The Miners got a television?!

By February 17 all US television will be digital not analog. This means that my parent's television (pictured above), which is older than I am, will be completely obsolete. No longer will I play with rabbit ears, attempting to get reception decent enough to watch tennis. It used to be hard to figure out which fuzzy line was actually a line on the court, which moving speck was the ball. No more. No more will I, with all the force I can exert with my thumb, silence the commercials by turning the volume down since the mute button broke. No more will I wrestle with the cart that held the television while it housed itself under a shelf in the pantry when not in use. (Once, traumatically, it fell off the cart when I tried to get it over the rug.) Never again will I peer behind the television and with the aid of an electric window candle fiddle with cables, attempting to get the sound or picture to work on a movie or dvd. And my parents will no longer be able to complain about how "they always make movies so dark these days. You can't see anything!"

The day after Christmas, Radu took my dad out to look at new televisions. My parents purchased a television, with a wider screen than the last one. I never thought I'd see the day. The new television won't permanently pollute the living room, though. When not in use, it will slip behind the piano on a different cart that my father is now making. I find its dark, looming presence in the living room mildly unsettling. I'll be glad when it fits behind the piano.

I've never been one for watching tv much. There is too much that is vapid and inane. I don't like the way my eyes are drawn to the screen, or the way the flickering images reflect on the wall across from it. On the rare occasions that my mother will turn on the television to flip channels and see if there's anything good on I always feel uneasy, like something is wrong and I can't pinpoint what. I like the odd good program or show, but I suppose I can be grateful that I don't easily fall prey to that medium's "evil wiles" of which I sometimes hear spoken!

Soon the old television will be carried to the curb, picked up, and taken wherever they take old televisions. Some day I'll get to push the new tv cart onto the rug and watch a few hours of tennis or a movie on a clear, wide screen. Such opulence!