Blame a two-foot power cord. It’s kaput. And so then, were my chances of turning out a column for the Oct.
11 Union Democrat. Because that charging cord for years brought power to my ancient laptop — on which I have pounded out reams of copy. Without the cord, I had little recourse.
In short order, my old Mac ran out of power. Its screen blinked, then blanked out. So what next? Replacement power cords were not in stock at Staples or Walmart.
So I mail-ordered one, commenced to wait, then weighed my remaining options. 1. Type out copy on my iPhone? I don’t think so.
My fingers are too big and the phone is way too small. 2. Hammer out a stories on a typewriter? I have two venerable Royals here at home, one of them being the “Chris Bateman Memorial Typewriter.
” But none of them worked. More on that later. 3.
Do it the old-fashioned way, with a pen? At one point of my long life, my handwriting was legible and, dare I say, neat. No longer: Over the years, my writing has become indecipherable hieroglyphics, legible only to myself and sometimes not even. My inabilities in all the various strategies above can be traced back to grade school.
My education began at St. Norbert’s, a Catholic elementary school in the Chicago suburb of Northbrook, Illinois, where I spent kindergarten, first and second grades. Thanks to the teachers, all nuns, I became proficient at block printing.
But by third-grade my parents transferred me to Greenbriar Elementary, a public school much closer.