I have a minimalist dilemma.

To idiot box, or not idiot box?

Our tiny home has not had a TV since we have been here, and we left our old, large Sony Bravia, a gift from my parents, at the old house, a black monolith, a space dominator, an attention stealer. Whilst we tried to set good habits, inevitably we ended up going the way most of us go - TV in front of the telly, it blaring Youtube or Netflix from 4 pm.

Life without is bliss.

Instead, we hit the 4pm point, where exhausted from the day we make tea and read, or knit, or just stare out the window at the trees and sky.

Sometimes Jamie will put his headphones on and watch tank videos on his phone, or anything with wheels - people bike riding across Afghanistan or bike packing in the wilderness, people fixing Land Rovers. Always the tinkerer, he likes to be inspired and informed by other tinkerers and adventurers, often resulting in him leaping off the couch and going to the shed, 'if that's okay'.

I'll get up and make dinner at some point, and call him when it's out - we sit at the table now, talk about the day, enjoy the food. After dinner we'll go awalking, even if it's only a ten minute stroll (my hips can only handle so much - it's an ongoing problem).

Sometimes we'll watch something together on the laptop - of late, Hijack, Black Rabbit, The Night Manager. It sits on the coffee table. After an episode or two, we slide into bed - him to read, and if I'm not reading I'm knitting and watching The Industry on my laptop, because I love a story, and I'm finishing off my grandson's deep blue blanket.

But with the plans to build a fire place, we realise that the couch configuration needs to be changed, and we can no longer position ourselves one a'couch to watch the laptop. With winter knocking soon, and the nights getting darker, we know full well we'll enjoy the idiot box more.

This means, however, firm ground rules. I don't want to slide into the habit of the TV being dominant in the room. We have agreed it won't go on til at least 7 pm, and only if we're both watching - no sounds of angle grinding as someone cuts metal for someting tank related, please. If we are desperate enough and tired enough to want to watch our individual shows, we have to watch them with headphones on our phones or laptops.

The idiot box must be a sometimes idiot box.

And one way to do this is to make television an artwork - literally. We're looking at a 32 inch Samsung frame TV, which looks like art on the wall. You can choose amongst thousands of artworks online, including the masters, or you can upload your own art or photography. The art gets displayed in mat and thus it looks even more like art - and it tracks your movements with a sensor so it turns off when you aren't in the room.

I know it's not as good perhaps as other televisions, but I'm not worried about how black the blacks are or whether the audio is diamond cut. I just want something a little bit better than a laptop, so that we can snuggle up with a winter illness or mid week exhaustion and watch a show.

I think we've got it as minimal as we can be - something that doesn't look like a television, but still fulfils a function, and that we've made a conscious, thoughtful decision about rather than having it for the sake of it.

With Love,

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