What?? No television?? I'm outta here....
This seems as good a time as any to alienate my reading audience, since it's getting so large and the email volume is just exhausting. Oh, wait. That's right. My audience consists of my husband (because he lives here so I have him trapped), my mother (probably the only one reading without prompting), and my three sisters (who may or may not be tuning in periodically). So, hey, where are all the emails? Where's the love? Heeeelllllooooo. Is anybody out there?
But I digress. I will try not to wax self-righteous, not to mention self-congratulatory. But it is so hard not to let the general reaction go straight to your head. When I tell people I don't have a tv, I couldn't get a more awed response if I told them that I'd served in a Washington think tank, gone over Niagara in a barrel, or cared for thousands of starving prostitutes in Nepal. My IQ immediately goes up 40 points in the respondent's estimation, along with my eccentricity quotient.
Before I get too puffed, I got the idea for this post after reading a comment by Veronica on Phantom Scribbler. After reading said comment (I don't have a tv - or something like that), I knew immediately that we were soul sisters. And, as an added bonus, after we'd emailed back and forth, I had a post topic.
Anyway, here's the story. Some years ago, my husband and I moved to the East Coast to live by the ocean. For God only knows what reason, my husband insisted that we sell everything we owned, including our three tvs. We ended up getting an apartment a half block off the ocean with a friend, who did not sell all her stuff before moving. Now, we didn't really watch much tv before we sold our household, and we watched even less after moving to the ocean. When the lease was up and our roommate moved out taking her tv with her, we decided that instead of facing our new couch (since she also took her couch with her - drat the woman - I loved that couch) toward the now blank white wall, maybe we should turn it toward the big sliding glass doors looking out into the courtyard full of flowers and citrus trees.
This seemingly arbitrary decision has had numerous consequences. For one thing, we learned that if you don't have a tv, you should really have a view. Our next place, a townhouse near the beach, looked out on ... weeds and scrubby undergrowth. I don't recommend it - though frankly, it was still better than tv. But from our next (and hopefully last) place we could see the intracoastal. Our stress level went way down (as noted by my tvless soul sister Veronica), which was really good since, unbeknownst to us, we were about to have two babies back to back to jack it up again. Our need to buy things (other than dinner), fix ourselves shopping, etc., basically just went away. The amount of memory cells wasted on completely useless information - who was sleeping with whom on "Friends" (the last sitcom we were hooked on) - was greatly reduced, another terrific benefit as we need those cells now to try to remember each other's names now that the children have arrived. Our interior decorating got much better, briefly (see above re arrival of children). And we got more time to play, blog, read, write, walk, hang out, and tune in to each other. At least, I assume we must have. Still, there never is enough time, is there?
But I digress. I will try not to wax self-righteous, not to mention self-congratulatory. But it is so hard not to let the general reaction go straight to your head. When I tell people I don't have a tv, I couldn't get a more awed response if I told them that I'd served in a Washington think tank, gone over Niagara in a barrel, or cared for thousands of starving prostitutes in Nepal. My IQ immediately goes up 40 points in the respondent's estimation, along with my eccentricity quotient.
Before I get too puffed, I got the idea for this post after reading a comment by Veronica on Phantom Scribbler. After reading said comment (I don't have a tv - or something like that), I knew immediately that we were soul sisters. And, as an added bonus, after we'd emailed back and forth, I had a post topic.
Anyway, here's the story. Some years ago, my husband and I moved to the East Coast to live by the ocean. For God only knows what reason, my husband insisted that we sell everything we owned, including our three tvs. We ended up getting an apartment a half block off the ocean with a friend, who did not sell all her stuff before moving. Now, we didn't really watch much tv before we sold our household, and we watched even less after moving to the ocean. When the lease was up and our roommate moved out taking her tv with her, we decided that instead of facing our new couch (since she also took her couch with her - drat the woman - I loved that couch) toward the now blank white wall, maybe we should turn it toward the big sliding glass doors looking out into the courtyard full of flowers and citrus trees.
This seemingly arbitrary decision has had numerous consequences. For one thing, we learned that if you don't have a tv, you should really have a view. Our next place, a townhouse near the beach, looked out on ... weeds and scrubby undergrowth. I don't recommend it - though frankly, it was still better than tv. But from our next (and hopefully last) place we could see the intracoastal. Our stress level went way down (as noted by my tvless soul sister Veronica), which was really good since, unbeknownst to us, we were about to have two babies back to back to jack it up again. Our need to buy things (other than dinner), fix ourselves shopping, etc., basically just went away. The amount of memory cells wasted on completely useless information - who was sleeping with whom on "Friends" (the last sitcom we were hooked on) - was greatly reduced, another terrific benefit as we need those cells now to try to remember each other's names now that the children have arrived. Our interior decorating got much better, briefly (see above re arrival of children). And we got more time to play, blog, read, write, walk, hang out, and tune in to each other. At least, I assume we must have. Still, there never is enough time, is there?
6 Comments:
Preach it, sister. Though I still sometimes overindulge on dvds on the computer.
Here's my post on the same subject back in March.
I'm impressed. I lived for years without TV, and my consumption is, compared to most Americans', teeny tiny these days, but I'm not sure I could go without. I'd love to raise Lucas sans TV, but with Mr. Trillwing being a news and DVD junkie, that just isn't going to happen.
Veronica, what a scream. I love your post on it. We catch a movie every once in a while on the computer, too. We probably would watch more than we do except the kids are up more than they're down at night. And Trillwing, I must confess, we do own 1 Barnie and 3 Veggie Tales. Maryn doesn't watch them often but they sure have come in handy once or twice.
I grew up without a tv. At the time I hated it, but now, well, thanks, Mom and Dad!
We own a tv now, but we don't have cable or any kind of antenna, which means we receive precisely zero channels. We use it only for dvds. That way I can get the kids out of my hair when I need to, yet still have total control over what they watch.
Sorry, I didn't mean to be anonymous. That was me.
If only I was not so much of a sports fan...the TV would be up on eBay. Maybe when the PC allows to watch games real time...I would love to ditch the tube as we do not use it for anything else but sports. You are not odd at all, just intelligent. Although odd and intelligent is an awesome combo.
Post a Comment
<< Home