Coach's Corner

I'll go on the record,straight away: I don't know much about The Culture of the Christmas Tree. And from my admittedly limited experience in this area it is a culture ... though not one a Jewish city boy would be very familiar with. My exposure was pretty much limited to what the Anderson family did on Father Knows Best. Nice families sat around a swell tree (mom in a plaid dress with pearls, dad in a coat and tie) and opened boxes and boxes of presents.

After some years of cohabitation and marriage with a good Christian girl, I've learned that those Fifties sitcoms left out some stuff. For instance: finding the tree. Like the groundhog who seems to know when to emerge from his hole, or the goose who understands the exact time to start heading south, my wife senses the exact proper moment to go tree hunting. As the odd sneeze signals the onset of the flu, the tree hunt is always preceded by a flurry of her many Christmas carol tapes. Whenever the moment comes, it's time to go ... right now!

I would've never previously imagined the complexity of this seemingly simple activity: the touching, smelling, and appraising that goes into finding just the right tree. To me, a tree's a tree. This, I've found, is simply not true. More than one stop and the rejection of hundreds are necessary before the right one is found.

The urge struck Kelly last Friday, so off we go. We journey to a distant landscaping store -- which has many trees -- but there's something wrong with the needles, or something. I don't know exactly. The hour is late, so early on Saturday morning we're off again to several of those ubiquitous places in mall parking lots. Many trees. But ... maybe the first place wasn't so bad. Back we go. After much searching, an acceptable tree is found. A problem arises. It's so early, the kids who cut the bottom off the trees (why do they do that?) are still home asleep. Not to worry: They'll save the tree for us.

After a midday break for the State Championship football game, we go back to the distant store. That the tree barely fits into the back of the truck is a foreshadowing that goes unnoticed. After the ritual of dragging, pulling, and lifting -- smashing fingers into door jams, legs into the sharp sides of tables, knocking down lamps, and scaring our various pets under beds or into cages -- the tree (clearly too big) is finally in the room.

It is my experience that the man's job is to lie under the tree -- being stuck and jabbed by sharp needles and tree branches -- and try to guide the tree into a little hole and then somehow secure it with those diabolically medieval metal screws as the female yells various physically impossible commands at him. It's quickly apparent, when the tree holder bends under the weight of our Yule tree, that the trunk's too big for the hole. This isn't going to work, though Kelly's not giving up that easily. Then, from my buried place, I hear this: "Son of a ** bitch," says my wife, the elementary school teacher, "I've got ** sap all over me!" And indeed she does. A close examination shows a huge crack in the trunk. Blessed sap is everywhere.

It's dark by now and quite cold. I'm informed we must drag the tree out -- large broken pine branches in every room marking our precise trail -- and take it back. This will be my sixth trip to a tree store, my fourth to this one alone. I've had it. I refuse to go. I'm told I must go. It's "my duty as a husband to go back," and if I require further confirmation in this area I'm invited to call her mother, who will gladly confirm this Christian precept. Kelly is close to tears at this point. Okay, okay, I'll go.

Another two hours, another fiasco. The new tree also proves to be too big. Kelly (now totally obsessed) goes off to find another base, something capable of supporting the National Tree at the White House. After some sawing, clipping, and bleeding on the rug, the damn thing's up. Of course we don't have enough lights to cover it, and within a day or two the cat will destroy it ... ornament by ornament.

A whimsical suggestion that next year she consider conversion to Judaism -- where we'd buy a neat little menorah and play with a dreidel -- is met with an icy glare and a totally unfounded, not very Christmas-y accusation that I've hidden her favorite Christmas tape.

Parting Shots: Rick Barnes has to realize he's selling entertainment pure and simple. Ripping fans for not trekking to the Erwin Center on a rare nice winter afternoon to watch his team play a dog like Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, when they could be across the street watching (many were) the 5A State Championship, or doing almost anything else, isn't being realistic. Austin's not Norman, or frigid Madison, Wisconsin. We have many entertainment choices. As for getting students into empty arena-level seats, it shouldn't be so hard. Many pro teams use the Internet as a conduit for filling empty seats. Smart people work in the Athletic Department. Figure something out.