We had white carpet in the sunken living room in our house in San Jose. If I’m not mistaken, there was linoleum in the kitchen and “family room” right off of it. I’m not sure skirted that living room or led to the bedrooms. Maybe wood. We weren’t allowed in the living room very often, but that’s where our tree was.
It was silver, our tree. Yep. We had one of those aluminum trees, complete with color wheel that rotated amber, green, blue and red light. (Of course, I didn’t know at the tender age of four that that was because aluminum trees are too much of a fire danger to string with lights.)
It was a magical tree to me: bright and cheery and dazzling. It’s the only time I remember having a silver tree. I don’t remember anything I got that year. But I can look back on it now and smile, knowing what’s considered “vintage” now was the latest thing then, and I had a sparkly Christmas because of it.
(Image borrowed without permission. We didn’t have one of the nice smooth color wheels shown in the picture with the tree. We had one with a metal frame like the one shown beneath.)
San Jose, CA: 1968
I recall being very impressed by the sight of candles upon a Christmas tree in a Tom & Jerry cartoon, and trying to duplicate the effect using cellotape and plasticine. Fortunately it didn’t work – otherwise I would have set the tree on fire, and with it the house probably.
Ahh…one of those times that find ourselves thankful (even if years later) for things we wanted that we didn’t get.