Radio

I recently put my television in storage, and I feel happier. I’ve started thinking about getting rid of my radio. In college I spent a few days in a monastery in Quebec. I went with a friend; there was no talking on the grounds; it was perfect for reading, for study, for working on papers. But curiously the monks all had radios. Saturday night I walked down the corridors of the monastery, and a radio in each cell was tuned in French to the Montreal Canadien hockey game. Today, 9 May, is the Feast of Saint Pachomius. In third century Egypt, Pachomius left his desert solitude to form the first communal monastery.