My Love Affair with TV

My interest in television viewing has waxed and waned over time. When I was growing up, I probably watched at least two hours of TV a day. This increased when I fell in love with Star Trek in the early 70’s and found reruns on a syndicated station. My mother actually allowed me to take my dinner downstairs and watch Star Trek on the basement television while the rest of my family had dinner in the kitchen. She told me later that she thought it was good to stimulate my imagination, but I question her wisdom to this day. I also watched many other shows – I won’t list them here.

College cured me of television – I watched nothing at all for four years. Then, when I moved to California, I brought with me a portable black and white that I used exclusively to watch reruns of WKRP in Cincinnati until it burned out. After that, nothing for another two or three years.

While attending Fuller Seminary, I visited my mother over Christmas in 1988 and saw a portion of China Beach. It was enough to hook me on the series. (To this day, I consider it one of the best shows to ever grace television.) I also caught bits and pieces of Thirty Something and Twin Peaks because my apartment mate watched those shows. Oddly enough, I studiously avoided Star Trek: The Next Generation, although I’ve since made up for lost time.

Joining Wycliffe and traveling first to France and then to Cameroon separated me from television once again, and I’m sure I didn’t miss anything important. In fact, I was blessed to have completely missed the O.J. Simpson trial and the Monica Lewinski scandal – one of the benefits of serving overseas! When on furlough in 1996 and serving in California, I tried to watch Star Trek: Voyager, but it didn’t take. (As with Star Trek TNG, I have since made up for lost time through the magic of DVD’s.)

Marriage changed my viewing habits. Bonnie and I would watch Touched by an Angel on the PAX network during the first year of our marriage. She was also a big fan of JAG, so we watched that as well. Later, while serving in Cameroon with my wife and kids in the early years of this decade, my wife’s sister would mail to us recordings of JAG, so we were able to keep up with that even though out of the U.S. When NCIS first appeared, we got videos of that as well. We still watch it. Bonnie’s mother also sent us recordings of Joan of Arcadia, an extremely interesting, very well acted show with some controversial theology. We stopped viewing that after two years. (We don’t even know if a third year aired, nor do we care.) Through our upstairs neighbors, we were able to watch all of Voyager and most of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine on their DVD collections. It was fun while it lasted.

Once back in the U.S. in July of last year, we tuned into NCIS, Numbers, and The Mentalist, as well as network news, mainly for the weather. We also got our fill of the Beijing Olympics. With the help of a local library, I have enjoyed watching several Ken and Ric Burns documentaries (The Civil War, New York, and various biopics; I’m currently nearing the end of Baseball). Also, their complete collection of NCIS has helped us to fill in the years we were in Cameroon.

To be continued…