A Gift that Still Means the World to Me

My first efforts at writing started when I was nine years old and contributing to our elementary school newspaper with my serialized detective story that brought me some fame among my fellow students. However, I was never able to finish that story, for shortly before the fourth grade term ended I was laid up in the hospital recovering from major surgery. Bedridden for two months and with nothing much to do from my hospital bed, I began writing short stories and sharing them with the hospital staff. Of course, at that age I had little actual life experience to pen, so I stole ideas from my favorite LP record album, “LIGHTS OUT” an old radio show by Arch Obler. That album, a series of paranormal/horror radio shows, is still in my record collection. To make a long paragraph not much longer, suffice it to say, the hospital staff, including my surgeon, loved my stories. In short, I became the hospital’s Author in Residence, and they sent me home with encouragement to keep writing.

So I kept writing; awful stuff influenced by every schlock horror movie that came on our old black-and-white television (when the TV was actually working, which wasn’t often).

Way back in 1969 I began my first serious effort at writing a novel. I was thirteen years old and trying my hand at a murder mystery/ghost story featuring a young boy who heard voices in his head. My younger sister (the youngest of eight children in our family) eagerly read each chapter as I completed them until the very end. She loved it. I was proud of it, but didn’t know what to do with it, so I stored the handwritten first draft of this (in retrospect) monstrosity in a drawer where it sat in obscurity for months while I struggled at school with eighth-grade angst, a victim of teasing and bullying, low self-esteem, and low grades in everything but English in which I excelled. The real life horrors of school and trouble at home gave me plenty of real-life material for my English class assignments. The only thing that got me through that school year was my English teacher, who told me I had a gift.

In 1969, only five of my parents’ eight children remained at home, myself, one younger and one older sister, and two older brothers. Our mother was our sole caretaker, having divorced our dad almost a decade before, and he seldom came to visit us. She had her hands full, especially with my three older siblings who had gotten into the drug scene, mainly pot. Because of her battles with them, life at home was tense, to put it mildly. I don’t recall ever placing any of my work in her hands for her to read, simply because I felt she was overwhelmed, and I don’t recall her ever asking to read my work. Aside from my younger sister, no one really took much notice of my efforts, or so I thought. It turned out my two older brothers had read my work without my knowledge, having seen me writing at my little desk in the bedroom I shared with my sisters. (That room was my escape from the mayhem when I wasn’t on my bike exploring the outside world, the only times I felt peace within.)

One night my brother Tim came home with something that looked like a small black suitcase. He made a beeline to me at the dining room table and set it in front of me. “This is for your writing.”

I opened it and found an old Royal typewriter inside with a blank sheet of paper installed on the roller. It was heavy and sturdy, the frame made of cast iron, and the letters and symbols on the keys were clearly visible. Someone had taken good care of it in its time, even though the case showed signs of wear from being carted around.

 I knew it had to be expensive despite its age, and I asked him, “How did you get the money to buy this?”

He answered offhandedly, “I traded a lid for it.” A lid was a lot of pot.

I must have thanked him twenty times in the next few seconds, floored by his generosity and surprised that he knew I had been taking typing class at school. Here I thought no one ever noticed what was going on in my life. That was quite a revelation.

Tim then told me, “I want you to keep writing.”

Decades have passed since that night. That typewriter experienced many changes of residence as the years unfolded, and produced many pages of my early and amateurish manuscripts that I have since thrown away. A third-hand electric typewriter presented by my dad replaced the ancient manual Royal during that time; my very first Windows desktop computer with a printer replaced the electric typewriter in the early 1990’s.

Although I donated my electric typewriter to a thrift store since then, the antique manual Royal remains one of my most treasured possessions. The keys may be stiff from lack of use, but it all still works. The cloth ribbon still prints. Imagine that after so many decades stored in my closet!

I love the thing and I love the memories it brings. I can’t and won’t part with it because of what it means to me: My brother Tim believed I had enough talent to someday be a published author. He wanted me to have the tools to make that happen. I cherish his belief in me.

When I was cleaning out Tim’s apartment after he died in 2019, I came across something that he kept, something that was special to him. It was a letter I had written him in 2018 telling him I still had the Royal he gave me, and I went on to tell him how much his gesture and words encouraged me to never quit writing. Because of him, I didn’t quit, no matter how discouraging my early efforts.

 Eventually, I had enough faith in my abilities to write and publish my novel, “The Finest Hat in the Whole World.”

It was in his copy of that book where I found my letter to him.