I was a young child when a black and white TV became the focal point of our house.

Until then, all the magic of my youthful mind was found between the covers of library books. I feasted on them, devouring words and images that expanded my world, deepened my understandings and stirred my imagination.

Books were precious and sacred and respected. How I loved to borrow as many as I could at one time and ‘cloister’ in my bedroom to read happily for hours.

First the TV was a charming novelty, a new toy of sound and pictures that sometimes turned to what the adults called ‘snow’. There were two channels then- one English and one French. At a certain time every night, they both signed off.

The children’s and adult’s programs were quite ‘innocent’ by today’s standards. Even the news was far less ‘graphic’. The few ads were ‘tolerable interruptions’. It was a friendly introduction to home media hypnosis that has now ‘progressed’ to an orgy of mind-deadening repetitious ads with moments of entertainment and information between.

From the unsophisticated entertainments to the glamorized comedies and dramas of those early days, then eventually to the fake ‘reality’ shows of amateur actors and badly written ‘scripts’, to the mind twisting horror shows and depravities aimed at immature minds, to the blatant psychological warfare of multiple agendas, to… what next???

About the time of the fake ‘reality’ shows with the amateur actors and the badly written ‘scripts’, I decided to unplug from TV World. Like so many, I turned to the Internet sites for information and entertainment. How quickly that became a cesspool of toxicity here and there with more mental darkness than light available. I ‘walk through’ these like one walks through a mine field to find something of value.

So tonight, I will be reading in my bedroom surrounded by precious books. I will be feasting on words and images I’ve carefully chosen to expand my world, deepen my understandings and stir my imagination.

I am about to savour the true goodness found in the nurturing serenity of quietly reading a book I hold as I happily nourish my mind.

January 24, 2021

Shelley Wilson