A Different View with Dave O’Connell

A dog, they say, is for life and not just for Christmas. But two things that meet their Waterloo every festive season – indeed whose existence appears tailored for just this time of year – after trees and turkeys.

A particular kind of tree, of course, because nobody is going to take the chain saw to a big oak and try and fit it into the corner of the sitting room.

That said, you might have a better chance of a Christmas oak tree than a turkey this time given the outbreak of bird flu in the border counties.

Although I think those turkeys might just be taking a leaf from the playbook of a couple of people I’ve worked with over the years – feigning runny noses to escape their fate.

I recognize that there are many don’t eat turkey – or any kind of meat – and who find this sort of talk more unpalatable than the actual dinner might be. Funnily enough, I feel much the same way about Christmas trees.

It’s for the same reason that I’ve never seen the point of bouquets of flowers; if you love flowers, why would you want to cut them down and put them in a jar of water so that they can wither and die and slow death?

Buy a bulb or a small plant that can grow in the great outdoors so that you enjoy the gift every year when nature returns to bloom.

So it is with trees; if space permits and you’re not living in a fourth-floor apartment, why not plant a Christmas tree outside and throw the lights on it every year so that you can admire it in its natural habitat?

Why cut it down and take it indoors where it just sheds its needles on top of the presents placed underneath its branches?

I’m the first to admit that I’m no gardener and if I ever found myself green fingers, I’d put it down to an alarming problem with my blood circulation culminating in gangrene.

But I’ve always loved trees; big, magnificent, lasting longer than you.

I believe that planting a tree is one of the most generous acts you can do, because you know that someone coming after you will get most of the benefit from your work.

The best thing is that the few trees in our own small back garden is that they were there for decades before we moved in, and – apart from one that died two years back – they’re likely to be there for many years after we’ve gone.