherever the Sleigh takes me. So long as I can be giving and creative. I won’t get into the 'why even bother decorating’ argument. I decorate. It is Satisfying. It is fulfilling. And that is that. Anyway, I have a scene today to share from the Grand Old Bank of Rememory.

Let’s Begin…

SEETHING and WREATHING.

It is a strange thing to say but I think the ultimate exterior accomplishment of a Christmas house is not the lights lining the roof or a nativity scene in the yard. The real stamp of Christmas cheer- the thing that makes an abode welcoming with Christmas magic- that makes a house truly inviting from the outside this time of year is a Wreath on the Door. I have always thought this and that comes from a lot of sad and pathetic experiences growing up in a home that paid little to no attention to the simple art of hanging a wreath on the front door as well as my own times being out of that house and in my haunting life neglecting it myself until realizing how much I absolutely love seeing hanging wreathes of pine, cypress, berries, twigs, and ribbons adding some cheer to the mundane entrances that usually close us all off from one another. It doesn’t have to be a circular wreath- it can be a garland or an arranged bundle of pine leaves and a nice red bow. No I'm not making this about Xmas DIY. It used to take a touch more effort than ordering one off of Amazon… You need the right kind of hook and then you have to plan a trip to the grocery store or mall to pick up the wreath. Atleast that is what was believed in the eighties when I was growing up.

I was in the store, excited for possibly the first wreath I was going to get. It will be somewhat pricey and maybe your Pops- shames you {like mine did} for wanting him to pay that much money for a bundle of branches that “we could just make at home"! Ha!”. There is a problem with this however. As a kid- you don't want what is at home- you want the pretty thing in the store- the thing that all the other kids have. You want the thing you see in commercials or in the mall or in the movies. O, but Dad buys your soul with this promise. "You see, you are going to have something much better than this because we made it."

Now these days- I see DIY projects as vastly inspiring and there is something satisfying about making something you want rather than buying it. There is also an artistry to DIY. But back then?

Well, I am taking in his words. I sigh wistfully at the wreath in the store- it is so fluffy and fragrant with the earthy redwood leaves, pinecones, and red berries- and it is woven beautifully into a perfect circular ring. With a sigh I think to myself "I guess, we will do even better than this. After all its Dad! He knows like- everything." Ahhh kid logic. Dad takes me by the hand. Damn. I really thought we'd have a shopped wreath but he seems sure of himself.

Dad is a great hunter- Ducks, Quail, Deer, and the magnificent Pheasant! He's also great at finding wild mushrooms, fishing- you name it. I can't wait to see the pieces I find with him for our wreath. My Momma will tell you- "Dad knows flowers- he always gets me the very best flowers!". So I am in the passenger seat on the way home- my feet swing up and down over the floor of the Datsun Truck as I pursue this thought experiment. By the time we arrive I have since mentally let go of the fancy store bought wreath and I believe we are going to make the best coolest wreath ever. Cooler than the one hanging on the door in Radioshack. Now I'm ready to make this thing. We go out- Dad and I and it is great being together and being united in a hunt of wreathly ingredients.

So if he can hunt Pheasant, and discern this flower from that- and we have an acre of this wild land {Thats a lot of land for a country boy of 6 or 7 years old} well just think about what he can find for this project! By the time the car is parked and we are off in the small field and trees- I am so excited that I will not pay attention to the scraggly branches we find. They are badass branches- nice and thick. Ofcourse anyone who knows wreathes knows that branches should not be thick. Heavens no. We grab some small branches with little red berries but there sadly arent many. We don't find many of those cypressy or redwood leaves. We get some pieces of pine. Unfortunately all the pieces are not looking right. I am starting to get a pit in my stomach.

Damn it.

We get back to the house with the less-than-spectacular- pieces of our wreath. By now I have a sinking feeling that I have been had by a Dad who sacrificed my ideals on the alter of him being all about the Washingtons. Well my Dad has done his part and it’s about time for him to get to work at the office. So he leaves. The task of actual creation falls to me and now, Momma.

