The Deleted Scenes - I Sing the Heater Electric
This isn’t going to be a long post, but it’s a bit of an offbeat one. Red Skelton said, “If you have a talent, that’s God’s gift to you. If you use that talent, that’s your gift to God.” Apparently God gave me the talent to write about anything. So my gift to God is…writing about everything. I say this because my latest article, in The Bulwark, is about electric heaters. The feel of the heat they produce, the old-fashioned smell of an electric radiator, the intense, quiet orange glow of an electric element, and other thoughts about nostalgia, memory, and consumer products. Thinking of a big, heavy metal electric radiator my parents had, I wrote:
That radiator is still in their house, with a broken thermostat. And so I also wrote about keeping old products around, which are theoretically repairable but may not worth the trouble:
Question for the room. I’m curious what old products do this for you—inspire strong memories (pleasant ones!), that make you wonder who designed and made them, that maybe even make you wonder whether it was a better society that was able to make them. I don’t necessarily think that, but it’s something that crosses my mind occasionally. The solidity and craftsmanship of some old stuff is sometimes astounding, and its tempting to think that it’s some kind of reflection of the character of the people who made it. On the other hand, it’s all just mass-produced stuff. The most-clicked link, of the 10 I included in my end-of-year roundup post, was this one, titled “Mechanical Romance,” in which I compared watching an old Japanese cassette player to attending church. I guess I keep coming back to the fact that manufactured products can take on so much meaning. Is this weird? Do you have one yourself? Leave a comment! Social card image credit Michael Pieracci/Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 Related Reading: Please consider upgrading to a paid subscription to help support this newsletter. You’ll get a weekend subscribers-only post, plus full access to the archive of over 200 posts and growing. And you’ll help ensure more material like this! You’re a free subscriber to The Deleted Scenes. For the full experience, become a paid subscriber. |
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