Christmas Tree Disposal

For most people the Christmas tree ends up on the sidewalk shortly after the holiday ends. In the Midwest I always started decorating the day after Thanksgiving. Rather than have one large tree, we had several small trees in different rooms. Then I would cut down branches from the back yard and stuff them in to pots both inside and outside of the house. All the outdoor window boxes were equally festooned. But all the holiday decor was removed no later than New Years Day. But there are people who prefer to keep the holiday spirit going long after December 25. There must be something about the end of January that brings them to their senses. So we saw many Christmas trees out on the sidewalks this week. Some of them were almost bare! All the greens have long gone. But there were two trees that were not only on the sidewalk waiting for trash collection, they were IN the sidewalk. Along Massachusetts Avenue near Union Station it looked like the trees were being used as barricades from falling in to a hole in the sidewalk. One of them still had what you could call decorations. It was very peculiar but not totally unexpected. People do odd things around here. We just weren’t expecting this. They will probably still be there next week.