00:00:05 Speaker 1: Welcome to This Country Life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves from coon hunting to trotlining and just in general country living. I want you to stay a while as I share my experiences in life lessons. This Country Life is presented by Case Knives from the store More Studio on Meat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best outdoor podcast that airways have to offer. All right, friends, grab a chair or drop that tailgate. I've got some stores to share. It's all about the Christmas Tree. It's that time of year when lots of friends and families start gathering to celebrate Christmas. Regardless of gifts and activities, the one central item or gathering spot usually has a tree of some kind and close proximity. Christmas trees are the theme this week, and I'm sharing a new story and one that I've told before that's so good it'll probably be in the Christmas rotation from now on. Before I tell you that one, I'm going to tell you this one. This first story was handed to me by the man who wrote it, Jeremy Slum. Jeremy and his son Jacob had driven two hours from their home near Joplin, Missouri, to meet me at the Shepherd Hills Celebration of the Ozarks event I spoke at last September. We visited for not nearly long enough, and I could tell right away listening to them talk, that these two were my kind of folks. Before they left, Jeremy had to me an envelope and said, here's something for you to read sometime. I handed it to my wife Alexis, and she stuck it in my backpack. Thank me for the stories I tell on here, and said he hoped I enjoyed the one that he'd given me. I opened it that night after we got back to the hotel, and inside I found a handwritten letter. Was well thought out and neatly written. I knew it would be one to share when the time was right. Now it is so, without further delay, here's the Christmas Tree, with my voice using the words of Jeremy Sloan. When I was growing up, I loved spending time with my great uncle. His name was James Wooten. He was born and raised in Arkansas, and later in life he moved to Oklahoma. My uncle had a love for God and the outdoors, and James loved grow in a garden, grafting for coand trees, camping, fishing, and just enjoying nature. Now, we would always get together for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I left two hours away in Missouri, so we didn't get to see each other as often as we wanted. I always cherished the time I got to spend with him. Growing up. I'd spend a week with him in the summer and we'd ride horses, we'd work in his garden. We'd go camping and fishing, and always eat good food. After I grew up, my uncle retired, we started a yearly camping trip. We would meet down on the river, and that trip became our new tradition. We always caught plenty of fish. Sometimes we'd eat fresh caught trout for breakfast, dinner, and supper. We spoke the same language, even though I was grown and he was old enough to be my grandpa. When we were together, we acted like a couple of kids. On one trip, late in the fall, as we were fishing our honey hole, we noticed a big cottonwood tree. Now, there were many cottonwoods lining the banks by river, but this one was full of fishing lures. It reminded me of a Christmas tree. The way all the jigs and the spinners hung down from the limbs. Those limbs stretched out like fingers, grabbing every fly and lure it could get its greedy hands on. Years of lures hung there, shining in the sun and swaying in the breeze, free for anyone adventurous enough to attempt to get them. For two days, we joked about trying to recover all the lost and abandoned tackle, but the water was way too cold, weight and the limbs were way too high to reach. What I didn't know was that my uncle was coming up with a plan. On the last day of our trip, he showed me a long stick that he had whittled the notch into to act as a hook. It'd be my job to use it to pull the limbs down to where he could reach Bates as he waded out into the frigid water to retrieve them. We waited for the sun to go down, and after all the fishermen had left before we began. My uncle waded out into the freezing river and started collecting the lures from the limbs I pulled down to within his reach. He gathered the treasure that hung from the tree and made several trips back and forth, each time working up enough courage to go back out a little further and deeper from the bank, returning from each trip with all the lures in tackle he could hold, and we started laughing at our success and couldn't stop. We'd hit the fisherman's jackpot. After getting all we could, we hiked back to the camper. My uncle changed in some dry clothes while I made a pot hot coffee. We separated all the lures onto several paper plates in the camper. We set around the table admiring the flies, the jigs, the spinners, the hooks, and the bobbers. We might not ever have to buy tackle again. We took turns, choosing our favorites, one at a time, back and forth until it was all evenly divided between us. I will never forget that night. Many years have passed and my uncle is no longer on this earth, and I know that he's in the big campground in the sky. He was my outdoor hero, and I think about my uncle James often, like when my kids and I go fishing or I'm just out working in the garden. I think about him the most during Christmas and the time we found the Christmas Tree of every fisherman's dreams. Well, Jeremy, my friend, I can't thank you enough for sharing that wonderful memory of you and your uncle James. Stories like Jeremys aren't uniquely American, that they are, without a doubt, the very definition of American. Thank you, buddy. Now, I don't want y'all to think I'm lazy or running out of stuff to talk about, because, like I said, the story I'm about to tell you I've told before. As a matter of fact, I told you all this yarn about a year