THE DAY I STOLE A CHRISTMAS TREE!

 I hadn’t been married quite one year when it happened. I wanted a tree for my wife Dodie and my six-year-old stepson, Mark, very badly, but I couldn’t afford one. The money I made barely provided for rent and three meals a day. Often we got along on two. Neither Mark nor Dodie complained, but the closer we came to the holidays, the more frequently Mark would ask, “When do we get a Christmas tree, Daddy? When will we start decorating it?” “Soon,” I promised him. “Soon we’ll get a tree.” But I didn’t have the faintest idea where the money would come from. About four or five days before Christmas I took Dodie and Mark for a walk through Griffith Park – for the only kind of entertainment we could afford. As we walked along a narrow, winding trail, I suddenly noticed how much the trees on both sides looked like Christmas trees. That’s when I got the idea. Rather abruptly I told Mark and Dodie that it was time to go home. I am sure they did not understand my shortness at the moment, but I did not want to get them involved by explaining. As soon as we got back to the house I called my friend Nick Benet and told him I had to see him immediately. When Nick came to the house, we had a huddled conference in the privacy of the front entrance. When we were through, I told Dodie I had to go out for an hour, but instead of heading for the door, walked into the kitchen and rummaged through the drawers. Puzzled, she watched my search. She was even more astonished when I finally lifted the meat saw out of the drawer. “What on earth do you need that for?” she asked me. “I’d rather you wouldn’t ask me,” I said, feeling guilty. Dodie looked at me in a peculiar way but said nothing.

 When Nick and I got in my car, I shoved the saw under my shirt so it wouldn’t be noticed as we drove along. We hit a couple of bumps in the road on the way to Griffith Park and I felt the sharp edges of the saw tear into my skin. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when we parked the car near the Observatory, climbed over the wall that encircled the parking area and slowly slid down the steep hill. There were a few people around but we were so well hidden by the trees that they didn’t notice us, or if they did they didn’t pay any attention. We looked for about half an hour until we found a tree which I thought would be about right. While Nick stood watch, I started sawing through the trunk until I was about seven-eighths of the way through. All I’d have to do when I came back at night, I figured, was to bend it and it would snap off. The task done, we climbed back up the hill, got into the car and drove home. After dark that night, Nick and I returned to Griffith Park. To our shock, when we reached the Observatory we saw that the parking lot was jammed full of cars for some sort of show they had that night. While we were upset at first, we quickly realized that this might be a break after all, for with all the activity at the Observatory, surely no one would pay any attention to two fellows climbing down the hill. Our plan seemed to be working perfectly. It took but a little effort to snap off the tree. But when we started to drag it back to the parking area, we discovered to our dismay that it must be twenty feet long. We had no saw with us and if I wanted a tree, there was no choice but to go through with our plan. By the time we got to the top, both of us were scratched and bleeding. We were just trying to lift the tree across the wall when a light was flashed into my face. I felt like a criminal who had been caught in the act. Mechanically, I dropped my end of the tree and Nick did the same. As yet we didn’t know whether the officer who was flashing the light in my face had seen it. “The park is closed, fellows,” he said matter-of-factly. He hadn’t noticed the tree. “Is it that late?” Nick cried out with relief. “Yes, you’d better get out of here,” he said kindly. We surely did, but when we drove home I felt miserable. All the work had been in vain; I still wouldn’t have the tree for Christmas, Mark would be disappointed. The shock of being given a warning should have been enough to make me refrain from continuing my plan. It certainly should have kept me from involving my wife. It didn’t. By the way I looked, talked and felt when I got home, it was quite obvious to Dodie that something was terribly wrong. I confessed my whole story to her. She looked at me quietly for a moment, then started to say something, but stopped herself. She thought about it some more and then came back, “What is it you want me to do, Mike?” My instinct told me to say, “Nothing, let’s forget the whole thing.” Instead I burst out, “I want you to help me. I need you.” 

