Festivus for the rest of us

*My mom knows how much of a sucker I am for volunteering for a good cause. So she went ahead and signed her, my sisters and myself up to help out at the Festival of Trees. Which if you are unfamiliar is a festival of donated trees by family members who have lost loved ones, mostly. The trees are extravagantly decorated and then auctioned off, and the money goes to Primary Children's Hospital to help other families. I have never been to this event, I have always wanted to go, but never had the chance. This event- unlike the Twilight convention I attended at the same location-was huge. Tons of trees and wreaths and many other overly decorated items. Turns out my sisters, the Lucy and Marianne, had things to do and couldn't come, or be charitable with their time, losers. So I went with the Mom, reporting for duty at 7:00 pm. We headed straight to the volunteer boutique and were briefed for 2 seconds. They gave us a section of trees to stand by and our job was to make sure no one takes or touches anything on/off the displays. Also there is a short story about who the tree is dedicated to on the back of the signs, and they suggest we read them. Then off we go.

Each section of trees, consisted of more than twenty trees. Which means more than twenty stories, so I opted to not read them. There were a few times I was asked what the story was and I just read it off the card, word for word. I was, as if by fate, placed next to a Nightmare Before Christmas Tree. It was upside down and decorated with Jack Skeleton ornaments, ssmarvelous (funny face anyone). I got asked about the story behind it a lot. Turns out the family didn't indicate how the teenage boy died, which most do. The first few people I said just that, and read them what the family wrote. People were less than impressed, they wanted the nitty gritty. So the next time someone asked, I said "Oh he died in a car crash, So sad, he was after all very young." and all were pleased, literally, smiling faces. It worked so well, I stuck to "pulling it out of my ass" all night, because people asked a ton of questions I had no answers for. For example: How do we know how much the sold trees went for? Some of them have prices and some have sold signs and some have nothing, what does that mean? Where can I find the other tree like this? Who sets the prices of the tress? Is it a packaged deal with all the other stuff or just trees?

Sooooo many questions, and at first I just said "I don't know, I'm just here to make sure you don't nick any of this stuff, or touch it, like you currently are." (for some reason adults had the hardest time not touching or coming over the rope. When I asked some of the other volunteers they had the same problem; not so much the kids, but the parents were handsy. Just because you are an adult, it does not mean you get to touch things!) So I started saying things like: Oh the tree sold for $6,000, I know so much! The trees with no price, are very expensive and they take you into a room and tell you the price! There is another tree like this one, its two rows over!

Oh man, it was good times! In hindsight I do feel sort of bad. Although it did please people to have their questions answered. Almost as if, by a christmas miracle I was able to enter their lives and give them a gift that no one else could, the gift of lies. It sort of warms my heart. L