SOUND STRENGTH

TVs at the gym: 15 screens — no sounds; just texts. “Mayberry” needs voices.

I was at the gym, in the “machine room.” Stair-steppers, treadmills, stationary bikes, rowing machines, and my personal fav — elliptical striders. There are at least 15 television screens mounted above the rows of machines. There is no sound, but there are subtitles that scroll across the bottom of the screens.

News and sports and house-buying shows are okay this way. You can read the explanations, and look to a different screen when a commercial comes on — sorry advertisers.

Down the row, I see that someone has “Mayberry RFD” on. Or maybe it was “The Andy Griffith Show?” Anyway, I saw Andy and Opie and Aunt Bee. Their faces were animated, but not funny. And then it hit me: the sounds of the voices — with their distinctive regional accents, dialects, syntaxes, and idioms — the voices made the show funny and the characters, memorable. And endearing! They said funny things — and they said things, funny.

I can “get” opera with subtitles because I can hear the voices and see the expressions — even if I can’t understand the languages. And I can read the body language. And I can hear the emotions. I can see the dancers and hear the orchestra. And music is a language — all by itself!

I need to hear Andy and Opie and Aunt Bee to “get” their humor. There is strength and understanding in the sounds of voices.