Early the next morning Dodie and I drove up to the Observatory. Because the battery of my old car was just about burned out, and not wanting to take a chance on not being able to start the car, we parked it with the front end facing downhill. There were practically no people in the park that early in the morning and Dodie and I managed to lift the tree across the wall and carry it towards the car. Suddenly we saw a couple of kids run towards us. Instinctively we dropped the tree and when they got close, I shouted, pointing at it, “That sure looks like a Christmas tree, doesn’t it?” Dodie nodded silently. Now a policeman rushed over, too. Again pointing at the tree, I told him, “We just found this tree. It sure looks diseased, doesn’t it? I thought if no one wants it, we’ll take it home for our boy.” The policeman looked at me questioningly. I force a grin. “Some kid must have cut it down.” “Or some nutty adult,” he said at last. “Well, maybe we’d better leave it, although it isn’t any good to anybody,” I said finally. “If you want to, you can take it to the National History Museum.” The policeman told us. “If the Ranger say’s the tree’s not diseased, you can have it. Dodie and I couldn’t fit the tree into the trunk, but we did manage to get it into the back seat of the open convertible, with the top hanging out eight or nine feet beyond the bumper. We headed downhill, but we hadn’t gone more than half a mile when the officer pulled up behind us. “Just follow me,” he shouted as he drove ahead. Now I was sure we’d had it. The ranger would discover that the tree was freshly cut and healthy, put two and two together – and Mark would spend Christmas alone while his parents were in jail, I told myself. About half a mile from the entrance the policeman waved his arm toward the Natural History Museum and then pulled away. I breathed more easily. Fate had been with us, I told myself as I slowed down, waited until the policeman was out of sight and then, passing the museum, turned left onto Los Feliz Boulevard, heading for home. I didn’t get far. A minute after we had left Griffith Park, I heard the sirens behind me. A few seconds later a fire truck pulled up behind us and the driver ordered us to pull over. “Where did you get that tree?” he shouted at me. I told him the same story I had told the policeman. And his reaction was just like the officer’s. “Take it to the Natural History Museum,” he told me. “Better yet, follow me.” He drove all the way to the museum, and waited as Dodie and I pulled the tree out of the car and walked to the side entrance on the far side. While the fireman was carefully watching us, I knocked at the door. There was no answer. I knocked again, harder, and then I peeked through the window and saw that the room was empty. I tried the door handle. Finding that the door was unlocked, I stepped inside and loudly said, “Hello.” I started talking just loud enough for the fire warden to hear my voice, and I answered myself with a different intonation. After a few minutes I came back out of the door and told him the ranger had said it was okay for me to take the tree. Of course, there had been no ranger. For an instant, I thought the fireman would seek to verify my information, but he just drove off. As Dodie and I drove back home we had such a guilty feeling about what we had done that we hardly talked to each other. We parked the car in front of the house and, when we dragged the tree into the room, we found it was way too high for the ceiling. So I chopped off a good part of it – and promptly split the tree right down the middle in the process. It was another bad omen. Dodie got some wire and I wired it together, then shoved it into a corner of the room because I had to leave for a job interview. When I came back, Dodie was frantic. It seemed the moment I left, all sorts of ugly bugs started crawling out of the tree. In fact, the whole room was crawling with little animals which we had to kill one by one. Both of us knew that such ill-gotten gain would bring no happiness to us, but Mark had no hint of what had happened. All he could see was a beautiful big Christmas tree; he was crying with happiness. 

The following day we took what cash we had and bought decorations. Meanwhile, the tree was shedding so fast we feared that by Christmas there wouldn’t be a needle left. Two days later was Christmas and, while the tree looked scraggly, Mark couldn’t have been happier. Dodie and I couldn’t have been more miserable. We realized what we had done. We knew we had to make up for it somehow. On the day after Christmas there wasn’t a green needle on the tree. We took off the decorations, cut up the tree and took it out to the street to be picked up by the trash collector. The same afternoon I got a check in the mail for some work I had done. It was the first money I’d seen in a month. “Now we can really celebrate,” I told Dodie. There was something in the way she looked at me that made me feel even more guilty than I had before. “How much will you need for groceries to see us through the next few days?” I asked her. She told me the barest minimum, which was about a third of the money I’d received. Dodie and I never discussed what should be done with the rest of it. We just knew. I didn’t know much about charitable organizations, but I knew that the Salvation Army was a pretty good outfit to hand a check to, so I took whatever we didn’t need for food for the next few days and gave it to them to ease our consciences. I didn’t quite succeed. I was convinced that the only way to get rid of my guilt was to confess what I had done and take the consequences. On New Year’s Day I drove back to Griffith Park and walked into the Natural History Museum. A tall, middle-aged man in a green uniform was sitting behind the desk. I gave him my name and then started to tell him what had happened. Before I got very far he looked up at me with surprise and some satisfaction in his eyes. “So you’re the boy?” “You know?” He nodded his head. “The police officer reported it the day after Christmas and the man from the fire department told me about a fellow who was talking to himself.” He smiled. So they knew all along, I thought to myself. “Why didn’t they say anything?” I asked the ranger. “It was so close to Christmas,” he said simply. “Thanks,” I said and turned to leave. When I reached the door I looked back, “I promise you I shall never do anything like this again.” “I know you won’t,” he said, then added, “have a happy new year.” I choked hard as I got back into my car and drove home. Although I did give some money to the Salvation Army, although I had confessed my actions, I have lived with a feeling of guilt all this time. I feel that in addition to telling you about it, I still have to tell it to one more person – my stepson, Mark. I hope he will understand, and forgive me.

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