No one who was alive then can forget the sights and sounds of that weekend in 1969.

The drawling voices of “Houston” guiding the lunar module gingerly into its assigned parking place on the face of the moon. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin floating with each step, like kids in one of those aptly named Moonwalk bounce houses now ubiquitous at children’s birthday parties. And the instantly iconic utterances: “The Eagle has landed,” and “That’s one small step for man….”

This life-altering technological event was unfolding on screens in living rooms across the land. In my family’s living room, there was something extra: The television had landed.

In my home, the weekend of the moon landing was forever known as the weekend we rented a television. Yes. Rented a television.

We had no television of our own. We were perhaps not rich enough to afford color TV at the time, but we at least could have had a small black-and-white like everyone else. But our parents, like some technological Bartleby the Scrivener, simply folded their arms at the onslaught of the television age and said: “ I would prefer not to.”