It was back around '76 'er '75.... One of those two years unless it was '77 then it was neither but nevermind that 'cause it don't much matter now, does it???

I was livin' in this, ahhhhhhh, big house in east Richmond with a bunch of stoners who I had known going back years and Christmas was a'comin'... But before we can get into all that I gotta introduce my housemates to ya'... Billy D was a truck driver, one fine harp player, quite intellectual considerin' he had never taken a college course and always reading history books... Why??? I donno seein' as all them peoples was dead... Then there was Stoner Bo who wasn't quite as intellectual... Might of fact, he flunked outta college during freshman orientation... Speakin' of flunkin' out of college during freshman orientation there was JD... He flunked out while fillin' out the application for college... I mean, he was a serious stoner...

And there was me... Considerably older and workin' to save the world as a social worker by day but just another pothead at night...

And, of course, there were always womenz hanging around doing womenz things like askin' if we were goina get a Christmas tree???

"Well, sho nuff, we are gonna... Right, boyz???"

*What's a Christmas tree???"

"Screw that, what's Christmas, man"

You know, the usual stoner answers...

But Billy D was driving a truck for a paper company that made big rolls of paper and his bossman said that we could go out to his farm and cut any tree we wanted to use as a Christmas tree so that was the plan...

So, I happened to have the largest car which was a '66 Falcon 2 door so we grabbed the directions that Billy D had gotten from his boss, piled in the Falcon with a couple of the womenzfolk and was off to the country to get us a Christmas tree...

Twenty miles and couple joints later we arrived at what we thought was Billy D's bosses farm and piled out, found a fairly nice white pine, cut it down with a handsaw we had brought and was tiein' it to the roof of the Falcon when 3 Henrico Police cars pulled up, red lights a'blazin'...

"Ahhhhh, what's up, officer???"

Well, as long as I live I don't think that when you ask a cop "Ahhhhh, what's up officer?" that yer gonna like the answer and this was the case, as well...

Best I could figure after gettin' handcuffed was that Billy D got something wrong in the directions.... Hmmmmmmm??? Did I say that he was kinda intellectual??? Well, not that night he wasn't... He was just another handcuffed stoner and we were all off to the Henrico County jail fir trespassin' and tree stealin' and just being dumbass stoners with wrong directions... Maybe they didn't like my Falcon either, I donno... It did have a hand painted paint job so it couldn't have been the paint...

So we all got booked for trespassin'... Fortunately fir us the at least the majistarte beleived our story and didn't make it the felony kinda trespassin' and seein' as Stoner Bo's parents were upstanding citizens we was all released on persoanl recognizance... BTW, I never understood that stuff at all... I mean, most folks been 'round enuff mirrors in their lives to recognize themselves, right???


And seein' as God looks after fools, stoners, drunks and kids we had plenty of Devine coverage that night 'cause the cops even gave us a ride to the impound lot where we had to fork over $35 to get the Falcon back... Also in the category of Devine coverage the cops never looked under the drivers seat where I always kept my stash...

So, what to do???

"Fuck it, let's go back and at least get that tree..." I said and so we were back in the Falcon, smokin' pot with the AM radio a'blarin' country Christams songs on our way back to get the tree the cops wouldn't let us take... Stoners ain't really the wisest of the lot, ya'll but that Devine coverage held up long enough fir us to stop on the side of the road, open the hood as if we was havin' car trouble while JD jumped the fence, snagged the tree, threw it over the fence, got the sumabich tied down and off we went to the tune of "I Saw Grandma Makin' it with a Raindeer" 'er somethin' like that...

'Bout 2:00 in the mornin' we get back home with the tree and the next day is Saturday so noone had to work 'er nuthin' so we got up bright and early, you know, about noon and brought the tree in and rigged it up inside a wash tub with cinderblocks holdin' it upright... We didn't really have any orniments so we made stuff outta beer cans and stuff and it looked, ahhhhhhh, okay to us...

Well, friends came by over the next week and added things to it and by Christmas it was one heck of a stoned out Christams tree!!! I mean, righeous... It was a lovely Christmas... Someone got a new Outlaws LP and we played it between Dead stuff, stayed stoned up prurdy good the entire time and that's all I remember specifically about that Christmas, other than the tree, of course...

New Years Eve came and the tree continued to get more and more decorated by us and by friends... Only trouble was that it had dropped about half it's needles but din't seem to bother anyone at all...

Our court day was January 15th and we all had to go in there and say they same story 7 'er 6 times about the directions and how we was sorry to have broke the law and that we'd be good and help old ladies cross the street and we was all given $25 fines and another $37 in court costs which brings me to the quesion about them court costs... Hey, what do we pay taxes for, anyway??? Ain't this like double jeoprady, 'er something legalese like that???

But we din't go to jail and we was all good and broke from all the money goin' into Boss Hog's peepot but it was over and so what are ya' gonna do??? Yep!!! Invite all yer friends over to listen to Outlaws, Dead and smoke alot of pot... It was one of them coldass night that Richmond gets the middle of January and we had us a bigass wood stove in the livin' room with a bigass fire in it... Now that woodstove also had a bigass crack in the side but it din't much matter as long as it was roarin' and roarin' it was a'doin'...

This guy from Southside always had this weed that he called "skunk" and he had brought a bag of that skunk and I'll be the first to tell ya' that everyone was purdy danged messed up on that skunk stuff...

'Bout midnight on that coldass January 15th night that dried out Christmas tree and a spark from that bigass woodstove somehow got inroduced and it was love at first sight... Sho nuff was 'cause before anyone could actually comprehend what was occuring before them, let alone get their stoned ass off the couch, that tree was seriously burned up... I mean, gone burned up... Gone, gone gone burned up...

After a chorus of "Far out, mans" one of the womenz went into the kitchen, filled up a cook pot with water and threw it on what little fire was left burnin' on the trunk of the burned up Christmas tree while the rest of us rounded up fans, opened windows and doors to get the bad smoke out and after about a half an hour we was all back to listening to the Outlaws and Dead, smokin' that skunk and havin' some good laughs about everything... Kinda made us forget that $25 plus $37 in court fees fir the rest of the night...

Now adays, I don't smoke no skunk and steal no trees and one might attribute that to that night but that ain't so... Just can't find the skunk no more...

Ya'll have yerselves a Merry Christmas and don't put yer Christmas trees next to yer woodstoves, ya' hear???

Bobert