In those pre-world-wide-web days there is no pinterest or website blog to help us with directions- nor do we have homemaking magazines at our house either. Shucks. Its just down to the improvisation of the inexperienced.

Momma does her best to help me bend the oddly stubborn branches. But she’s in the same boat in a way as me- she is about one decade into living in the US- from India. Not many wreathes there. I soon realize we are not doing well. I thought the branches would be in a perfect circle by the night. Alas, they refuse to make a consistent curve and only in a few places do we succeed at this- but then those places begin to split with the bending before snapping and breaking. We don’t have other twigs so we keep the broken pieces in there. The underwhelming result is a flimsy oval with mildly fastened bindings and unimpressive red berries. The bindings were simple white strings and the bow was closer to thin red ribbon from the drawer of gift wrapping tools. I don’t even remember seeing any ribbon or bow on it actually.

Finally it is finished. As I gazed upon the ugly sight I was confused by the celebratory words of accomplishment coming from Momma. How could such a wobbly looking object elicit such effusive sentiment? "Tada!", she said. "Its a Christmas Wreath!" continues the exclamation. I whole-heartedly disagreed with her but I started feeling a little confused by the barrage of obvious enthusiasm she returned. I uttered a small sign of my doubts as to its festive capability. But she proved to me- just by the sheer technical ingredients of it that it was a wreath and that not only did I have what I wanted- I had made it to. I think I even recall her proudly declaring "Its a wreath just like the wreathes we see everywhere". Now that was the very thing I wanted and somehow hearing it thus mentioned had me starting to sway to the distortion of reality.

So we put a nail in the door- I remember it being a rather large nail to hold the so-called 'Wreath' and as we set in on there- the wreath revealed that it had one more insult in store for me: It was going to hang hideously uneven. As I mentioned before, the Wreath curved as an oval. The branches were too thick in some cases and you could not bend them- also the arrangement of leaves was poor and not continuous. There should be a seamless feeling of leaves 'chasing eachother in a circle.' and the trigs and branches they are connected to ought to be below them as the frame of the wreath.

Alas, this atrocity appeared like the twiggly skeleton of a wreath rather than a lush and vibrant, festive wreath- as though the leafy body had rotted off, creating the look of a zombie wreath with hanging flesh and exposed bones. As the hanging commenced I quickly saw that my creation was even more off than I thought. The top of the oval bent outward towards me and it could not find the nail. My only option was to find an arbitrary spot on the wreath as close to the top of the hanging bundle as possible. This made the unwieldy long oval shape stretch out at a diagonal angle towards the lower right corner of the door.

The door surface behind it was white. So its odd shape was starkly contrasted to the viewer.

This wreath wasn't the smallest thing in the world either. From top to bottom it was about three feet and it was heavy and awkward for me to carry. To see it hanging there was slightly eerie. Even if we had made it into a circular body it likely wouldnt have fit in the door frame. If you were to approach the house, step onto the small raised cement porch and knock- you'd be seeing a strange large and uneven slanting oval with skeletal branches and bare tendrel-like twigs rather crudely bound together. The whole thing seemed to have a sense of movement about it- like it might suddenly reach out and grab your hand. Terrifying indeed.

As a child trying to fit in and make sense of the world- I felt utterly depressed by that wreath- it felt indicative of how different our family was- eating organic food in the eighties, farming the land, not to mention living in the countryside- rather than the urban. I didn't want to bring it for show and tell {rightly so}. But I kept the thing hanging up on the door because even at that age of seven years old- I had an ego. I had a little brother also. And as embarrassing as the wreath-thing was- it would be even more embarrassing to admit the failure by not hanging it or taking it down too early. An older brother has to keep his reputation of examples after all. So I endured it. And I made everyone else do it too-

Especially-

My Dad. I remember deriving some dark satisfaction that he had to see the fruits of his 'brilliant idea' once he arrived home. "What's this?" I heard him ask my Momma.

