it's amazing what will happen when you turn off your TV. I never realized how the flashing commercial color and fast paced talking actors really overwhelm one's senses. In making that choice, a flood of realization. I'm thirsty and the way I was sitting was incredibly uncomfortable. I don't really want a cigarette but I do want to write something down. Or read something. What if we all decided to turn off our TVs at night and talk to the person sitting next to us on the couch? Or instead of chain smoking, dazed, you're drinking water and exercising your brain that you finally realized was dying a little? My eyes are thanking me for staring at the words on a page instead of flashing capitalized bold agendas trying to sell me. My ears are much more at ease with Dylan crooning in them instead of being yelled at to believe them. Life becomes a whole lot simpler when you turn off the TV.

We were all brought up losing ourselves in the voices coming from the radiating box pedestaled at the center of our family's community rooms, rather than listening to our own voices telling a story while reading. Maybe the days I can look to to find a time I was a lot less high strung, was when I was eight, fat and read books all day. I was fat, and in elementary school that's a bummer, but I was happy. When I was in High School and 5 foot Rockette- potential inches, a size impossibly small, I lost myself in fluff television shows. Puffed full of unrealistic future goals, I acclimated to envying lives of fame and fortune. Realities in books and novels don't have to be unrealistic. They don't make choices for you, you choose them. If you don' t like it, you can put it down and pick up another that speaks to you. But if everything on your television channels aren't playing exactly what you want, who's really making the choice of what you're watching?

Not only has my days of being a whole lot less high strung seem to be slowly creeping into my present, the realization of what can make you truly happy is pretty relaxing.

But until someone has turned off the TV, maybe it'll be harder to find. Not just turning off a TV, but turning off, completely. Your computer, cellphone, too. Ghastly thought, right? Or is it? Some of the best times I've had recently, leading up to my new found personal bit of sanctuary, were sitting in rooms with no televisions, talking or inventing new ways to enjoy time. It's fascinating how much more enriching time can be when you're forced to entertain yourself rather than be entertained. I propose a new movement. We've all been exposed to reinventing our food by going back to growing from seed, slow food. So why not go back to the seed of communication and talk to the faces around us instead of screens? Or reading the newspaper or a new book instead of watching CNN and watching a sitcom? We've wandered from just that and given into television, video games, high speed internet and smart phones. Not saying that I'm not a true fan of all of the above said, but I'm also quite the fan of living a relaxed, fulfilling and enriching life. So why not going back to the basics? After all, when I read, I write. The last time I indulged I was eight, fat, reading a book a day and... happy. Luckily, I'm no longer the fat kid in elementary school, but this life sure has been working out pretty swell for me, again. We all want to be kids again, and "go back to a simpler time," so who said that was ever impossible? You can, too. What's stopping you? Put down your remote and pick up a book, turn off the news anchor and get black ink on your fingers from your local paper, invite people over to play a card game instead of watching that movie. You'll be surprised. I was.