I put my Xmas tree up the other
night. Then I lay down for an hour to rest. Said tree is HUGE.I should have
phoned in some people to help me wrestle it from the loft. Took me three trips
up and down the stairs to get it through the doors and into the living room.
As I placed the tree in the
middle of the floor and cleared the eagle’s nest from its branches I remembered
the day it came into my possession. Just four short years ago...
......cue swirly music (violins
and shit like that)....
....the phone rang. It was my twin sister. The Queen of Chaos (QC). For any newbies reading this, she’s a lovely
lady. She’s four feet eleven inches, a size six, thinks tact is something you
stick your posters on the wall with and enjoys a lifelong blonde moment.
I had earlier been at the swimming
pool with my son where he invented a new sport, Dad Surfing. (In case you don’t
value your lungs and you’d like to try it, all you need is a swimming pool with
a current and a child who is happy to stand on your back while you – and this
is where it gets tricky - float) It was great fun ...and this explains my
uncharacteristic willingness to step in and help. I was in a good mood.
Long story even longer, QC had
been offered a free second-hand Xmas tree. It was seven feet tall, cost £190
new just 2 years ago and it was a cracker. Only thing is QC doesn’t have a car
and is a master of the passive aggressive. I don’t have car, she says - like I
don’t know this – and how am I going to get the tree home to my flat? In Troon?
Like I’ve also forgotten where she stays.
I load the car with self and son
and drive to meet her. She has a piece of paper in her hand with directions to
the home of the tree. The directions to the home of said tree were lousy. We
got lost in a housing estate with one road in and one road out. Several phone
calls later, with shouted instructions from my backseat sister, me snapping at
her and the wee fella giving me a row for being bossy with my twin, we made it.
A nice lady is standing by the
door of her flat on the third floor wearing a look of relief. The look of
someone who has just been told; yes it piles but yes, we can cure you. She
directed us to a cupboard in the communal hall. And opened a door. The only
thing I saw was a huge white box. You know those containers you see on the back
of ships? Roughly the size of one of those.
-that’s your tree, says nice lady
and runs back indoors before we can say anything else.
I couldn’t lift the box off the
ground, never mind lifting it out to the car, but with the wee fella pushing
and me dragging and QC carrying a free box of 20,000 lights the tree owner no
longer needed, we made it.
By which time my shirt was
sticking to my back, my jacket was torn in three places and I was wishing I
only had brothers.
I looked at the box. I looked at the
boot. Not going to happen. I open up the boot (or as the wee fella calls; the
trunk) in the vain hope that Doctor Who has been working nearby. Na. Not a
chance. The tree box would never fit in the boot. There was a large green skip by
the side of the road and it had some space. But the thought of dumping tree
lady’s gift was too much and we resolved to try harder.
While all the pushing was
going on QC was standing to the side wearing an expression of mild panic. It’s
too big, she says. I don’t have big enough corners in my house, she says. You
have it and I’ll take yours. It’ll be lovely for you and the wee man to have a
nice big tree, she says trying to sell me the idea.
- Can we get it in the feckin’
car first, says I.
- Dad! says the wee fella.
Eventually I worked out that if I
moved the front seats forward that there might be room in the back. With a lot
more sweat, more pushing and some muttered curses, we made it. And bonus, we
even managed to close the car doors.
Of course we now didn’t
have enough room for three people. So the wee fella (who’s nearly as tall as
his aunt) sits on QC’s lap and I drive to my house, which is nearer– but I have
to go the long way as the short way goes past the police station. We all hold
our breath and look straight ahead for the ten minutes it takes to get to my
house – because this is proven to make you invisible to the police. Fact.
We get home safely – no
blue flashing lights. I couldn’t possibly drive to QC’s like this. I can’t
leave the wee man at home on his own while I take the tree to hers. Besides, I
can’t face the thought of lifting this humongous box up the three flights of
stairs to QC’s flat. I face the realisation that I’m going to have to accept
this bloody tree.
