i feel sorry for inanimate objects

under cover of twilight at 4:45 P.M. i drove bob's big old green ford F250 to the parking lot of the Bluebonnet Diner (or Blue Vomit as bob liked to call it). my mission was a christmas tree and i had to wait til dark because the inspection sticker on the truck expired back in august (i hope there are no cops reading this). my christmas tree guy has a set schedule and i knew he'd only be there until 5:00. bob and i discovered him years ago and love his variety of many-sized christmas trees for only thirty dollars max. i even brought my stand hoping that maybe he'd help me get the trunk in. this is my 3rd year getting a christmas tree on my own (bob was too sick in '06) so i still have a hard time getting the trunk in the stand. then again, both bob and pop had years of christmas trees under their belts and i seem to recall a lot of swearing by both parties associated with this once a year holiday effort.

i pulled in to the Bluebonnet lot to see jim (that's his name) putting his sign in the back of his pick-up. one lone christmas tree leaned against his wood stand. the only one left. this is one of the saddest christmas sights there is. i can't bear to look at un-bought wreaths and trees on christmas eve, looking so lonely and forlorn. their lives wasted because no one bought them for christmas. so you can imagine what the sight of this little lone tree did to me. you see, i have a problem. i feel sorry for inanimate objects and it would be all i could do not to buy this tree even if it was far too small. apartment size. i thought i'd go something like a six footer this year.

"is this the only tree you have left?" i asked and of course yes was his answer. i stared at the little tree, tormented. oh god, how could i leave it there all alone? if i didn't take it, who would?

as if reading my mind, jim said, "don't worry, if you don't take it, it won't go into the chipper. it was fresh cut yesterday and it will sell when i set up again on friday. i can't have too many small trees. people want them."

thank god. people want them. i didn't have to buy the tree based on fear that no one else would want it. because if that was the case i'd have to get it, even if it was too small to hold more than one string of lights and only a quarter of my ornaments. despite jim's reassurance, however, i felt bad that the poor little tree had spent 6 hours sitting out in the cold, rejected by every person who'd stopped there that day. it would be riding back to ashfield alone in the cold bed of his truck. could i actually let that happen?

i fought my urge to shell out $23 for a too-small tree just so it would have a christmas home tonight. i have to trust in jim that it won't be fodder for his chipper, that someone in northampton will need an apartment-sized tree on friday. if you live here and you need a little tree, please go buy that one. it took all i had to abandon the tiny tree and climb back in my truck, watching jim grab it by its little bark throat and toss it into the bed of his truck.

no, no, no, go home, valerie. wait for the tree you want.

this isn't my first struggle over inanimate objects. in fact, it happens all the time. i feel sorry for pathetic things, for lonely things, for leftover things. one day in a department store with my sister joanne we came upon an easter display. heaps of pastel-colored fuzzy stuffed animals just tossed into a pile, half of thems with their asses in the air, heads buried in the pile. i couldn't stand it. the ones with the faces would get all the attention if i didn't do something about it. they all had to have an equal chance at an easter home. so i stood there and righted every single stuffed duck, chick and bunny. sat them in a happy, smiling pile and left them, hoping my efforts would earn each one a home.

you might wonder how i ever worked at an animal shelter, right? believe me, it was hard. the only way i could do it was to take charge of photographing and writing up every cat for the web. to do so, i spent time with every cat trying to discover something unique about it. some hook by which i could draw someone in. one cross-eyed flame point siamese i compared to barbra streisand. i was not afraid to pull on heart strings and if a cat stayed too long at the shelter and became part of its Lonely Hearts Club i made it a poster and bombarded northampton with pathos. won't you give patches a chance? for months she's watched other cats come and go and wonders why no one ever chooses her... people started to come in to Dakin shelter actually asking for a cat by its description! barbra streisand was popular (again)! that's how i could spend hours there on sundays and manage to leave cat-less. well..... for the most part. we did end up with Mosby because after 6 months he was deemed unadoptable because of his unrelenting fear of people. and we did end up with Big because he was tagged as "vicious" ( of all things) depressed and anorexic. at 20 lbs, 8 yrs old, he romps and stomps happily around the house when he isn't licking me to death. and okay...i did end up with Baby from Best Friends out in Utah because she too was depressed and only (and literally) came out of the closet she hid in when i entered the Kitty Motel to squawk at me in her rusty gate old lady voice.

aside from the unwanted cats i've succumbed to, i have a special favorite and i sleep with it every night. it travels in my backpack with me on vacations and housekeepers set it on my pillows after making my motel room beds. it is my pink stuffed bunny rabbit. it doesn't have a name. that's all it's known by. bob and i happened upon the bunny rabbit in the grocery store shortly after one easter several years ago. a big cardboard box stood by the entrance filled with leftover easter candy and a 50% off sign. splayed alone in this pile of marshmallow chicks and hollow chocolate eggs was the pink bunny rabbit, a sad multi-colored pastel ribbon around its neck. god, it was so pathetic. every other stuffed animal had apparently been sold except him.

i have a lot of guilt associated with easter bunnies. as a child i had a big fawn colored bunny named Bun-Bun that my mother bought me when i was in the hospital. he was so tall and proud and cheery in his day. i destroyed him by sleeping with him for years. eventually he sagged and his metal frame feet stuck me in the ribs. his ears fell off and his head holes had to be sewn closed. he lost one black button eye and all the turgor went out of his neck so that it flopped over. fake fur rubbed off from years spent in the crook of my arm as i slept (yes, even into my teens), Bun-Bun looked like a mangy dog. sometime in my heartless 20's i threw him out. and to this day i wonder, how could i have done that?

so when i saw that pink bunny rabbit i stopped dead in my tracks and bob, knowing what was happening, groaned and picked the rabbit up by one leg and tossed it into the grocery basket. when i protested at such cavelier treatment he leaned over and put the bunny instead into the child seat of the metal basket and so we wheeled our way through the store. people smiling at us, somewhat charmed by our 'baby'. even the check-out lady was delighted and bob had to tell her " she felt sorry for it".

i sleep with it now the same way i slept with Bun-Bun of old. the pink bunny rabbit is a comfort there in the crook of my arm. a gift from bob i can hold close.