Television

The first television I ever saw was the decrepit black and white Zenith we kept in the middle of the combination living room/bedroom that my grandmother and I shared growing up. It was the only television in the house, if you don’t count the other larger, broken television it was precariously perched on. The stupid thing had a sixteen inch screen, weighed sixteen tons, and had no remote control. Instead of buttons, it had two knobs: volume and channel. Anytime I wanted to change the channel, I had to use all of my might to pinch the knob with one hand while wrenching it with the other hand because it was semi-broken.

Despite the frequent hand cramps, this television was my prized possession. I spent almost every waking moment watching one of the four channels that came in clear: ABC, PBS, WPIX (now the WB), and WWOR (now UPN/my9). In fact, I learned most of my English from watching Sesame Street and Perfect Strangers.

Around second or third grade, I discovered that there were cartoons on the other channels, namely FOX, which came in mostly as snow with the occasional flash...
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