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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

Trees of life

December 22, 2014 by Terry Teachout

Mrs. T and I put up our Christmas tree in Connecticut on Friday afternoon. I drove to a farm not far from our place, picked it out of the field myself, and carted it home for the two of us to trim. This is only the third tree that we’ve put up together, and like its two predecessors, I treasure it with all my heart.

B5P-gjRCIAAPDVoI snapped this picture immediately after we plugged in the old-fashioned lights. The photograph under the tree is a portrait of my mother, with whom I spent all but a handful of my Christmases prior to her death in 2012. It was her favorite holiday, and I think it would have gladdened her heart to know that Mrs. T and I have chosen to so honor her memory.

We opted for a miniature tabletop tree this time around, since it will have to be taken down the day after Christmas. On Saturday we return to New York, and on Sunday we’ll be traveling by train from there to Florida’s Sanibel Island. Even so, we couldn’t delight in it any more than if it were ten feet tall, for it is a symbol of our abiding love. As I wrote in this space eight years ago apropos of our first tree, “To be happy, not in memory but in the moment, is the shining star on the tree of life.”

I had that tree in mind when I wrote my favorite scene in Satchmo at the Waldorf, the one in which Louis Armstrong remembers his own first Christmas tree, which was bought and trimmed for him by Lucille, his fourth and last wife. The scene is reprinted below. I put the words in his mouth, but they’re all true, and I like to think that the little tree that is twinkling at my elbow as I write these words is not unlike the one that Louis remembers in my play.

I hope you’re as lucky as he was—and as I am.

* * *

1224_louis-wife-226x300ARMSTRONG First time I laid eyes on Lucille, I says, “That’s for me.” Now she got them hoity-toity ways, put that cute little nose in the air. (In falsetto) “Louis, this the way it gonna be!” (As before) And that’s when I gotta take her down a peg. (Blustering) “Woman, don’t you be giving me no shit now!” (As before) Mostly, though, we get along real good. I guess most ladies would have quit my ass long ago, but Lucille, she digs me. Don’t bother me till I’m ready to bother. Use to call me on the road ‘fore she fly out to see me, just to make sure I ain’t got no chick in the sack. How ’bout that?

Tell you a story. We get married, Lucille goes out on the road with me and it’s Christmas. Come back to the hotel after the show and there’s a little tree right there in the room, all lit up like nothing you ever seen before. She done trimmed it and put on the lights for old Pops! Now I ain’t never had no Christmas tree before. We couldn’t afford nothing like that back in New Orleans. Then I go out in the world, hit the road, nobody ever thought to put up no tree for me in no hotel room—not until Lucille. I come in, see that tree in the corner, and she say, “Merry Christmas, Louis!” And you know what? I wouldn’t let her turn it off. Lay in bed all night looking at them pretty lights winking and blinking, and I say to myself, “Satch, you done lucked out. Better do what you gotta do to hang onto that gal. You ain’t gonna do no better long as you live.”

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Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read More...]

The Long Goodbye

To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here. … [Read More...]

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