If a Ghost from Christmas Past came to visit today, he may not be familiar with some of the new practices that have become commonplace in today's world.

In days gone by - I am now old enough to use that phrase - the Christmas season began on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. Back then, we did not see holiday displays in the stores on Halloween or even earlier.

Black Friday was when stores like K-Mart held special sales that began at 5 or 6 a.m. That is when you visited the store to grab a $49 VCR or a $99 25-inch television. The news shows on Black Friday morning were filled with scenes of people storming into a store or a shopping mall to grab a bargain.

Today, many people choose to shop online. Some malls have even closed because people prefer the ease of ordering and having items shipped right to their homes. While growing up, the King of Prussia Mall was the place to go at Christmastime with the elaborate decorations and a huge selection of stores where we could do our Christmas shopping. It was a bit of a hike for us from our home, but we made a day of it, shopping and then eating in the mall's food court. A store back then called Korvettes was one of the first stores in the area to have an escalator, and we kids would take endless rides on it. We were completely fascinated by those moving stairs.

Of course, we still decorate today as we did in the past, but now there are prelit artificial trees that you can buy online, and you can synchronize the lights with an app. Many people, however, prefer a live tree and visiting the Christmas tree farm to choose just the right one.

After the usual struggle of getting that tree into the stand, then comes dealing with the tangled strings of light. And no matter how careful we are in the previous year, there are always one or two ornaments that just don't make it. Even after testing, it is inevitable that one rebellious light string on the tree goes dark. That means searching for a missing bulb or the one faulty bulb that causes all the other lights to not work.

Of course, Christmas is about the birth of Jesus, and Christians everywhere attend services on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, and their spirits are lifted by the sacred music and the spirit of celebration. Technology again plays a role since those who are unable to make it to church can attend services via livestream.

So Christmas Past may not be familiar with a world where shopping is done with a click, where we use phone apps, where we send digital greetings instead of actual Christmas cards, where we use streaming services for music and entertainment and where children can monitor Santa's progress around the world on the NORAD Santa app. But what remains the same is that Christmas is a time of giving, spending time with family and friends and embracing that general sense of wonder and magic.

And, hopefully, next year there will be no broken ornaments and no tangled Christmas lights and every bulb on the string will shine brightly.