Saturday, December 13, 2008

THE Christmas Tree

Friends of mine were going to see "The Little Mermaid" on Broadway tonight and asked if I would join them for dinner before the show. We went to Virgil's on 44th Street; yum.

I decided to walk up a few blocks to Rockefeller Center and see the tree now they have turned on the lights. I had been by right after Thanksgiving--the tree was there but it was surrounded by all sorts of stuff while they put the lights on it. It is a pretty impressive tree: 72 feet tall and weighing at at 8 tons. The tree is from Hamilton, New Jersey where it was planted nearly 80 years ago. Here is information on the tree from Rockefeller's Web page:
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The Christmas tree that adorns Rockefeller Center is typically a Norway Spruce. The minimum requirement is that the tree be 65 feet tall and 35 feet wide, however manager of Rockefeller Center gardens prefers the tree be between 75 and 90 feet tall and proportionally wide. Norway Spruce that grow in forests don't typically reach these proportions, so the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree tends to be one that was ornamentally planted in someone's front or back yard. There is no compensation offered in exchange for the tree, other than the pride of having donated the tree that appears in Rockefeller Center.

Over five miles of lights are used to decorate the tree every year. Only the lights and the star decorate the tree. The tree is recycled and the 3 tons of mulch are donated to the Boy Scouts. The largest portion of the trunk is donated to the U.S. Equestrian team in New Jersey to use as an obstacle jump.
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Yes, impressive. But you know what goes through my mind every year when I see it? "Nice, but it could be bigger." Maybe because it is placed in that large, open area but it just seems small. I wish they kept the lights turned on all night. I would love to go down there in the wee small hours of the morning and stand next to it, without all those tourists, while the snow comes down and makes everything so quiet. I'm sure it would then seem very, very big.

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