📺 Breaking Crumbs

An internal strategy for irrationally irate strangers: "I'm sorry you're having a hard day."

“The child is born whole, but then is wounded by life events, each wound splitting off some natural truth and producing a concomitant strategy for survival. Such a split and attendant reflex is more popularly known as neurosis, the split between soul and society that each of us suffers.”

—James Hollis, Under Saturn’s Shadow: Studies in Jungian Psychology

Early on in childhood, I realized TV news was scarier than any horror movie because all the terrible things they showed were true, not just a figment of someone’s gory imagination, like Gremlins or Tremors.

At ten years old, I was utterly convinced that any day now I would be kidnapped from my bedroom while sleeping, the way Polly Klaas was (Content warning: please don’t click if this kind of story will give you, too, nightmares for the rest of your life. I will never understand true crime as an entertainment genre). Polly was two years older than me, and lived less than an hour away. Why not me?

I learned to quickly shield my eyes and ears when my mom had the morning or evening news on—or better yet, to leave the room—and I haven’t watched it since.

For over two decades now, despite (and in spite of) the rise of 24/7 cable news, scrolling apps, algorithm-optimized videos, flashing reels, and addictive TikToks—I have dished myself news in measured doses only by reading physical newspapers and magazines, free of the intrusive blinking ads and the temptation to scatter my focus by clicking random links. (Yes, it means sometimes I get breaking news a day or two late, and that I often mispronounce names, but I’m willing to live with those consequences.)

And so, when I encountered that familiar noise pollution at my sacred spaffice last week after a refreshing swim, I knew what I had to do. With water still dripping from my swimsuit, I looked around to see the women’s executive lounge empty, except for the talking heads on—what else—TV news. It’s often the case that someone who might have been watching leaves it on even after they leave the gym, so after glancing around and not seeing anyone, I turned it back off, resurfacing the soothing sound of spa music.

I always do this when there’s no one sitting in the lounge area—the one we all pay extra for—restoring the vibe to blissful quiet, away from the alarming red ticker visual and the sound of anchors’ contrived voices pressing various political hot buttons, tossing out crumbs designed to titillate, captivate, and enrage.

Too late. It had already riled up at least one person, who came storming around the corner looking for the culprit.

I had one hand on the door to the steam room. As soon as she found me, she stopped, stomped her foot, and pointed back toward the lounge area. I was now naked under a towel, dignity quickly draining, as she was fully dressed.

“EXCUSE ME,” she boomed, her voice already simmering with rage, “did you just turn the TV off?!?”