In this high-tech day in age, the VCR has become, to some, an ancient relic. My first experience with a VCR came in the very early 1980's, when my best friend's parents paid big bucks for one. We couldn't believe how cool it was to have a VCR and we would sit in front of the TV and watch the two videos that her family owned over and over again. Soon, mom and pop style video rental stores began popping up all over the place in my hometown. Back then, you had to pay a membership fee of about twenty dollars to join these exclusive clubs.

A few years later, when VCRs became more affordable, I bought one. I also joined one of those clubs and I would rent classic movies for myself and kid's movies for my son. I joined a mail order video club to beef up my collection and I even bought some videos from some of my favorite classic television shows like "I Love Lucy" and "Bewitched". I had one VCR in my family room and one upstairs in my bedroom and it was pure heaven.

Then along came the advent of the DVD player. Now I'm not one to snub technology, but it had taken me the better part of a decade to accumulate my vast collection of VHS tapes. What was with this DVD stuff now? I resisted jumping on the DVD bandwagon for as long as I could. Then, when my upstairs VCR broke, I knew I had to make a decision.

What was the sense of buying a DVD player, I asked myself. It won't play any of my VHS tapes and it won't record programs the way a VCR does. So what, exactly, was the point of the whole DVD thing?

My husband made the decision for me-- he went out and bought a DVD player on sale. He then bought a couple of DVDs of his favorite movies. My husband loved how the DVD player worked, how much better the picture quality was-- and those goofy "extras" that were included in his new "Jaws" DVD.

Still, I had reasons for wanting to hold onto my VCR:

I had a large collection of VHS movies and television programs.

My camcorder used VHS tapes, which meant the only way I could view the footage of my children would be via a VCR.

I liked how I could forward or rewind a VHS tape to exactly the part I wanted-- easier than the DVD "chapter" system, in my opinion.

I hate change. The DVD player was just one more electronic device that I would have to learn how to use. And it came with one more remote control to add to our collection.

That was a couple of years ago. Today we own three DVD players and about two dozen DVD movies (most of them are movies for our kids). But we still own one VCR. Granted, it's in our basement, hooked up to our kid's playroom TV. Still, when I'm in the mood to watch my treasured old movies and videos, I have a place to go. And if that VCR ever breaks, you can better believe I will be buying a new one.