Let's get physical - Shawn Loughlin editorial

At home on the Loughlin compound, as we’ve struggled with the ability to watch television due to spotty internet connectivity (I won’t litigate here whether it’s due to bandwidth being syphoned away by baby monitors or the new and improved way of doing things not being an improvement so much), it’s been frustrating, to be sure, but not soul-crushing because Jess and I have just passed the time by getting physical.

 

To be clear, that’s not physical in the way that certain regions have baby booms nine months after days-long storm-stays, it’s more about the regal and dignified realm of physical media. Indeed, I am a bit old school in this way and I have a shelf full of blu-rays that most young people would probably think is very, very unnecessary. And yet, while these young losers may snicker behind my back on TikTok - something I not only don’t understand, but openly fear - I am having the last laugh. 

 

So, when we sit down to catch up on this show or that - we’re currently in the middle of a Succession rewatch, for your information, though not that it’s any of your business - and our television makes it clear that we will not be watching television that night (and by that, I mean unwatchable, won’t even start, kind of stuff, not just a little freeze here and there), we reach for the blu-ray shelf and save ourselves the aggravation. Some nights it’s not easy, as one of us has to have the baby monitors going while the other attends a meeting virtually. But, on those nights when it’s just about finding a few hours of entertainment after a day of work and parenting, blu-rays it is.

 

So, yes, this is a column in praise of physical media. Having said that, if you’re reading this column on newsprint, you’re clearly a keeper of the physical media flame. You read the newspaper, you likely thumb through books. I have many full bookshelves and a cookbook collection that borders on the obscene. You are me and I am you. We are one. 

 

A few weekends ago, I drove around this great province more than I’d driven in a while. I drove from Huron County to wine country, then from there to Ingersoll for a wedding and then back home, largely on my own as I met people here and there. I dutifully downloaded podcasts and music to my Spotify account to bridge any connectivity gaps and went on my way. However, if the internet can’t connect to the app, then my downloads are useless. 

 

Chalk up another win for physical media. Because I drive an absolute dinosaur of a car, I had some old CDs lying around and they were there for me, like a warm embrace from an old friend. Soon I was listening to the Talking Heads, Elvis Costello, the Pogues (we’ll miss you Shane). What a glorious time.

 

My next endeavour is to get a turntable and become a vinyl hipster. Talk about physical media - that’s a matter of diving in head-first. I’ll be sure to let you know how that goes. 

 

As the world returns to all that is tactile (like virtual meetings that can never take the place of sitting across a table from someone, seeing a concert that could never impact you the same way over your phone, hugging a person you could only elbow-bump not long ago), try making physical media part of your life again. A blu-ray is never going to get the hook from Netflix, a record is never going to be pulled off of Spotify because its author hates Joe Rogan and a book made of paper will never be burned or banned; wait, scratch that last one with the way the world’s going. You get the point - live among the physical. Never again will your internet signal (or lack thereof) stand in the way of the telling of a great tale.