ago, and for those that are interested, it was an absolute chary to record because I couldn't stop laughing. My gal, Paul Rivera Hansen made either sound engineer extreme. The lady who struggles to make me sound like I know what I'm talking about every week said it was the most start and stops and do overs of any recording I'd ever sent her. I love to be able to tell y'all that what you hear every week is exactly what I send Reva, but that would be a bald face lie. I may read a paragraph I wrote three times in a row, or mispronounce a name, or confused myself with my own writing, to the point I have to edit the script myself right on the spot. Then I send that whole recording, including all the redos, the do overs, and the corrections, for her to sort out in her office way up in the frozen tundra of Bozeman, Montana. She takes all the calamity out of that amalgamated word jumble of nonsense, adds some music, and publishes what you good folks have allowed me to job in your ear holes every week. This story was a classic from the first time I read it when this Country Life listener Damee Fuller sent it to me last December. Dame is a storyteller, and as far as I'm concerned, he should be known as the Bard of Oklahoma. Timeless classics for the ule Tide season include stories from generations before us that are still relevant and being told today. This is one of those that I will go to my graves saying ranks right up there with the best of them. In eighteen forty three, Charles Dickens penned a Christmas care In nineteen sixty six, Jeene Shepherd wrote in God We Trust All Others paid cash that was turned into a screenplay that we all know as the movie A Christmas Store, And in twenty twenty four, Dame Fuller emailed me the Christmas Trees. It will be made into a movie one day, and when it is I'm going to make a fortune selling paper towels and depends on the theater lobby. Here it is again, just as Dane sent it to me, and his words and my voice. This is what might very well be the best Christmas story ever. Even though it took place roughly fifty years ago. Most of my cousins and I will attest that this is a mostly factual account. Growing up. Christmas even meant one thing, ma'am all and Papa's house. It was a tradition of the Fullers dating back to I believe three days after dirt was invented. R. C. Peck and Edith Gert Fuller had a pretty big family, five boys and a girl. Eventually, as kids back then did, they all left home to start families of their own, and soon they began bringing them back for the holidays. Not only kids and grandkids were there, but there were great aunts, uncles, second cousins, and so forth. By the nineteen seventies there was approximately five hundred and ninety seven men, women and children crammed that old house out in the sticks of Muskogee County in northeastern Oklahoma every Christmas Eve. Not really, not many, but man, it sure seemed like it now. One particular December twenty fourth, the house was filled to capacity. We had all eaten supper, and everyone was gathered in the front room. All of us grandkids were excited because Pap had finally said we could open presents. Our grandparents weren't rich, In fact, they had very little. Somehow, though every year they managed to get us all something. This year, times must have been a little tougher than normal. Instead of buying a tree, Pap had gone up the hill with his double bitted axe and chopped down a cedar tree a few weeks earlier. By the time the festivities rolled around, that cedar tree had turned the color of brown paper bag. Keep in mind, the Christmas lights back in the seventies were of the variety that could rival the temperature of the sun. Twinkle lights weren't anywhere close to happening. Seeing as how that tree had morphed into something akin to napalm. The adults in the room had decided that no string of Christmas lights would be plugged in. The grandkids tried their cow eyed best, their angelic faces to convince Papa into plugging the men, but he wouldn't budge. All of us tried, except for one, Scott cousin. Scott was born into the middle third of the order as far as the grandkid's ages went. However, he was lead off on the kind of kid that when his dad said not to do something or he'd get a whooping, Scott would ask how much of one? It was awesome being Scott's cousin back then, I could tear the bar down, and if he was there, I'd never get so much as looked at. Everybody just knew Scott did it anyway. He was seated next to me that night, and next to him was the television. Behind it was the outlet that would have held the plugs that were lying on the floor going to the lights that were still draped onto the Christmas tree. The duty of passing our presence that night had fallen on Ain't Judy the lone girl of the Fuller kids, and being a girl with five brothers, Judy had put up with a lot in her day. Not enough, though, to have obtained a calm demeanor capable of taking on anything. To say that she is easily frazzled is an understatement. After the first twenty or so kids had gotten their presence, Judy was nearing the end of her rope. The sound of shredding paper and squeals of delight and parents yelling at their kids to await their turn had taken its toll on Judy. It was at that precise moment that Scott made his move, without tapping my knee or giving me so much as hey, watch this. I observed him as he slithered behind the TV and picked up the light stream plug, eager to see the lights and maybe watch him get the butt busting of his life. I didn't say a word. He gave me a looking with that crooked smile. He plugged in the lights. Oh what a glorious sight. The red, blue, green, and orange bulbs sprang into light. Nobody noticed except for me, Scott's sister Charmon, and my sister Karen. The adults were too busy breaking up fights over cap pistols and baby dolls. They had no idea of the coup that Scott