Change doesn’t kill you. It just feels like it does.

A terrible thing happened the other day — my compact disc player died.

I mean, it’s not that I’m not used to appliances of all types dying, it’s just that it means I will have to replace it. And I read the other day where compact discs are dead. So that means I will have to replace it with something else and that means change.

There’s that word again — change. Fear of change is called metathesophobia. I think I dread change more than I fear it. A small distinction to be sure. Realistically I know that change won’t kill me, but I figure, why take that chance? Sure the world has to change but if I stay small and insignificant, maybe I won’t have to.

But, as usual, that philosophy didn’t work. While I wasn’t looking, the music world changed and will drag me along behind it. Some stores aren’t even going to carry CDs anymore.

Unfortunately, I miss listening to my collection of what can only be called dinosaur rock because most of the bands and artists are long since extinct. Radio isn’t nearly the same. With your own collection of music, you are in charge of what you listen to with no commercials.

I had a portable CD player I used when I worked in the yard, but it died too. I could replace it but they don’t seem to last an entire summer so what is the use?

Back when I had a collection of a couple of hundred of vinyl albums, the music industry started manufacturing eight track tapes. After I had a good collection of eight tracks, cassette tapes became the rage. Then someone decided that CDs were the way to go. Over the years I spent thousands of dollars duplicating many of my favorite albums in different formats.

Now I will have to go online to find music, I think.

I still have the vinyl albums stored in the basement, but I don’t know if they would play anymore. To find out, I would have to buy a turntable and all the assorted stereo parts whose maintenance used to drive me crazy.

I know there are small portable music players that download music and allow you to listen anywhere with earbuds. But I can’t even work earbuds. They never seem to stay in.

I know there are free music services out there because I looked up some of them on my computer. I think you can buy individual songs and albums, but I really don’t want to spend the money to replace my music one more time.

Sigh. This is just the griping before I bow to the inevitable. I don’t know how much of this is just the process of getting older and how much is my quirky personality. It’s always hard to tell.

I probably will do what I usually do in these situations and ask my kids for help. That’s how I got my smart phone, even if I don’t know all the best ways to use it.

That is how I got my CD player on the stereo system I had. That’s how I got the speaker in the basement that works off Wi-Fi in my smart phone, or would if I could remember how it works.

Technology will keep advancing and I will follow in its path, far behind but trudging steadily along. Did I mention that I am somewhat of a technophobe as well?

I’ll change and I probably will like it when I get it figured out. But, as always, I’ll go kicking and screaming.

Wally Spiers: wally.spiers@gmail.com

This story was originally published August 17, 2018 at 10:01 AM.