One day in November, the TV just conked out after months of bad picture quality. It's an old set after all. The first few days were quite an adjustment, primarily for my mother and sister who spend more viewing time and who derive more satisfaction from it.
I don't remember which gave out first, but my PC was also out of commission for more than a month (I got it back from the shop two days before Christmas day). Since I was so busy, I didn't have time to have it repaired right away; hence, staring at screens was reduced to a minimum in this household! In fact, the only screen-staring was done by me -- whenever I had to send or read a text message.
I love life without a TV. Since that day the TV died, my mom and I have been talking more. And not just idle talk -- really conversing, sharing ideas and experiences. Let me tell you that this does not naturally happen so often in my family so help (like a busted TV or a power outage) to facilitate things is always appreciated by me.
My mother got to talk about snippets of life in the province where she grew up, about her siblings whom she had gotten to spend considerable time with lately on account of two sisters who vacationed in the Philippines last month, stories she'd read. Have you heard the details of what inspired the song "Tie a yellow ribbon"?? I've heard it half a dozen times but everytime my mom tells it, it makes me tearful (in a good way). Well, that'll be for another post.
Anyway, I also asked her about her travels with my Dad and she seemed to enjoy talking about those, though I could see she became teary-eyed during some moments. It's not surprising -- they were married 51 years when he died, and sharing one's life with someone for that long is bound to make the separation difficult when God decides it's time to take one of the spouses Home.
Then there was the baking. Did I mention that I have no electric mixer? So ignorant am I about the rudiments of baking and going into this business that the significance of not having a mixer didn't occur to me. Needless to say, my right arm is now very toned and strong. But if my mom had not been around to help me during our mixing sessions, I might have given up completely. So, with all the baking that we did, there was plenty of time for chitchat amid the bowls, spoons and ingredients. One of the things I learned was that she minored in home economics at university, which explains her knowledge of baking and cooking principles which she would casually spew out in the course of our conversations while working the wooden spoons.
At one point, my mother even said that she likes it that we have no TV to use because now she spends more time reading and doing crossword puzzles. Man, I know very few people who can finish entire puzzles to the last letter! Besides the puzzles in the daily paper, she has stacks of crossword puzzle booklets in her room! Then of course I'm sure she notices the difference provided by our "unplugged lifestyle" of late to our remarkable daily interaction. I've been quite content with this...until yesterday when she announced that she wanted to buy a new TV. I was crestfallen, at the same time thinking that it was too good to last anyway and that at least we had the time to do all that talking in the first place.
She misses watching Fr. Corapi and the other shows on EWTN. "Jeopardy" has also been among her regular viewing fare. So I said, "we better make sure we control our viewing time and not let the TV control us."
Let's see what happens. I just don't want to return to the time when people would sit and stare at the TV screen for hours at a time, become somewhat lethargic and more concerned about catching some show instead of checking up on the others in the house. I'll admit the TV holds some "magical power" over me at times so I avoid watching. Even this computer screen has been in control of me many times, so I make it a point to be as detached as possible even if I do love to blog and to read others' blogs!
So, with my PC back on and my family shopping for a new TV set within a week, the challenge to moderate technology use around our home comes to the fore again. Let's see how it'll turn out. I'm wondering if there's a patron saint for technology or electronic gadgets whose help I can enlist right away. We certainly need the assistance!
