23 Days of Forsaking the Talking Light Box

I have now passed the three-week mark without* television and I thought I’d give you some of my thoughts on this experiment.

First, you probably noticed that asterisk next to “without” – let me explain. It’s not like the asterisk next to the names of homerun hitters and cyclists in the 1990s – I haven’t been doping. I’ve just tried to remember the spirit of the 30 days – no mindless watching or channel flipping during the day, no using it to escape the stuff that I should be doing, no watching it in the evening with my family, and no TV at bedtime.

Here is when I have permitted myself to watch TV:

• On November 7, I watched OT in the Arkansas-Ole Miss game – and that was worth it for sure.
• On November 15, I watched Dawn of the Planet of the Apes with my family, until 30 minutes in when both kids left the room and then I just watched it with my husband.
• On November 18, we sat down to watch an episode of Frontline that we had recorded a couple of weeks earlier and I fell asleep 20 minutes into it. I finished it the next morning.
• I sat in the same room during a number of football games this weekend though I wouldn’t say that I was watching them. I’ve pretty much had my fill of football for the year. Anyway, it was Sunday and my whole family was in the family room watching and I didn’t feel like isolating myself.

And that’s it. Our DVR is almost full and I’ve had to make the kids go through and delete stuff that they have watched so that there is room to record the rest of my shows for the week. I know…what was it worth if I’m just going to go back and watch them?

This is what it was worth…

I have had lovely, quiet evenings in the family room with my family over the last 3 weeks that included conversation unrelated to the boob tube. We don’t have a lot of down time at our house. For instance, on a typical Monday, our daughter’s day starts with a 4:20am wake up call for 5:00am swim practice. Both of their schools start at 7:15am because everyone knows that’s the exact time of day that teenagers are at their most chipper and ready to learn. That’s a topic for another blog post on another day. They get out of school at 2:15pm and are home a little before 3:00. Then they change, snack, chat with us a bit and head to swim practice (that’s #2 for daughter) at 3:45. They get home at 6:30 and scarf down the entire fridge or dinner – it all depends on how quickly I can get it in front of them. And then they scatter to do homework until bedtime at about 9 or 10 o’clock. Not a lot of family time.

Now, they don’t scatter to do homework, they do it in the family room. We can all talk

about things as they do it, or we can help ( if it’s not math, because 5^th grade is that last time I was able to help with that.) It’s quiet but not silent. And it is commercial-free which is the best part. Commercials make kids ask for dumb stuff that you step on and break when you walk around in the dark. Or they cause them to ask for cereal and candy.  And then I have to be a “no” mom. I’d rather be a “yes” mom but TV makes that harder. Anyway, these evenings have made my heart full and that, as Martha would say, is a very good thing.

I have read a lot more. Mostly news articles. I feel like an educated citizen and since there were local elections this month, that’s a good thing for me to be. I wouldn’t say that the news is any more hopeful when I absorb it through paper or online, but I definitely feel as though I’m getting more legitimate information. Did you know that getting your news from a Facebook headline or from a 140-character tweet might leave you without part of the story? Did you know that when two or three gas-bag, political pundits are screaming at each other on a “news” channel, that it isn’t actually news? Did you know that BuzzFeed is not a quality source for journalism?  I stand by all of these statements and offer this one word: Reuters. Do with it what you like. I’d also like to say, The Atlantic, but at least half of you would say that it is slanted…and that is partially true. However, it takes me about 45 minutes to read an article from The Atlantic and while it is likely covered from a particular angle, there are mountains of verifiable facts included in a single story. And they are sited so that we can go back to the source of the information to decide if we think it’s credible. This may sound like Journalism 101 – of course periodicals have to site their sources.

Au contraire mon frere.

There are an astounding number of online “news sources” which include links in their articles that lead you only to other unsubstantiated articles published by that same journal. It’s like a giant circle of ignorance. SO I’m not just a more voracious consumer of news, I’m a more discriminating consumer of news. That means the left side of my brain – the analyzer – is still working. And that too is a good thing.

Finally, I think my creative muse is present with me for more of the day now because he/she doesn’t have to compete with all the noise and other voices. I have book ideas and blog post ideas and gift ideas and event artsy craftsy ideas at the most random times throughout the day – and I dream about them at night. I forget about 75% of these great ideas but just having them is so reassuring. The right side of my brain – the synthesizer – is not dead either. Another positive takeaway.

So that’s three plusses and zero minuses – a success to say the least. I’m not giving it up forever, but I’m also not going to forget what I’ve learned.

• It is spirit-lifting and peaceful to be in a room with my family when the TV is not on – even if there is math going on in the general vicinity.
• It is beneficial to the universe for me to absorb actual facts with my news.
• My creative muse appears when it is silent and the more time he/she spends nearby, the more he/she gives me to work with.

One more good thing…I have not watched any debates. I could not be more pleased about this fact if you covered it with chocolate and stuck $100 bills to it. I’m not sure either side of my brain...or my heart... or my stomach would know what to do with that crap right now.

Maybe come December I’ll give myself 2 days a week to watch in the evening. And maybe after I go back and watch what I’ve missed, I discover that I didn’t actually miss any of it at all.