Television has not always been a required appliance in everyone’s household. As a matter of fact, the television has not even existed for 100 years. Yet, many people believe that having at least one television in their house is necessary.
In 1970, my parents got their first television. I was four years old and I remember coming in for dinner after being outside playing with my friends and there it was, a huge black and white television sitting right in our living room. My mother talks about how I ran into the door frame as I went toward the bathroom to wash up for dinner. I was so engulfed by this new television that now had a dominating presence in our home.
The furniture had to be arranged to account for this new appliance. No longer could the chairs and couches face each other. That arrangement made it comfortable for people to sit and talk and play board games on the coffee table. Now all the furniture had to face forward toward the television. No more coffee table, that just got in the way. We could watch TV now so why would be play board games? Episode after episode of various TV series came across our screen and we were happy.
Television has come a long way since then. Now we can watch television on large plasma LCD screens with high definition (HDTV) signals and digital cable. But is it really a requirement? I don’t like most television programming but I do use it to watch either a DVD or a VHS tape of movies or old shows that I do enjoy.
Tags: Movies Television Media