Today’s entry comes from my Aunt Joy Roberts. For those of you not related to me, she is my Dad’s second oldest sister. What can I say about my Aunt Joy? She was well named. She smiles easily and often and has a lovely singing voice. She has done many things in her life but most prominently she has led the music in hundreds of churches in her lifetime. Perhaps most worth mentioning for my New Mexico friends is that for a season when I was a child her husband Dale Roberts was pastor of the tiny Glorieta Baptist church just outside the conference center there and Joy led the music. I have so many memories of my Aunt Joy, but today we are focusing on the memory she shared.
The year we couldn't afford a Christmas tree.
In 1962, Dale was In the Army stationed in Christmas tree town USA (Shelton, Washington). Shelton is the present day home of a 32’ Santa that was originally built for the 1962 world fair. They are known for their rich timber heritage, and hosting annual christmas festivities.
One morning one of the Army wives and I went into Shelton to the laundromat. There were 11 families living in the same Army housing community. Dale had the highest rank so we made more money than the other families, but not much more. In this county if you were caught with a tree that was not tagged by the forest dept. you could be fined or even jailed. On our way to town at 6 am we were blocked on the highway by a bundle of tagged, 11 Christmas trees. Every family had a tree [free] for Christmas.
She and I struggled to lift those trees and tie them on the trunk lid of my MGA sports car, but we managed. It was fabulous. God provided.
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