"He made the wreath!" was her reply, "From the branches you found”, she said slyly. Even though he knew this- the rhetorical question was asked so he could process what he thought of the dastardly wreath. He had blown it. Not only was that a small consolation to me- {bet you wish you had a real wreath now Dad} I made a show of being proud of that terrible ornament and whenever it came time to ask this here little- wreath-maker if I was ready to take it down- I said-

“Nah- not yet”.

I think we kept that failed giant wreath hanging on the door for four or five months. I remember feeling territorial about it staying there and also kind of proud I made it. But aye yai yai, that wreathe was an eyesore. And when it was finally time to get rid of it- I took it to that tin Trashcan by the driveway with a bittersweet triumph in my heart. God's joke on me though is that when I would see other wreathes forever after they looked a little too perfect.

I know what you may be thinking. The Boy's old man was trying to teach him to build and create rather than consume. And I would agree with that. And I will say I took the lesson. Having kids in some ways is a lesson in delayed gratification. You give them an assignment and they are expected to do it. Making the bed or cleaning the room can be tallied and calibrated. Teaching a principal is a different matter. There are the more 'abstract' jobs. Sometimes you can't answer their incessant questions. "Don't ask- just DO." {Which later turns to “Do as I say don’t do as I do.”} There is no telling when you will see that they heard you. Over the years they start putting it together and then one day if you are lucky, they are responsible, disciplined, thoughtful adults. Now I feel blessed by the Old Man- we have the notorious "Internet of Things" at our disposal yet as I order something from Bezos-land, I also have an impulse to see if I can make it- or to learn how it is made. How about that.

To this day I walk by a house with a pretty wreath on the door and think- what a beautiful wreath that is. I feel like they don't 'challenge me'. They don’t push me and laugh at me and anger me like that very first little Christmas disaster did. They don’t drive me to challenge my Dad- {every boy ought to challenge his Dad at some point}. These wreathes just hang and say hello. It’s devoid of failure, of father/son arguments, of hard lessons, no statements made of pride and/or humiliation, no resentments, no crappy oval shapes, no conflict whatsover. Well- thats kind of a boring wreath now that I think of it. With a chuckle I walk on... Some of them drive me to sneer. Bah- humbug. Isn't that demented? And yet I love all the emotions I feel when I see them- I see positively beautiful festive wreathes each year and I stand in awe and appreciation. Some are grand and others are simple and elegant twisted twig wreathes.

Well yes, I intended to write a Krampus wreath story. Instead- this happened. Not sure why but then again- Krampus teaches lessons himself. So in some twisted logic- it is appropriate. After all- I am sitting here all these decades later and I feel I can tell you now exactly what in hell he was thinking: he wanted to stave off the frivolous Christmas spending instinct- lest he spoil his child rather than build characte. He wanted to teach me a kind of 'anti-consumerism/ pro-builder mindset'. Yes his son didn’t take kindly to this and sought to discipline his father somehow. Dad never pitched building a wreath again. Neither of us wanted to build a wreath again. The next year I'd say the household was content to leave that white front door blank with nothing hanging. If Dad bought a shop wreathe he'd have to concede defeat.

Anyway a year or two later the House burnt down. All my things were blackened, burned, melted, and ruined. When we finally got a new house, no one really cared about wreathes again for a while.

You never forget your first and I don't know how but I think the Old Man is laughing about it up there. I doubt the rest of the family remembers this. But I sure do. Many Wreathes have been in my life- but the best one is that assymetrical mess that did its best to welcome visitors but wound up defiant and naked in it's odd appearance. It went to the tin trash can but remains a legendary war in this man’s mind. Maybe I'll make a wreath again. Who knows.

But there is nothing like that one the old man tricked me into making...

Anyway…

Happy Krampus.

~Fin.