My phone died this week.
No miracles, no resets, and no taking out the battery and blowing the dust out of the nooks and crannies could revive it.
People’s Merry Christmas and Happy New Year texts have gone unseen and thus ignored. I’ve probably offended some people by my lack of response, or perhaps failed to solve some problems.
In the event of an emergency, I would have had to add 911 as my friend on Facebook and wait for them to accept my request as I watched my house burn down in the meantime.
I’ve been forced to live in the moment instead of taking pictures of the moment or seeing what Twitter had to say about the moment.
I kept my thoughts inside my brain instead of maintaining a running commentary on social media or sending my tolerant friends multi-paragraph texts.
It was anxiety-producing.
It was liberating.
However, today’s world doesn’t allow much grace for phoneless people, and so I must replace it. Herein lies another opportunity for panic. All of my smart phones thus far have been Blackberries. When one dies, I replace it with another. I hunt for them on Amazon or Ebay, and hoard them when possible. On a Blackberry, I can’t see or send emojis, can’t access many apps, can’t do much more than text, surf the internet, take photos, and make calls, but I love the asdfghjkl keyboard. I type faster with my thumbs on that tiny keyboard than I ever did in high school typing class, and can bust out paragraphs in seconds.
Much to my chagrin, I am being dragged, kicking and screaming, into the modern world, the world of touch screen phones. I dread it. I know that even children can manage to send texts on touch screen phones, but I have a deep-seated fear that auto-correct will ruin my life, that my clumsy fingers will produce garbled nonsense that predictive text can’t predict.
As I brace myself to accept the latest technology, I am reminded that over 30 years ago, my high school graduation gift was a typewriter. I was excited to begin college with my very own machine. No more waiting for siblings to finish typing term papers so I could have my turn sitting at the kitchen table hunched over the old black Royal with the sticky keys.
I typed much of my work on my bright shiny typewriter throughout my freshman year of college. I fell in love with erasable paper and corrective tape, both of which saved me from ripping pages out of the rollers in frustration when I discovered an error three-fourths of the way down the page.
Even as my friends began to migrate away from typewriters to the university’s computer lab, I steadfastly stood by my typewriter. Real writers used typewriters, usually in damp attics, where great works were pecked out despite dim light and drafty windows. My dorm room wasn’t a damp attic, but I loved my typewriter and couldn’t imagine a day I would write without it.
Midway through college, I discovered the magic of the computer. Early word-processing programs such as WordStar and WordPerfect seemed to me to be astounding inventions; I could save my work, make changes, erase errors, and then watch with amazement as pages emerged from the dot-matrix printer. I felt important as I carried around my cute plastic box of floppy disks, knowing they represented not only hours of work but my ability to adapt to the modern world.
I gently tucked my typewriter into its case and stowed it in the back of my closet where it stayed until I dragged it out when my children were young. Fascinated by what seemed like a relic from ancient times, they amused themselves by pecking away on it until the ribbon finally ran out of ink.
Meanwhile, I set up spreadsheets, carried photos, music, and essays on flash drives, and made PowerPoint presentations. I learned to use the SmartBoard in my classroom, and cannot imagine teaching without it. I have never looked back at my typewriter with longing, although I maintain a fond nostalgia for the days when it appeared to be my ticket to literary greatness.
As I head into the newest— touchscreen—chapter of my life, I know that someday it will be as easy to use, and as indispensible, as a computer is to me now. I will shake my head with astonishment at my reluctance to embrace modernity and ease, and wonder why I clung so tightly to antiquated technology.
In the meantime, however, I’ll be working on a way to send texts from my typewriter, and trying to refine my touchscreen skills. Wish me lyck luvk luck.
