I have mixed feelings about Christmas. On the one hand, I enjoy the time and many of the traditions attached to it. On the other hand, I am not very fond of much of the commercialization of Christmas.

I live not far from a super highway. During the Christmas season there are so many cars on the road as people go shopping for Christmas presents that the air by my house gets quite polluted. There is a yellow haze outside and the air has a kind of acid smell as taste from all the burnt hydrocarbons from automobiles and such.

Since air pollution is linked to health problems I am not fond of this aspect of Christmas.

There was a study a couple of years ago where researchers mapped the locations of people who got Alzheimer's disease. They found that a lot of people who got this disease lived close to highways, airports, railyards and factories that produced air pollution. Christmas brings a lot of pollution to where I live so this is downside to Christmas for me personally.

People seem a little bit nicer during Christmas, a little bit happier too. But of course I realize that many people become very frenzied, nasty and miserable during Christmas too. I remember once when a friend told me: "I am so miserable because I am all alone on Christmas. I wish I had family." That very same day, another friend told me: "I am so miserable because I have to be with my family on Christmas."