Yesterday, when I put up the tree at the LaGrange County House, I expected it to  be a short one that I would put on a chair and position on the porch. Well, in the end, it’s there on the porch, but it’s not on a chair. It is six feet tall.

I think what happened is a variation of the “upside down top of the Wal-Mart tree” syndrome.

Years ago, before we got our super Wal-Mart building, Wal-Mart was where Rural King is now – sort of a gloomy place. And at Christmas, one little section was transformed into a towering clutter of Christmas ornaments, lights, trees and garland. Trees were in a crowded display, put together by the random, unlucky employee. One year, I thought one tree looked a little odd; finally, I realized the tree looked like a big triangle on the bottom with a small inverted triangle on top and it dawned on me that someone had put the top of the tree on upside down.

That was before cameras in phones.

But let us look at 2011. I went into the Christmas area to get the aforementioned small tree and I saw one. I looked at the identifying Capital Letter by the tree to see what I should look for in the stack of boxes. No problem. Until yesterday when I pulled the branches and base – and middle section? – out of the box. So I look at the box closely and see the number “6” as in 6 feet. I believe someone left the middle section out when they were assembling trees.

I toyed with doing that, but decided to go “full tree”. It could use another string of lights. At least. Well, in a bit I’ll see to it, or maybe I’ll just decide I like the primitive tree look. Yes, I can feel myself liking it  more already.