The Tree That Was Finally Tall Enough

On high ceilings, eight-foot trees, and finally having room for what I actually want

The star fit perfectly in my palm. Not heavy, but substantial. The kind of weight that feels intentional.

I stood on the small stepladder, just high enough to reach the top of an eight-foot tree, and placed it there. The lit star. The one I’d imagined since I was a child flipping through Christmas catalogs, circling the trees that looked like they belonged in department store windows.

When the light came on, something in my chest opened.

Not metaphorically. Actually.

A fullness I wasn’t expecting. Joy that felt almost startling in its brightness. Like my whole body had been waiting decades for this specific moment and finally had permission to feel it.

It was just a Christmas tree.

And it was everything.

The House with Seven-Foot Ceilings

My first house was a rectangle from the 1940s. I was blessed to have it…homeownership at all felt like an achievement. It served me well in the ways houses do: shelter, equity, a place to build a life.

But the ceilings in the main living area were just barely seven feet tall. The basement was shorter.

I didn’t realize how short everything was until I’d already moved in. The realtors had been clever; they’d opened all the doors during the showing. But the doorknobs were a few inches lower than standard doors, and I didn’t notice until I was living there, ducking slightly every time I went downstairs, that the whole house was built for a smaller scale than I’d imagined.

Every December, I’d think about Christmas trees. The magnificent ones. The kind that fill a room and demand attention. Eight feet tall, at least. The kind that truly celebrates Christmas instead of just acknowledging it.

We never got that tree.

We’d put up something sad and practical. Five feet, maybe. Haphazardly stood up a few days before Christmas, if we remembered at all. Minimal decorations. An afterthought more than a celebration.

I told myself it was fine. The house was too small for anything bigger. The ceilings wouldn’t accommodate it. We were being practical.

But I was always a little disappointed. A little resentful, even, though I couldn’t have named what I was resenting.

The house was too small for the tree I wanted.

And I was learning to make my wanting smaller to fit.

You probably have your own version. The thing you stopped wanting because the container couldn’t hold it. The desire you learned to trim, accommodate, make practical. Until you almost forgot you’d wanted it at all.

What Else Was Too Small

I left my marriage for specific reasons. Clear ones. I wanted kids. He didn’t. That’s not the kind of difference you can compromise on or wait out or hope changes.

But there was something else underneath that. Something harder to name.

The marriage felt small.

Not in the sense of intimate or cozy. Small in the sense of constricting. Like I was learning to fold myself into a shape that fit the container, but the container kept getting tighter.

I couldn’t grow the way I wanted to grow. Couldn’t want what I wanted to want. Couldn’t even decorate for Christmas the way I’d imagined since childhood.

Every accommodation felt reasonable in isolation. The house has low ceilings, so we get a smaller tree. He’s not ready for kids yet, so we wait. My voice feels too loud in this space, so I make it quieter.

Small adjustments. Practical compromises. The kind of thing you do in any partnership.

Except they accumulated. Year after year. Small accommodation after small accommodation. Until I was living in a space, physical and emotional, that was too small for anything I actually wanted.

The tree was just the visible symptom of something much larger.

Or rather: the tree was the visible symptom of everything I’d learned to make smaller.

The Countryside with High Ceilings

When I moved after the divorce, I didn’t just leave the city. I left the scale.

The new house—the one I’m renting now—has ceilings that are actually tall. Vaulted in some places. Room to breathe. Space for things that aren’t practical or minimal or afterthoughts.

And definitely space for an eight-foot tree. 🙃

I didn’t think about this consciously when I moved. I was thinking about distance from memory, about needing space to rebuild, about following the pull toward land and slowness I’d been suppressing for years.

But my body knew.

My body wanted room. Literal, physical room. High ceilings and open space and the possibility of filling it with something magnificent instead of something that fit.

Saturday

We decorated the tree together.

Not haphazardly. Not a few days before Christmas as an afterthought. Mid-November, with intention and time and actual presence.

Eight (actually nine 🫣) feet tall. Beautiful. The kind of tree I’d wanted since I was a child.

We carefully fluffed the tree. Hung ornaments. Added picks. Stood back to look at it from different angles. Made adjustments. Took our time.

