Going Digital

One day channel 7 was nothing but static. It just happened, inexplicable as cancer or a sudden hemorrhaging of delicate brain tissue, the skein of dreams torn apart. The next channel to go was 18. Then 33. The show about the tall blond detective who slept with the District Attorney’s ravishing wife was no longer on for our enjoyment. The documentaries on endangered species and dying whales and burning rainforests and three-headed children worshipped in foreign countries as gods were no longer available for our edification.

Next 14 went, and with it Judy’s most precious game show. She became hysterical. Call the company! She screamed at me. What company? I asked. Any one! she screamed, but there was no one to call, and she knew it, and it only drove her into a deeper and sicker rage. We only had an antenna. I refused to pay for advertising, the true function of TV.

I gave Judy copious pills and she slept, tossing and turning in fitful dreams. Perhaps she dreamt she was on the set of her favorite game show, only it was empty, abandoned, the lights and sounds gone. No audience, no contestants, no host.

At work I mentioned my problem. Yeah, they said, everyone’s going digital, don’t you know? They told me to buy a special box that would fix everything. Someone handed me a coupon but I felt scorned, and alone in the bathroom I crushed it with my fist and flushed it away.

That night at home I couldn’t find Judy. I looked everywhere in the apartment; she was not there. I wasn’t worried. I sat down with a beer and turned on the TV. Static hissed at me from every channel. I turned the TV off and got up and went into the bedroom and without undressing I climbed between the sheets and I found her. Found Judy. She was right there in the bed beside me, a puddle of shimmering static.

I touched her and she rippled.