Once again, for the 18th year, my wife and I attended the Tree of Angels ceremony last night at a local church in Austin, Texas.
I have written about this touching ceremony before, the last time in 2011, and I will jut recall some details and do a little update.
Every year for the past 22 years, a wonderful organization, People Against Violent Crime, led by Verna Lee Carr, has provided a most reverent and appropriate forum for the families and friends of victims of violent crime and some of the surviving victims themselves to join together to place their Angels — each representing a loved one who became a victim of violent crime — on the Tree of Angels. One of the Angels is in memory of our beloved mother.
Until 2010, one tree was sufficient to hold the Angels of families and friends of victims of violent crime in Austin.
Then, in that year, a second tree had to be added — there were so many more Angels.
In 2011, I remarked “Tonight, both trees are almost full — hardly a space remains. A sign of the times?”
And last night, two years later, more and more people than ever stepped forward to hang their Angeld on the Tree. The new organizer of this wonderful ceremony, Kimberly Orts, tells me that there are now more than one thousand Angels. A sad statistic.
Even more sad, there are thousands more Angels being paced on Trees elsewhere as Austin is not the only city to hold this ceremony the first week in December. Forty-one other Texas counties now host Tree of Angels ceremonies, in addition to one in Oklahoma and in places as far away as New Castle and Sydney, Australia — a ceremony in honor of which Gov. Rick Perry and previous governors have declared the first week in December as “Tree of Angels Week.”
There were many new faces last night at the Christian Central Church, many new Angels and many fresh tears.
But there were also the familiar faces, the old and the young, who have kept each other company and who have consoled each other year after year.
In 2011, the heart-rending sight of a little boy placing his Angel on the Tree caught my attention. I talked to his mother after the ceremony and she told me that her son’s father had been killed by a drunk driver three-and-a-half years before that Tree of Angles ceremony. The little boy, Jeffrey Rosales, was only six then and appeared to be handling it well.
Last night, I recognized Jeffrey, two years older, again remembering and honoring his father by placing an Angel on the Tree.
Precious eight-year-old Jeffrey, still “handling it well,” showed me where he had placed his father’s Angel on the Tree (below).
Perhaps the biggest change for us this year was seeing our beloved 14-year-old grandson, who has been placing an Angel on the Tree for his great-grandmother — his “Oma” — since he could barely walk, playing — along with a friend — the prelude and accompaniment music for the ceremony.
Listening to our grandson play Christmas music so beautifully on his guitar brought tears of joy and sorrow to our eyes, realizing that his “Oma,” who never got to see or hold her great-grandson, must be so proud seeing and listening to him now.
The author is a retired U.S. Air Force officer and a writer.