What story does this ornament tell?

Christmas ornaments can be very sentimental and hold our memories.

I have always loved Pottery Barn Christmas ornaments - they are so beautiful.  And usually, they aren't super expensive - some of the ones I have were less than $9 each and came with free shipping.  Sometimes Mark and I would get them as a gift at his office Christmas party since the boss's wife was really into PB.  And sometimes I ordered them as Christmas gifts - especially for Chloe, as a mother/daughter Christmas tradition. They were also a once-a-year splurge for the family tree which was always styled elegantly, compared to the kid's tree.  But quite literally, I was the only one who it mattered to, and I bet my kids wouldn't even remember them.

Sometimes that's how it is with such things at your house - not every thing is meaningful to everyone who lives there.

I came across an ornament that I dubbed "the magical tree".  The year it came out, bottle brush trees were having a major moment.  They sold out pretty fast, and I remember sending a photo of this one to a friend with an excited "look what I got!" message.  Over the years I have coddled and babied the storage of this ornament, wrapping it carefully in bubble wrap and tissue paper, setting it at the top of the box so I wouldn't forget it was in there and set something else on top of it.  I never even hung it on the tree because it was "special", so it tended to live behind the glass of the china cabinet.  But what was so special about an ornament I didn't even hang on our tree?

I feel like this ornament tells a story of valuing things over experiences and people.  Over making Christmas into a pursuit and accumulation of more stuff that is pretty, but not necessarily useful or even memorable.  It made me feel nothing when I saw it, so I wasn't going to set it out anywhere.  Then I decided to just go ahead and hang it on the tree, stop prizing it so much (if it breaks, it breaks), and think about what I truly want to feel and experience this Christmas.

Maybe this tree was a literal message to me in a bottle.