We understand one another.

I have a television -- the very same Pensacola television that my parents bequeathed to me upon my departure from the family unit oh so many years ago. It is the only television I have ever owned. I'm 37 years old now. This television was old when I received it as a young man, eager to face the new world.

It is still bravely running. It is plastic brown. It delivers its messages in color. Its pitifully small speaker is a little blown. It performs barely adequately by receiving PBS, a little NBC, and sporadic episodes from The WB. It abandoned me during the last Super Bowl. It refused to get that channel… That was a difficult time in our relationship. But we moved through it.

Yes, I've grown to love it dearly. We are like an old couple who stuck it out in their arranged marriage and are finally entering the twilight years. We have learned to live together. She has helped me to remain relatively television-free. Like a loving but mostly sexless wife, she pushes me toward National Public Radio to get my news (delivered in my kitchen, via an even older AM radio about the size of a toaster oven with an upholstered speaker grill). And I admit to a daily foray into the dark forest of Internet news.

We maintain reasonable, mutual expectations. We understand one another.