The next trick is to get
the box out of my car. We all adopt the same activities as before – the wee
fella pushes, I pull and QC stands wearing an expression of alarm. Eventually –
presumably in the same time it takes a crane to lift a container from the ship
on to the wharf, something gives – the car door handle- and the box is out the
car and with more pushing, pulling and sweat, is in my front room.
While my son and I catch
our breath, QC tears the industrial tape from the box – you know the silver
duct tape kind that serial killers use in all the movies – just to see how big
this tree is.
Think Norway’s annual gift
to the British nation.
-it’ll be lovely with lights on it, says QC prompted by
the fact that the room is so dark because the tree is blocking out the light
from the window. The expression of alarm on her face has deepened. She is by now desperate for me to take it off her hands.
She paused, where are the lights? Did you leave the lights behind, she asks me?
-I was
kinda busy with a big feckin’ box, sis, says I.
- Dad!
says the wee man.
QC’s last memory of the lights
was while standing watching me wrestle the tree container into the car. She
must have put them down somewhere, she surmises. So we all jump back in the car
and go back to the tree lady’s building …and there in a dark corner of the car
park was our box of lights. Hurrah. Nobody had stolen them. No doubt any
prospective thief had been put off by the thought of the increase to their
electricity bill once they were switched on.
A wee guy was walking his wee
dog past the scene as we screeched to a halt. QC jumped out of the car before I
could pull on the handbrake.
-forgot
my lights, she explained to the man as if it made perfect sense, while she
swooped for the box. I caught a glimpse of him over my shoulder as I circled
out of the car park – his chin was resting on the back of his dachshund.
By this time we had all worked up
an appetite so we decided to go to Pizza Hut. (Other restaurants focusing on saturated fat are available.) My stomach was saying, do not go
home, do not pass “Go”, go straight to food. The unhealthier the better. The
stomach was to be obeyed. QC generously offered to go halfers for any food.
Relieved the worst of it
was over, we had a wee laugh about our adventures on the way to the restaurant
– but it was to be an illusory moment of calm for when we parked and climbed
out of the car QC realised she didn’t have her handbag. I reasoned that it must
be in my house and besides I was not driving another inch without throwing
something down my throat. And it didn’t matter it if wasn’t a meal acceptable
to polite society.
By the time we got a seat in
Pizza Hut (see above) and ordered our food, QC had worked herself into a frenzy of worry. Her
house keys. Her mobile phone. Her purse.
Oh my fucking god, she screeched.
Maybe the handbag wasn’t in the house. It was on the backseat of the car while I
was pushing the tree-box in. Maybe it got pushed out the other end. Maybe she
left it in the same car park as the box of lights. Maybe it was in the tree
lady’s house. Maybe the tree lady had emptied her purse, had been shopping
on-line with her credit cards and was now happily phoning a porn phone line in
Chile using her mobile phone.
While QC borrowed my mobile
and phoned all of her friends to try and find out the tree lady’s number, the
wee fella gave me another row.
– you’re
different with your sister, he said, much more bossy.
Nobody had tree lady’s
number. Cue more worry and more doomsday scenarios – her house keys were in her
handbag, I would have to kick in her front door. No, I couldn’t do that as she
has mental neighbours and while she was sleeping they would ransack her flat. She
thought about it some more. NO, she couldn’t do that ‘cos she’d have to stay
awake all night and she was a monster if she didn’t get her sleep. Could she even
get a locksmith on a Saturday night? Shame she fell out with another neighbour
– the witch- ‘cos she used to keep a
spare key for her.
The food arrived and was eaten in
Guinness Book of Records time. The wee man didn’t even have time to get that
tomato smear on his wee cheeks.
There was a collective
holding of breath all the way from Pizza Hut to my house. The wee fella worried
that QC was going to have a rubbish Xmas. I worried that I was going to have a
mad woman on my couch for the rest of the weekend and QC just worried.
We pulled up in front of my
house and all of us took a deep breath and paused in prayer before we get out
of the car.
I unlocked the front door to my
house and QC almost knocked me into next door’s garden in her rush to get past.
The wee man and I looked at each other and waited at the door, afraid to look.
We heard a squeal. She’d found
it. Care to guess where?
Under the tree.
