Every loving parent is aware of the priceless value
of perfect imperfections. Refrigerator
doors in many homes are decorated with childhood drawings of trees, people, houses,
and other images drawn perfectly—not in the sense that they can compete in a
literal sense with the exact representation presented by a camera photo, but
that they represent the imagination and love of the households’ growing children. I got on this train of thought because today
Kathy decorated our house for the Christmas season. The little green reusable Christmas tree she
put up, she pointed out, did not stand up perfectly straight. This brought back memories of the Christmas trees
we had in Ellenton when I was a child.
For several years it was my good fortune to acquire the tree for our
living room. “Tree” in this case should
be used loosely. One year I cut several branches
from a nearby Australian pine, and somehow arranged them in the shape of a tree
in the Christmas tree stand. Another
year dad and I went down a country road eyeing growth near the ditch. There was a bush (not a pine) growing that
looked promising. It was dark green, and
about 3 or 4 feet tall. I climbed the
far side of the ditch and cut it down. We
had our Christmas tree. These “trees” of
course were no match for well-formed, regal pines. I suppose, looking back, that my parents saw
these as perfect trees in part because their son had fetched them. I only know that I felt that I was making a
real contribution to our Christmas celebration. This stands as a lesson for me: lack of
vision and love can sometimes mistakenly lead us not to see perfection in the
imperfect. What impact would it have had
on me, I wonder, if my parents had ridiculed and rejected my gifts of trees—if
they had preferred the conventional tree at whatever the relational cost?
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