By DAVID SVIEN
Just when I thought I was out … they pull me back in.
Video stores are long gone and streaming has almost totally replaced the days of VCRs and DVD players.
With a Roku device being approximately the size of a large eraser, I understand why many people have divested themselves of physical media.
Heck, I did it several years back, when I sold off my own collection.
And yet, the itch is always there.
Holding a DVD case in your hand, marinating in the soft glow it gives off, whether it’s an Oscar Best Picture winner like “Rocky” or a non-award winner like “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze,” takes me back.
To 15 years in the small-town video store biz.
To the ever-present smell of popcorn and the streaks of “butter” forever mashed into the carpet.
To the thrill of unrolling new posters and fighting over who got to claim the free movie studio swag, be it a T-shirt from “Apollo 13,” a bomber jacket from “The River Wild,” or a “Forrest Gump” box o’ chocolates.
To playing “Bugsy Malone” and the original “Gone in 60 Seconds” and “SpongeBob” and Riverdance and opera on the in-store TVs until customers lost their minds.
All it takes is one generous person to offer me some free DVDs, and I mentally plan out how I can turn the side room in my duplex into a small-scale recreation of Videoville.
This time, I tell myself, I won’t spend money on movies, only offer a forever home for movies being given away.
I’ll be strong, but compassionate.
In a world where the Criterion Channel got caught editing “objectionable material” from Oscar Best Picture winner “The French Connection” — without telling viewers — and in a world where so many movies simply don’t exist on streaming, I’m preserving history.
When the apocalypse hits and the internet goes down forever, if I have DVDs, the movies will live on.
So, I’m doing it for the good of all mankind, is what I’m saying.
Sure, David, sure.
Well either way, I’m doing it.
Going back to my misspent younger years. Preserving movie history.
Relaxing by putting movies in precise alphabetic order (remember, you don’t count “a, and, or the!!”), and gazing upon the wonder of physical media.
So, want to clear out space in your own abode? I’m here for you.
No VHS – it’s a duplex! But DVD, if it doesn’t cost me money I don’t have, yes.
165 Sherman Road, Coupeville, WA, 98239 is the address.
It’s the place where the cats will be wandering by outside, shaking their heads and whispering, “He’s back at it, boys.”
Now, I just need to see about liberating the chair with the Videoville logo on it that’s part of the bench at Coupeville High School basketball games.
‘Cause what better way would there be to sit among my movies, pretending like it was still 1997?
David Svien writes the Coupeville Sports Blog and used to own Videoville, a popular video store on South Main Street.
