TV...

I have always been bored with TV. There were very few shows I could even tolerate as a child (Gilligan's Island, Brady Bunch, and Little House on the Prairie.....now don't THOSE date me? LOL) My mom and dad had the TV on every evening from after supper until bedtime. Us kids could have it from when we got home from school until supper, so about 2 hours a day. If it was raining, or I ran out of books to read, I would sometimes watch it, but certainly not every day, and most DEFINITELY not if I had a book, or could go outside.

Back then we didn't HAVE video games...not till I was about 10 anyway, and we didn't HAVE computers, so TV was the only screen time I was exposed to. So what did I do instead? Well, in the summer time, I got up and watched the sun come up from my bedroom window and waited for Mom to wake up. When she was up and gave me permission I could come out of my room. I'd eat breakfast (cereal or a pop-tart) and away I would go. I'd swing in one of our 5 swings. I'd ride my Big Wheel up and down the block. Once I could ride a bike, I rode it all OVER. I'd climb trees. In other words...I got exercise and fresh air. I'd build tree houses and forts with my friends. We would walk 2 blocks to "Sherwood Forest" which was a very tiny little wooded area that we thought was huge, and a secret place from the grown-ups. As I got older I would sometimes jump rope for hours, ride my bike for hours, and not just around the block, but all OVER town and the countryside. My best friend and I would walk to the library and check out as many books as we could carry. If we were "rich" we'd stop at my dad's store on the way home and buy pop and candy. We happily took old, used textbooks home from school at the end of the year, and would "play school" for hours and hours. We were "home schooling" ourselves, and didn't even KNOW it. LOL The only rule back then was "be home before dark." In other words, I had adventure, time with friends, and all kinds of learning experiences....you don't learn safety any better way than going a mile out to the creek with your best friend and realizing how thin that ice really IS. And those electric fences around fields to keep cows in the pasture? Those really ARE electric. Ask me how I know....LOL

What brought this post on is that my new husband (and the ex-husband, to some extent, although if there were better things to do, he, at least, could shut the TV off, and if there weren't, the girls and I could, at least, go in another room and do our own things) thinks TV is a NECESSITY of life. This man LITERALLY never shuts it off. NEVER. We go to bed and all he does is turn the volume down a little. We eat dinner, it's on. We are talking, it's on. 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, that TV is constantly on, noisy and intrusive. I'm peacefully sitting in the living room drinking my coffee, and mentally going over what I need to do for the day, and hubby wakes up, and within 30 seconds he turns the volume up loudly blaring to his favorite cable news channel. Now, I am all for keeping up with the local, the national, and the global news. I, too, think it is important. The difference is that I can watch 30 minutes of our local news, or check online for 5 minutes, and get all the bullet points. If something piques my interest, I can do my OWN research into it, and form my OWN thoughts about it. At M's house I go from "peace and quiet" to "migraine" in less than 30 seconds. I can't get away from it, like in my own house, because his house is too small, and there isn't a room the girls and I can go to to play games, or read or do puzzles or school together.

When I was in college, I didn't OWN a TV. Never even thought about buying one. I had my books, and I had my music,, and I had my car. When I lived in Nevada for 3 months in 2004 with the girls, I didn't own a TV, and, again....it never even crossed my mind. The girls didn't care, and it was just not something I thought about getting. I spent my summers as a child and teen living in Michigan, and we didn't own a TV there, either. The funny thing was that my mother thought we watched too much of it...and back then we only watched maybe a total of 2 hours a day and only when we couldn't go outside for some reason. TV was a last resort for us kids, only in the most dire of boredom circumstances. We much preferred learning math by playing Monopoly or card games, or spelling and dictionary usage by playing Scrabble or Boggle, or logic and problem solving by playing Checkers, Chess, Clue, or any number of other games out there designed to use our brains to think and strategize and reason.

Technically I own a TV now...I own a huge 5 foot big-screen TV, and the stupid thing takes up my half my living room. I have even turned my TV ON a few times since the girls dad left us 2 years ago. Last night, I counted up the number of times I turned it on, and I came up with 4 times. Once, when E was sick she watched "The Price is Right." I, myself, watched the Royal Wedding a few months ago. 2 or 3 nights ago we had a storm, and I turned the TV on for about 60 seconds to check the local radar. And one night about a year ago the girls and I watched an episode of "America's Funniest Home Videos". Not one time have the girls EVER asked to turn it on or to watch something! They, too, have better things to do with their time, and ways to have more fun.

