Anyone who knows me knows I don't need another typewriter. I'm coming up on 40 of them now. The difference between owning a typewriter and having a typewriter collection isn't a large difference; both of these things give me membership in a shrinking minority of people. A typewriter collection means I talk about Tom Hanks more than other people do; when you're not a typewriter collector, one of the few things you know about typewriter collections is that Tom Hanks has one. I enjoy Mr. Hanks' work and I'm envious of his collection, so speaking about him is not something I view as a hardship, but it doesn't always go anywhere -- we mention the collection and we each choose our favorite movie, and then we have nothing else to talk about.
The thing is, I'm not really a typewriter collector, either. I'm a writer, or I try to be. I don't have a great deal of interest in antique and collectible typewriters; I have interest in typewriters that can be used. I own multiple typewriters because beyond the basics, I know very little about typewriter repair, and I don't want to be caught without a working typewriter. I even have multiples of the same typewriter for this very reason (because honestly; can anyone kill a mid-50's Smith-Corona?). I enjoy knowing I can keep typing for many days to come, but others find my collection mildly annoying. My wife sometimes wishes I collected spoons or thimbles or something--you know, the type of thing where the entire collection might fit in a single drawer. Still, this post is not really about typewriters, nor is it about the perils and pleasures of typewriter collecting. This post is about Fate. It happened like this. Earlier this week, I had a birthday. My father-in-law sent me a card with a check. My in-laws have been sending me checks on my birthday every year since I married their daughter; Mom started it, and when she passed Dad continued it. So I had this check from Dad that I needed to cash. I also have a dear friend, and this dear friend of mine and I exchange letters. I have shared the dorky joy of owning a typewriter with this friend, and so we type letters back and forth to each other, as we only actually see one another four or five times a year. My friend sent me a lovely letter that arrived on my birthday, and yesterday I typed my reply and sealed it. But the letter needed a stamp, and I didn't have any fun stamps. I had stamps; I just didn't have any fun ones. This is one of my best friends in the world, you understand, and the lack of fun stamps caused a minor moral dilemma. Did I really want to use an un-fun stamp for one of my best friends? Was I supposed to use the same stamps for my dear friend that I use when I pay my bills? I didn't think so. I had errands to do yesterday. I had told my wife I could take care of the grocery shopping. I needed to put gas in my car. I needed to cash that check I got from Dad. So I figured I would just add to the list of errands and go to the Post Office and buy some fun stamps and mail the letter to my friend, as well. All told, that would only add about ten minutes to my errands (it's a pretty small town, where I live). So I got the gas and I cashed the check, and then I headed across town to the Post Office. (One should always save grocery shopping for last, so the frozen items don't thaw too much in the car.) I bought 20 stamps celebrating the Lunar New Year and the Year of the Ox, and I used one of them to mail the letter, and that was that. Except it wasn't. Because I had taken ten minutes to get to the Post Office, my route back to the grocery store had been altered. Not by much -- again, it's a pretty small town -- but enough that my return took me past a St. Vincent de Paul store. I thought to myself, "When was the last time I had been inside this St. Vinnie's?" and I could not recall, but I did remember that the last time I had been inside, they had had a typewriter near the exit. I had time, so I pulled in the parking lot and walked inside, and I didn't find anything I really needed. Still, I walked toward the exit and checked the shelves, and there I found a late-50's Triumph De-Jur Perfekt. This is not the most common typewriter to find, but there it was, a portable in a hardshell case that even had the original brushes and cleaning cloth. Its two-toned color practically gleamed beneath the fickle St. Vinnie's fluorescent lighting. It had a piece of paper in it, so I tried it out a little, and the German engineering (West German, at that time) was evident from the first. I don't need another typewriter. "You're buying that?" asked the lady at the counter as I plopped the case near the register. "I just put that out ten minutes ago. But I don't know if I can sell it to you; our credit/debit system is down right now." If you're following along at home, here's a brief recap of where we are right now:
Anyone who knows me knows I don't need another typewriter. But anyone who knows me also knows that when Fate slaps me upside the head, I pay attention. Welcome to the collection, Beautiful.
2 Comments
Vicki Colle
2/27/2021 09:06:11 am
It's funny how these things happen, it must be fate! It certainly is a beauty!
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Your dear friend
2/27/2021 06:26:39 pm
I cannot wait for the letter with the beautiful stamps. Thank you for including me in your blog and for making me smile at the fate of it all. ❤️
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