A journey to the centre of Christmas

When I was young the city would collect all the Christmas trees after the holidays and set up a very large bonfire. I don't think this would be an acceptable practice now, but at the time it was return and burn.  There was still lots of tinsel and ornaments that got burned up in the process. Hot chocolate and apple cider served and the community came out for this festive event. At times that I felt like I got the inside track because my Dad worked for the city.  In this instance he let me crawl in the tunnel at the base of this giant pile of Christmas trees to where they would light it after I got out of there. I felt like this was something worthy of bragging about for sure.  My father helped burn all those trees and I got to go in the secret tunnel.