**WARNING...THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH HAS SOME MINOR LANGUAGE SOME READERS MIGHT OBJECT TO THEIR CHILDREN READING**

I can assure you...if I couldn't stand TV BEFORE...I REALLY DETEST it now that I can't get away from it. And to make things worse....the GIRLS have a TV in the room they sleep in. C, my oldest, could really care less about TV. She watches it only out of boredom, and at least she watches half-way educational shows. Forensic Files, the Weather Channel, animal rescue documentary type shows, and CMT when they have music videos on. E, on the other hand watches what I refer to as "CRAP" . Cartoons with subtle sexual innuendos, shows on 2 certain networks specifically called "Children's Programming", with the little teenagers all dressed like street walkers, and nothing but materialistic mind-sets. On every one of these shows my littlest girl is viewing episode after episode of "how to get away with something without your parents or teachers knowing", "how to trick someone into doing your work for you", in other words...how to be dishonest and disrespect your parents and teachers. The ------ Channel...a channel supposedly for children...is nothing but disrespectful, materialistic, overly-made-up irresponsible teenagers. And for some reason, ------ makes a lot of money promoting teeny-bopper singers that have no talent and CAN'T sing, so they just dress them up like whores, and play them over and over and over, brainwashing my child that that is somehow TALENT or musical ability! They have a FEW shows that don't involve talentless singers making money for the network, and they even have one or two shows where the kids dress like normal kids, and are respectful, and by the end of their 30 minute sit-com they have "learned a lesson". But those are few and far between, and apparently they only made about 5 episodes of each, because I'VE seen them enough that *I* have them memorized, let alone my poor girls who are stuck with the TV on...again...24 hours a day, 365 days a year. (I went back and edited out the specific network names, but I'm guessing any of you who have TV know EXACTLY which networks I was referring to.)

UGH!

C complains constantly about having the TV on. But...she wants a light that "isn't right in her face" and though she has a lamp for when the ceiling lights are turned off, E wants the TV on. C says she can't sleep with that flashing, changing light in her face all night. And no matter how low we turn the volume, she can still hear it. I know that's true, because that all bothers ME, too. We thought we had found a solution by hanging Christmas lights all around...but the cat chewed the cords the first night, and we can't afford to buy strings of lights daily. LOL

So...what's my point? Other than, obviously I can't stand TV. My point is that I think it is fine to watch the news, or check the weather. I think it is even fine to watch educational shows where I can actually LEARN something, or see far away places I will never in a zillion years be able to travel to. I think it is even fine to watch OCCASIONALLY for simply the entertainment value, and share some laughs together as a family, or watch quiz shows where, at least, we learn and test our knowledge. But I think news can be gotten in 30 minutes or less, and it's not necessary too see it over and over and over all day long. I prefer to just hear the news and form my own opinions, not listen to grown-ups arguing politics all day long, rudely yelling and interrupting each other to get THEIR viewpoint across in the time segment allotted. I don't want THEIR opinion; I'd like to form my OWN. I prefer a good, well written BOOK any day to watching a show on TV. With a BOOK I am subtly learning spelling, grammar, how to construct well written sentences and paragraphs, and using my mind to think, "what happens next?", picturing the setting, picturing the characters, cementing in my mind historical dates and figures that would be bypassed completely staring mindlessly at a TV.

I am not completely opposed to TV, not at all. I know there are some really good shows. But I AM opposed to having the durn thing running all day and night. I am opposed to children not using their minds to THINK and their bodies to get off the couch and MOVE. I feel TV wastes a lot of time that could be better spent getting our work done, or finding things to make, games to play, or talking, having conversations, not staring at the TV watching OTHER people talk and live their little made-up lives.

I will now step down off my soap-box. I have to get ready for our school year to start Monday. I would love to hear YOUR opinions on the issue of TV, so comments are welcome.