The room smelled like pine and the faint vanilla of the candles we’d lit earlier. Outside, the neighborhood was already quiet and growing dark at four o’clock, the cold closing in. But inside: light. Warmth. The particular quality of attention that comes when you’re building something with someone who doesn’t need you to hurry.

And then: the star.

I climbed the the step stool. Felt its weight in my palm. Placed it on top of the tree that was finally tall enough.

The light came on.

And my chest, my whole chest, filled with something I can only describe as gratitude and light.

Not relief. Not “I survived and now things are better.” Something brighter than that. More alive.

Pure joy. Undefended. Uncomplicated.

The recognition: Oh. This is what it feels like to stop making myself small.

What I’m Learning About Gratitude

I stood there on the stepladder a moment longer than necessary, letting the fullness settle. The tree glowed in the dimming room.

The cultural script around gratitude after loss goes something like this: “I’m grateful for what I learned. I’m grateful for the growth. I’m grateful that I survived.”

And sure. That’s true. I am grateful for what the basement taught me. I am grateful for the solitude that showed me how to be whole alone.

But that’s not what I felt in that moment.

I felt grateful for the tree itself. For the eight feet of it. For the high ceilings that could accommodate it. For the person who helped me decorate it. For the lit star that finally exists in reality instead of just in childhood catalogs.

I felt grateful that I finally have space, literal and metaphorical, for things that aren’t practical or minimal or accommodated down to something smaller.

This is a different kind of gratitude. The kind that doesn’t need to earn itself through suffering. The kind that doesn’t require me to justify wanting by proving it taught me something.

I don’t have to frame this tree as a lesson about resilience or a symbol of growth. I don’t have to extract meaning from the having.

I can just want. And have. And be grateful for the having itself.

I wanted this. For decades. And now I have it.

And it’s exactly as magnificent as I imagined.

The Person Who Makes Space

Here’s what I didn’t expect: I’m not doing this alone.

The solitude taught me how to be whole by myself. How to stop performing. How to want what I want without needing permission or validation from someone else.

And I thought, somewhere in the back of my mind, that meant I’d always be alone (dramatic, I know). That intimacy would require me to make myself smaller again. That letting someone in would mean going back to accommodating, compromising, fitting.

But yesterday, decorating that tree together, I learned something different.

The person at the door isn’t asking me to shrink.

They’re helping me make space for the things I want.

Not because they’re rescuing me or completing me or giving me permission. Because they’re just... here. Present. Participating in building something that has room for both of us and for the things we each actually want.

The tree fits. The house has high ceilings. My chest fills with light.

And I’m not alone in any of it.

The Star

When I placed that star on top of the tree and the light came on, I understood something I couldn’t have articulated before:

Aliveness isn’t just about being present to what is. It’s about making space for what could be.

For years, I practiced presence in containers that were too small. I learned to be grateful for what I had. I made peace with limitations.

And that was necessary. That was survival.

But this… this is different.

This is what happens when you finally stop shrinking to fit. When you find space—physical, emotional, relational—that can actually hold what you want at its full size.

Someone’s at the door, and I let them in.

And together, we put up a tree that’s finally tall enough.

The light is on. My chest is full.

And I’m celebrating Christmas the way I always wanted to.

With a magnificent tree. And a lit star on top. And room for everything I actually want.

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Someone in your life might be learning they don’t have to earn joy through suffering. That they can just want something and be grateful for getting it.

Would you send this their way?

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About Alex

I’m Alex Lovell — political psychologist, yoga therapist, and writer.

Lived homeless. Been divorced. Survived a seven-car pileup with a semi. Fell in love with questions that don’t have easy answers. I’ve met a lot of thresholds. Even the one before death.

These days, I split my time between research, writing, and holding space for people figuring out who they are after everything shifted.

This Substack is where I make sense of things out loud.
I write for people in transition — between roles, beliefs, relationships, selves.
The ones quietly wondering, “What now?” but allergic to one-size-fits-all answers.

Sometimes I quote research. Sometimes I quote my own nervous system.
One speaks in data, the other in sensation. I’ve stopped choosing sides.

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