Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Clickety Clack


Years ago my son was completing a worksheet, and one prompt asked: "Which one of these does not make noise?"  Some of the options pictured were of a rotary dial phone, a television with knobs, a radio with knobs, and the like.  He knew those made noise; they were similar to things around the house (or we even have had them).  "Mommy, does that make noise?" he asked, pointing at the mystery object.  That was a typewriter.  I was astounded to realize that he had never heard the lovely clickety-clack of a typewriter.  It sort of resembles a keyboard...or not?

I then kept an eye out for a typewriter, and when a friend asked if I wanted one that was going to salvage, I hauled the big clunker home.  The kids were enchanted, typing and typing, until the novelty of it waned.  Then it sat in the basement for several months until we saw a Euromaxx tv segment on typewriter artist Dirk Krecker.  



Next thing we knew (heard, actually), the typewriter had been hauled upstairs by our son, and the loud clicks and clacks resulted in this:




He made these fun creatures and even inserted words like "brim of hat," Word World-style. 





A couple of weeks ago, the ribbon finally gave out, and we are looking for more ribbon or, preferably, a much smaller and lighter typewriter.  In the meantime, I am trying to persuade the kids to learn how to type (through BBC's online dance mat program), so we will be ready when our next typewriter finds its way to us.

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