The Minimalist and the Typewriter

A rare smile flashes on the proud new owner of a late 1960s Remington Rand typewriter.

My 16 year-old son, lover of retro.

Lover of minimalism.

Writer.

Keys clack-clacking echo down the hall.

Slim notebooks filled with captured thought stack up nearby.

Brusque men, a woman named Carol, and rainy, urban evenings with slick sidewalks pour into the world through his mind.

3ams back in the day, typing reports for my high school biology teacher who refused papers with White Out or erasures, waft through mine.

…that middle of the night, years ago, when Mom typed until almost 4am, spotlessly finishing what my tired fingers could not continue past 2.

…her home office below my bedroom, set up for her, the new realtor, with the then-latest technology, an IBM Selectric — my falling asleep most school nights to the electric types and ‘chings’ of Mom’s new career.

When my son walked down main street with his new purchase a street kid calls out, “Hey, that looks like Pistachio’s typewriter!”

“I don’t know,” my son replies, “I just got it. At the vintage store.”

“Pistachio sold his typewriter?! But, he’s the Poet — you know, ‘One poem, one dollar — typed out for you’?”

My son shrugs his shoulders and moves on.

Painted in white lettering on one side of the typewriter case:

Poet ~ At Your Service

Today, the typewriter case sits neatly tucked underneath his desk. The clack-clacking continues its echoing sound.

The typewriter. Now at the service of the Writer.