Sunday mornings with CBS

My Sunday mornings are spent -- religiously, if I may be forgiven for saying that -- with "CBS News Sunday Morning."

I've rarely missed an edition of the program since it first aired on Jan. 28, 1979. It was dreamt up by two giants of television's second generation, Charles Kuralt and Robert "Shad" Northshield.

The program was designed to be a sophisticated TV version of a Sunday newspaper magazine supplement. That's still the formula, all these years later, although Charles Osgood has succeeded the late Charles Kuralt as the host. Osgood is no Kuralt -- there'll never be another -- but he's almost as good.

"CBS News Sunday Morning" is laid back by comparison to any other news program. It's almost languid in style, just perfect for greeting a Sunday morning with coffee in hand. Nothing is rushed. Nothing is over-produced. Nothing is cluttered.

Sure, it opens with a short summary of the latest news, intelligently written. But the remainder of its 90 minutes is filled by the kind of in-depth stories and features and personality profiles that you find in the lifestyle section of a good newspaper -- stories that usually aren't covered on TV.

Its stock in trade are pieces on the arts, architecture, music, ballet, design, and interesting people who do interesting things, either because they just want to or because they want to make their world a better place. Perhaps the most extreme example of the program's respect for its audience came in 1986, when the entire 90 minutes was devoted to a live broadcast of a historic piano recital in Moscow by Vladimir Horowitz.

From it's inception, "CBS News Sunday Morning" has violated several cardinal rules of TV journalism in its final segment. It's my favorite part of the broadcast. Videographers are set loose across the world from the usual restrictions to present simple visual essays on nature, with no soundtrack other than the location itself and no narration at all. Whether they be scenes of graceful ducks in a pond or an undulating field of Texas bluebonnets gently waving in a breeze, they're simple perfection. They offer moments to reflect on our world and perhaps listen to the quiet buzz of a bumblebee. This week's nature segment focused on grey wolves in the wild.

My only complaint is that these delightful essays are too short. They're somewhere shy of 60 seconds now, although they used to be longer when the program debuted. Like everything else about TV, "CBS News Sunday Morning" has succumbed to the tempo of the times, although not by much. The signature Sunday morning nature essays are still there, still achieving what they've always achieved. And I look forward to a restful treat for jaded sensibilities as I wrap up the weekend and gird myself for another new week.