Each season we're reminded of Christmas' true meaning, and yet the Christmas ads seem to start earlier each year. Making the Savannah River run north would be easier than stopping Christmas' ever- growing commercialization. It's way out of line.

Still, Christmas, the most wonderful holiday, remains special to me, despite greed and politically correct efforts to make Christmas trees and nativity scenes offensive to others. Christmas, despite the emphasis on buying gifts, remains a time to worship, reflect, celebrate, and hop off life's rollercoaster to spend time with family and friends.

Change marches on though, and some aspects of Christmas have fallen prey to progress. Take artificial trees. What kid gets excited about them? Those who never hiked through fields and woods looking for a real tree I suppose. As a boy, a big part of the Christmas excitement for me was the hunt for a red cedar with the perfect shape and size. We would go to my grandfather's farm looking for the perfect tree. Bitter cold days were best, especially if a billowy gray sky hinted of snow.

We usually found a tree with the perfect shape. Out came the saw and a fresh tree was headed home for lights and decorations. There was something mysteriously vengeful about a real tree though. Only when you got it home did you discover it had a "hole' in its branches. That side was doomed to face a wall or window. Hole or not, its fresh-cut fragrance was as much a part of Christmas as eggnog and wassail.

But time kept marching on and the hunt for a tree in woods gave way to an empty lot strung with naked light bulbs. Red cedars gave way to Fraser Firs, Scotch Pines, and Leyland Cypress. Spray-painted green, these trees are handsome, exotic even. The problem is you don't find them as much as they find you.

Artificial trees appeal to practicalminded folks. Aside from that first trip to Wal-Mart, a climb into the attic or pulling a box out of a closet suffices, and an artificial tree has no holes. You can even buy scent to make it smell real and if that's what you like, I suggest you buy a can of "new car" scent for your old car and see how that works for you.

The first artificial tree I saw was at my grandmother's house. It was silver-metallic, complete with a spotlight and revolving lens of red, blue, and green that gave the tree its color. Today you can buy trees that spin, trees with built-in lights, and you can even buy a fiber optic tree with LEDs that change from color to white with the flick of a switch.

The Christmas specials have changed too. Today's digital animations pale in comparison to classics like "Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer." And old grainy black-and-white classics like "The Little Match Girl" were so much more touching.

Remember it? On a cold winter's night, a poor girl selling matches on the street takes shelter in a corner and lights matches to warm herself. In their flames, she sees lovely visions including a Christmas tree and a holiday feast. She looks skyward, sees a shooting star, and remembers that a shooting star means someone is dying. As she lights her last match, a vision of her deceased grandmother comes to her, the only person who treated her with love and kindness. She dies and her grandmother carries her soul to Heaven. The next morning, passers-by find the little match girl dead, a smile on her face. How could anyone forget a Christmas special like that.

The old Christmas variety shows were memorable too. Hearing Bing Crosby and Andy Williams sing meant Christmas was, indeed, close at hand. Their sets were simple: a fireplace with logs afire and stockings hung with care. But things are so commercial now. Christmas specials are over the top and an ad interrupts the show every five minutes. I don't want to hear TV commercials selling jewelry to the "The Twelve Days of Christmas" nor do I want to hear the Garmin GPS ad sung to the tune of "Ring Christmas Bells."

But the good still outweighs the bad. The Salvation Army's bells please me outside grocery stores and malls, and inside the mall the other day I got a nice surprise when I least expected it. The place was packed with throngs frantic to get their shopping done. People were fractious. They had to fight Atlanta-like traffic to get to the mall, fight for a parking spot, and then stand in long lines to buy those allimportant gifts.

And then I heard music. Not piped in Muzak, mind you, real music. The voices seemed alive, not taped. I followed the music, making my way though crowds. There in a corner stood a quartet wearing Victorian finery singing traditional carols a cappella. It was as if they had stepped right out of an old-fashioned Christmas card complete with snowy streets, gas lamps, and horse-drawn sleighs.

I knew one of the women singing, and we talked when they took a break. "The joy of singing to the glory of God is the most important thing we do," she said. "Singing Christmas carols," she added, "piles joys upon joys."

She's right. Hearing those enduringly beautiful carols told me the true spirit of Christmas was alive and well. Christmas trees can change and lazy copywriters, I know, will always succumb to the temptation to hijack a Christmas song's melody, but underneath it all, the true spirit of Christmas lives on.

Email Tom with feedback and ideas for new columns. tompol @earthlink.net