A Romantic Piece of Equipment

Last summer I decided to invest in this stereo system that is a piece of nostalgia and Romance. I can almost hear the 'R' in Romance rolling when I think of this prize. This pre-modern stereo console sits in my bedroom with my AM/FM cathedral radio on top of it. Both are reproductions of entertainment equipment from a much earlier time period.

My stereo console is from Seventh Avenue , a company whose catalogue I have been receiving for several years now. Seventh Avenue sells all kinds of items for the home ranging from furniture, accents like grandfather clocks, toys, housewares, electronics, jewelry, collectibles, and even fitness machines. I really love this company for their furniture items that are a throw back to earlier eras. My console has a turn table that plays records of all speeds, a cassette player, an AM/FM radio, and a CD player. It even has a remote control devise.

Shortly after I was born in the early 1960s, my dad bought a stereo console from Philco. It's cabinet was made of pure walnut veneer, and he was extremely proud of it. It was one of the most expensive pieces of furniture that my parent's owned at the time. It had a turn table and an AM/FM radio. We still have it even though neither the radio nor the turntable functions anymore. Throughout my childhood it was a mainstay in our home with my dad playing his jazz records on nearly full blast many evenings, and Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" Speech became ingrained in my mind because dad would play it over and over. When the Philco stereo was first purchased it came with a shiny, silver colored label sitting regally on its' left speaker. Being curious even then, I quickly peeled it off one day when my parents were not looking. My dad later said he was so hurt when he saw how I had sneaked and defaced his most prized possession at the time.

Now this year I have my own Romantic looking console. It is not made of the sturdy stuff of which my dad's is made, but I think it is far more beautiful. It harkens back to a time before my dad's piece. It looks rather Victorian whereas dad's looks more 1960s-ish, last elaborate and more direct.

I still have some LPs (Long Playing records) of my own that I bought when I was a university student, all of Culture Club, a couple of Gino Vannelli albums, Dionne Warwick, Mario Lanza, Chopin. What's left of my dad's old jazz collection is still here too, Thelonius Monk, Ahmed Jamal, Miles Davis, Dakota Staton, Nina Simone, some Leonard Bernstein, even the "I Have Dream" speech is still around. This is what I cut my cultural teeth on. What and whom I listened to over the years has been a subliminal influence on why I am a very unique and Romantic individual.

Like my dad was, I am very proud to own the above piece.