Fewer Thoughts About TV

Lantana continuing to bloom in a frenzy. Frost-kissed (aka brown) artichokes proliferate in the markets. Roses starting to form buds and lettuce sprouts coming up (mesclun mix). Just cut back our Catalina Island Poppy to one half, it will grab the winter rain and rebound by late January.

Christmas is over and the rains have come. The kids and I bought Wendy a milkweed plant in the fall, which was supposed to attract monarchs. It probably would if it still had any leaves. This is the second one we've planted in the last two years and I'm thinking they're just not crazy about our soil.

By weird coincidence, the other Blogger for my company led me to a NYC Blogger who I've been reading. That Blogger, in turn, loves a LA Blogger who is a Writer/Actor/PowerPoint Artist that I'd met at my company-sponsored portfolio review last summer. She goes by the name Communicatrix on her blog and she, like I, has given up TV wholly, choosing instead to watch only DVDs and videos.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, wish I could declare that giving up TV has led me down the path of finishing that novel I always had been trying to write or has brought my family magically together or even that it has brought me fabulous wealth, but that's simply not the case. (Maybe it has indeed brought my family together, but it's hard to tell with such young children. How am I to compare?)

This woman seems to be experiencing the same phenomenon, which is something I love hearing. Mostly because of the sheer honesty of such a statement. There are probably people giving seminars on giving up TV who are expounding those very things I have no achieved. And, sure enough, I could get in front of a bunch of people and tell them the evils of TV and how much better I am as a result of dropping it out of my life, but I'd be on the road to politics at that point. And I'd be a colossal liar.

I was just talking to my officemate, Ryan and his wife the other night at a party. These are two confirmed TV addicts who have no idea how I can live my life the way I do. Actually their jaws dropped to the floor after I told them I didn't watch TV, then they asked what I do instead. I told them flat out there's nothing to do.

But that's the strange thing: I don't think there's ever been anything to do. I mean before the invention of radio, TV, or the Internet. People sat around and played games, or did that endless amount of work they always had to do, got drunk and beat their wives and children, I guess.

Wendy and I eat dinner together, without the kids, in our own dining room twice a week. I go to yoga one night a week. We both get out for bike rides at night during the week. Honestly, that's about it.

When I first gave up TV, I'd go for walks around the block and, weirdly, I couldn't walk by a house without seeing that familiar blue tint coming out the living room window. It was a very creepy experience. It was almost as if some alien race had come down and bribed us with the ultimate drug which would keep us passive, afraid, and inside all night, then kept setting our country up with worse and worse presidents.

For those who don't believe it's a drug, consider the fact that it's one of the few resting activities that actually lowers your metabolism below normal resting rate. Yes, if you are sitting at home and staring at your wall, you are actually burning more calories than watching your favorite show or DVD.

And you thought playing video games was bad.

I don't know how to promote the no-TV thing. The two facts I keep coming back to are a) that most people don't have anything good to say about it except that it's entertaining, mostly and that b) it's great way to find out whether to wear a coat or not to work. Not overly compelling arguments.

A strange fact is how guilty people feel about watching it. I noticed, after asking many people about their viewing habits, that they generally underestimate the time they spend watching it. They tend to forget about the news that they watch every night, which adds an additional 7 hours a week to their viewing schedule. And the sad fact is that news on television is not very good, and the local news (even LA), is some of the worst trash televised.

One night, years ago, I was talking to Wendy about watching a program together and she said, "You know, it's not really an interactive activity." Which, until that very moment, was news to me. But damn it, she was right.

Giving up TV was hard for me. I am, at heart, a TV addict. I can watch program after program until I am essentially sick to my stomach. (My friend, and quite possibly twin-sister-separated-at-birth, Lauren has the same issue. She watched the Home & Garden channel, HGTV, so much one day that they actually started to run the programs again. Sadly, she watched a few the second time around.)

When I was in high school I started to realize the most interesting people I knew watched hardly any television at all. The couldn't digest many references I made pertaining to Gilligan, the Brady Bunch, or any of the 5 to 6 hours of television I watched daily.

(And I'm not exaggerating much about this daily intake. I watched, after school, TV until dinner time, 3:00 to 6:00. After dinner I would often rush through my homework to get downstairs before 8:00, prime time. I'd watch that for 2 hours, sometimes 3, until the news came on.)

This whole No-TV thing started as a Lenten promise. Though not a practicing Catholic (okay, not true. Not a Catholic at all. An agnostic), I still observe Lent, which are the 6 weeks after Ash Wednesday leading up to Easter Sunday. You choose something to give up which is not "going to church" or "Lent", then see if you can actually do it. I'd given up the radio, my favorite section of the LA Times, meat, and alcohol, when it came to me that I should try to give up television. Both Wendy and I did successfully (alcohol and radio were the most challenging by far) and really never looked back. For awhile we watched movies on Thursdays and Saturdays, but Wendy, it turns out, is a bigger fan of having me cook dinner and sitting down for a few hours over a nice meal and wine.

She gets up for work at 5:15a six days a week, so by 10:00 on most nights she's ready for bed. I'm just worn out by then, and unless something's really holding my attention, I'm in bed a few minutes after her.

Besides being painfully unaware of the goings-on in the latest hit TV shows, a strange side effect is existing outside a major part of the advertising loop. People reference commercials all the time and we have no idea what they're talking about. We also have no idea what the hell a Hemi engine is. Or why anyone in their right mind would make Paris Hilton a star.

Which is probably the strongest argument against watching TV. There's some mediocre programming on there, but, let's face it, for many of us, most of it is crap that we're afraid to admit we're dumb enough to watch.

And aren't our minds worth more than that?

(Photo by Hamachi, courtesy Creative Commons)