Typewriter

I want a typewriter badly. I want an old, really old, typewriter. I'd like a typewriter from 1944, when a first class stamp cost 3 cents. Or maybe one from 1952, when a stamp still cost 3 cents and "The Cat in the Hat" was published. I'd even take a '66, because the 60's brimmed with floral prints and good music, and I think '66 was an excellent year even though I wasn't born yet. A first class stamp cost 5 cents in 1966 but surely the typewriters made that year were nice.

I want a typewriter that's like something out of a movie I'd never watch. I'd like it to be harsher and louder than necessary so I could slam down keys in the sort of crazed enthusiasm that only an author with a typewriter could know. I would be a better author, I think, if I had a typewriter. I would be forced to write, really write. If I had a typewriter I would write everything that came to mind and I would have to keep it all or rewrite it all or throw it all away. I wouldn't have a backspace key or an undo button and I'd have to really write.

I want a typewriter that's heavy and impractical so I can carry it to distant places and write for hours straight. It would be tiring and painful but it would make me a better author, I think. I'd learn to hold back my pains and emotions so I could save them to pour out in words. I'd have to write, really write, and I would hate it so much I'd fall in love. I'd write to live and to keep from dying and I think I am going to buy myself a typewriter.