Trick or Tree

And other fall holidays…

A friend of mine at the office is part owner of a tree farm in Marlborough, NY, which is across the river and up the road from our house. Late yesterday afternoon, with directions to this place firmly locked into my infirm brain, we popped across the Hudson to cut down a fresh tree for the house. I had never been there before, but the directions seemed fairly simple. So simple, in fact, that I failed to get a phone number.

This farm specializes in trees 10′ or larger for the one-price-fits-all sum of $50. We don’t really need anything more than 9′, but the price was better by twenties of dollars than anything else around. That was, of course, until you factored in the gas I wasted looking for the little tree farm.

What was supposed to be a simple, “…drive to the library in Milton, turn left and drive to the end of the road,” ended up being a drive around in circles for an hour asking every twelve-year-old kid you see on the street if they know where there’s a Christmas tree farm. By 3:45 we’d driven around for over 40 minutes with absolutely no luck. Kathy, to say the least, was feeling a little disappointed.

Not willing to give up completely and not yet ready to take a trip to Lowe’s to snatch a 6′ tree, I decided to drive a little further up the road and just beyond the Hudson Valley Sports Dome, where I play soccer during the winter. The Sports Dome is situated in a former apple orchard and there are still a lot of farms around the area. I figured that a trip in that direction might work out well.

As we turned onto the road leading to the Dome we saw a sign for a place called Split Rail Nursery that was right down the road. The sign said that they closed at 4:00 pm, the current time was 3:55. We raced down the road and pulled into the parking lot at 4:00 sharp. We were met by a guy wearing Carhartts and a baseball cap who looked none too happy to see us. I asked him if they were closing and he said that they were trying to. I asked if we could look at a couple of trees and he said sure, but we couldn’t cut a tree down, we had to choose from one of the pre-cut trees he had sitting stacked on a rack. Seeing as it was 4:00, we weren’t about to complain.

The first tree we looked at was GORGEOUS. Perfectly shaped, about 9′ tall. Just plain lovely. The next tree we looked at was GORGEOUS too. About 10′ tall and, again, perfectly shaped. And so was the third and fourth and fifth tree. Kathy and I looked at each other like we’d just struck Christmas tree gold. We selected our tree—the first one—with the help of our three little cherubs—Cherubs being a necessary part of Christmas—and then I went inside to pay.

When I got to the counter I noticed a list about a mile long with nice little highlights and check marks next to each name on the list. So, checkbook in hand, I asked, “Are we supposed to be on that list?”

“Yup, supposed to be.” said the guy behind the counter.

“Oh, I don’t think we are.” said I.

“You want me to put you on the list?” says he.

“Sure,” says I.

“That way we’ll let you know when it’s time to come and get your tree next year.”

“Oh…” says I, “Yeah… thanks…”

Kathy got the whole story from the owner—the guy in the Carhartts—while I was inside paying the bill. Turns out these guys typically only sell trees to the people on their list. They spend the entire year pruning and maintaining the trees and then, sometime around Thanksgiving, the people on their list get to come out and tag the trees that they’ll come back later and cut down. After looking at some of the tagged trees it was pretty clear that this was not your typical “cut-your-own-tree” farm. This was a “cut-your-own-perfectly-groomed” tree farm.

The trees on the rack? Those are for schmucks like me who happen upon the place and decide they need a tree. Our GORGEOUS tree didn’t even come from this farm. It was handpicked by the owner and also groomed and trimmed to perfection. The price? $40. Or about the same price I might have paid for a smaller and much uglier tree from Lowe’s.

Needless to say, we’re on the list for next year.

By the way… I didn’t even have to cut any branches off the tree. I just cut 1 1/2″ off the bottom and dropped it into the holder.

Like I said, perfect.