Friday, August 9, 2013

News Watch

I'm sitting here in the kitchen playing hearts on the computer.  Timeout Boy sits beside me eating grapes and cheese.  The TV is tuned to the news.

There are wildfires in California.  I glance up for a moment to see the damage.  Then I notice the boy.  He is staring at the screen intently, a grape in one hand and a slice of cheese in the other.

Suddenly I remember being a little boy in the Philippines.  I'm sitting on the concrete floor in our living room.  My dad is on the sofa, and the TV is tuned to "NewsWatch".  Our set may have still been black and white, but I'm not sure.  The anchor is white and speaking in English.  I have no idea what he's saying.  Something foreign, grown up and important.

I tried looking up "newswatch" on YouTube, but there are too many results with those key words.

I wonder if Timeout Boy will remember this moment.  He just stopped eating and went to look for his dalmatian movie.  I won the hearts game by 1 point.  The evening news ended, and I switched over to a rerun of "The Simpsons".  Now he just came wandering back in, placed his hands on my elbow and shoulder, and stands watching beside me.

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I kinda lost my train of thought here.  I guess my point was that I remember just playing and not caring and leaving all the supposedly important stuff to the adults.  And the news certainly seemed to be relevant back then.