I started on a typewriter just like this one, maybe this one. A De Luxe Olympia. I didn’t know QUERTY and was not acquainted with Mavis Beacon either. I would hunt and peck and hours later I would have a few paragraphs filled with youthful enthusiasm if nothing else.

I was tentative with the keys. I’m surprised that I didn’t end up with TMJ . I would grit my teeth with every strike.

I had amazing speed. Somewhere around 10, maybe 15 characters per minute.

I remember staying up late at night, my bedroom door closed, a solitary lamp close to my desk illuminating the keyboard and the paper. I could not stream my consciousness, only think in phrases and catch up with my fingers at the end of each word.

My only companion with the click, clack, tick of the keys. They typewriter and maybe a dog.

And what crap I wrote. Science Fiction. I never finished anything. I wonder where those pages have gone? Lined a bird cage? In a folder on a book case? Where have those old works gone? Where are the words?