What is in Word?

To me, the word "binge" is negative; it implies unhealthy consumption and a lack of self-control. So when folks started talking about "binge-watching" TV shows, all I could picture was pale people with sunken eyes sprawled in the glow of a screen in a darkened room surrounded by empty soda cans, chip bags, and pizza boxes.

Turns out, binge-watching can also mean dedicating your viewing to a single show, which, after the stay-at-home months of 2020, makes quite a bit of sense to me. Then, we watched shows we had never seen for a couple of hours each night, from the first episode to the last. Since not much new content was being released, each show was our entire viewing experience for the weeks, or months, it took to watch it in its entirety.

I still remember those days in terms of what we watched. Spring and summer of 2020 was Once Upon a Time, late summer was Heart of Dixie, fall and early winter was Revenge, followed by The Resident because, well, Emily Van Camp. And our viewing habits have evolved to pretty much be one show at a time, with the exception of a few network shows, mostly reality format, or new episodes of shows we have binged and caught up with, and the occasional movie.

There is an instant gratification, to be sure, in being able to punch a single button on the remote and find out what happens next. Gone are the days of waiting a week, or even the whole summer to find out who shot JR or what would happen with Ross and Rachel. But gone, too, is the shared experience of waiting and then watching together with family and friends, and knowing that a lot of other people, across the country or even the world, were watching, too.