had pulled off for about two seconds, Almost as suddenly as the lights had appeared, they were being put to shape by the flame shooting out from under that long dead cedar tree. Now everyone had noticed. Uncle pee Wee grabbed the cord and tried to yank it out of the socket and then do it so he knocked over the inferno that was once considered a Christmas tree. Things sort of got blurry after that. The house was full of smoke. Dads grabbed kids and started literally throwing them toward the back door. Moms had run from the kitchen to catch them before any bones were broken. Uncle Rudy waded through the sea of kids, the wrapping paper, and the toys and made it to the tree. He began trying to stomp out the fire. Somebody no one knows who got the front door open, the very door that hadn't been opened for years because Mamma didn't want to tear a hole in her carpet. Terrified me. Because I sat next to the door and had been threatened with a switch or even acting like I might have open, I knew, without a doubt I would get whooped for sagging the carpet. No matter the black hole that had just been burned into it. Uncle Tuffy, Scott's dad, grabbed the still burning torch of a tree, knocked me out of the way, and threw it out into the front yard. Amidst the chaos, the screams, and the smoke, still in the center of the room was Judy running for her life with her hands clasping her face. She was screaming, oh my gosh, over and over, trying desperately to get herself and her kids out of live. She had never made it one inch farther from the tree than she was at the moment of combustion. She was literally running in circles. Happened. Never made it out of the recliner, Dad had never made it off the couch, and both were laughing as hard as I had ever seen anyone laugh. By now, Scott had made it out from behind the rc He probably knew that he should run while he was still able, but he was too busy enjoying the fruits of his labor, enamored by the sight of all the carnage. He never noticed his dad reaching for him, and no one knows exactly what happened to Scott once his dad pulled him away, but when he came back and the tears dried up, he was as quiet as a church mouse for the rest of the night, Christ has averted. It wasn't long until all the windows and doors in the house were opened to let the smoke out, and everyone had resumed their positions, though all were now wearing their coats. What was left of the presence was handed out, and Scott never sat next to that old TV again. And according to Dane Fuller, Native Oklahoma, now spying on the Texans down and Childers, that's just how that happened. A Dane. Once again, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for sending that treasure that I enjoyed telling as much as I do hearing it myself. That whole thing plays like an old timehole movie, complete with big haired ladies and corduroy breeches and flat top haircuts. I can smell the cedar burning as if I was right there when Uncle Tuffy save the day. I absolutely loved this story. Thank you, buddy. Now, still on the subject of trees, many moons ago, when the alexis and I wears broke as Job's turkey, a phrase my sainted grandmother Mama Slye used to describe poor folks. It was all we could do to afford to pay attention, much less by a bunch of Christmas decorations. It was our first Christmas, and while we had a tree, we needed a star for the top, and I bought one at Walmart. It was cheap, kind of gaudy looking, but it was a star, and outside of re presenting the Star of Bethlehem, its signified our first Christmas together as a family. For years now, me and my ball on a budget star. Having weathered yearly attempts to be replaced by something of a more cosmetically appealing nature, I have stood my ground and told them that they can decorate the tree every year with whatever they want. I don't care what they hang on the limbs. They can string popcorn, they can throw tensil, they can release possums, they can hire Martha Stewart herself to come over and decorate it, and I'll pay for it. But the first time someone replaces that star, We're gonna have problems. I get it, there's prettier things out there. One could argue that it was designed and put together in the dark, and from the looks of it. I couldn't prove it wasn't. But that heavy, old, ugly silver star that sheds glitter like a shaggy dog is more than just a tree topper. Is the where we were at a time when getting by was a struggle and extras for few and far between. After everyone else has gone to bed and it's just me and Whalen, I see that star sitting up there, and I can hear the laughter echoing in a small apartment of a new family, the beginnings of what would evolve into our well of life as we walk together into what has become our existence. It is a symbol of a time when we didn't see that star is settling for less, but rather looking at it as being grateful for what we could afford. Alexis is gonna hear this, maybe, and if she does, she's gonna roll her eyes most assuredly. Her idea of keeping something around after it starts to look beat up ends with me for now anyway. But regardless, I don't ask for anything for Christmas. I have everything I've ever wanted, and then so I love to give, and I can't keep a present longer than a week or so before I break down and give it to whomever I bought it for, just because I can't wait to see the expression on their face when they get it. So my gift to me every year is a clunky metal star that's as appealing on the tree as the starter off an eight in Ford tractor. Would they both in appearance and gross weight, or as the rest of the Reeds crew would suggest, gross weight and gross appearance? Who cares the star stays another year? They ain't really mad about it. If they were, they wouldn't be here with me right now to tell you all this For me Alexis and wailing to wonder how Mary Christmas. Y'all be careful