Blast from the past...

...not fit for use today.

Am I starting to seem like that man after marriage who only comes once a month if you're lucky? God knows I have been feeling that these past few months while I try to - never mind. I digress.

Visitors and avid lurkers may have noted my direction and focus on writing & general liberal arts. I felt willing to slip away from the covers of not letting people into my life through photography.

I'm not keen on giving the internet roamers access to more pieces of a puzzle called my life so they can start their perverse hunt for the soul behind the ink (even if it is digital). However, pictorial context is necessary to flesh out the archeological findings I uncovered within my storage unit after helping my parents declutter Mama & Papa's things.

Hidden under some sheets and boxes was an old Underwood Champion typewriter. Sadly, it's well beyond its operative lifespan. It is an amazingly majestic artifact of the Gilded Age of literary drafting. A time before autocorrect & backspace or delete keys, when you felt the tactile indentations of the letters within the keys, the force of your digits produced the leverage to strike each character onto your paper.

This gem also harkened to a time of solitude within a study or room as it was only you, your thoughts, your typewriter & the sounds of your typing as you spilled the inner machinations of your story into your fingertips and onto the page with ribboned ink. There is a very romantic, dare I say literarily erotic aura, which a typewriter commands your attention upon its sight.

Truly, I wish this typewriter from my grandparents was functional to use. Yet - I share here its form for my fellow literary souls who may appreciate the sensual forms of its key sets, feed drum, & strike arms - which once would write worlds onto woven sheets of fiber.

I hope to find an old Smith Corona unit someday that speaks to me & maybe when that day comes, I will have something aged like wine within my conscious to strike to paper. Until then - please enjoy these two photos I took & until next time I see you, my lovelies ~ goodnight!

 

Underwood Champion Typewriter (Manual Operation)

Underwood Champion Key Set and Striker Rack

 

💋P.S. I am in no way an expert on typewriter terminology, so the naming of parts I say are most likely nonsense to true experts.