The idyllic wintertime scene that I painted for you in my last entry quickly turned into something less than ideal when we lost power to our house the very next day (Valentine’s Day). The snow that I wrote about was followed by freezing rain, which ultimately proved to be too much for the power lines and tree limbs to bear. As a result, my family and I found ourselves “camping out” in our home, bundling up in our sleeping bags at night in order to stay warm for example. With the WiFi out, work-related activity was a no go, even if I had found a way to keep my laptop charged. When I took stock of the situation, trying to figure out what I could do with myself under the circumstances, I didn’t come up with a whole lot of options.
However, as manual typewriters don’t require electricity to function, typing was definitely an option. So I ended up typing quite a few letters during the two days that we were without power. Typing during the day was easy enough, while typing during the evening was feasible with the assistance of a headlamp. This further added to the whole feeling of camping out in our home. All in all, l had what was more than likely my most productive stint of typing since buying my first typewriter. I think that I knocked out at least eight letters in total.
In my case, the act of typing in the midst of a power outage wasn’t so much a part of the insurgency as described by Richard Polt in his book “The Typewriter Revolution“, nor was it an act of survivalism (like eating and drinking or staying warm). But it was incredibly therapeutic to be able to capture all of my thoughts that were taking place during the power outage in the way that only typewriters can offer. I knew that the letters were not going anywhere any time soon, yet I kept on writing them because not only did it help to occupy my time in a way that felt productive, but it also allowed me to use my typewriters in an unique setting. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not wanting to recreate this scenario again. Still, the typewriters definitely made a bad situation better in my case under the circumstances.
At one point I even hauled a typewriter out to my truck to type in the warmth of the cab while charging my phone. I was going to use the truck to make a run to the grocery store anyway so I figured that I would get it nice and fully warmed up while partially re-charging my other communication device. But in the case of the Smartphone, I was keeping it turned off most of the time in order to conserve what little power it had left. While I tried to be mindful of the time that I was spending on the phone, I could type away on the typewriters for as long as I wanted to. All in all it made for an interesting experience. A few individuals will end up with some rather unique letters as a result. I highly doubt that I’ll ever find myself typing in the cab of my truck ever again. I hope that I never find myself typing during a power outage again. But I’m glad that I bad re-discovered the typewriter before all of this went down.
AFTERTHOUGHTS: I actually thought about trying to create an entire blog post from within my truck with the use of my iPhone, but in the end, it all seemed a bit too gimmicky and would have taken too much time. Still, I’ll admit to being surprised at how incredibly well the Olympia Traveller performed under the circumstances. (Personally, I prefer typing with the Traveller over the Olivetti Lettera 32 that I also happen to own.)
While rather far-fetched in this day and age, typing in the cab of my truck even had me thinking about the days when reporters were still cranking out copy on typewriters as a matter of course. No doubt plenty of them did so from the passenger compartment of a vehicle back in the day. I can say that I much prefer typing in the comfort of my home, preferably heated during the wintertime.
Winter here is fineshed ..for now, you never know what could happen in winter months, but a Power outtake we never had, I guess cause all powecables run underground.here.
Cool story nevertheless, it even sounds a bit like fun camping out in you’re home and typing!.
Received you’re letter this week, I’ll reply soon.
Many thnx,
Indro
It definitely qualified as a “cool” story. Still my family were fortunate compared to many in Portland who lost power for far longer. Meanwhile, Portland and other spots in Oregon were fortunate compared to other parts of the country that lost power (and in some cases water as well) where it was much colder outside.
Sometimes I think power outages are given to us as a time to reflect, write, and think. We grow so accustomed to our modern life it is easy to forget how things used to be done. I found my down times during storms, floods, winter, and other power outages to be a great time to record my thoughts in writing. Then I bought a typewriter.
Manual typewriters and slide rules, and crystal sets, don’t require electric.
In the past, backpacking and car camping provided similar escapes. In those cases, my thoughts were just that, and were never recorded or passed along to others.
I have an identical traveller de-luxe, so dazzling and so practical.
Just imagine how many others are literally left out in the cold with dying devices and no way to communicate with the outside world. We are fortunate to have a passion for these beloved machines as well as the privilege to keep them working.
I agree John. In this case I still remained grateful that I had shelter, even if there was no power available for a period of time. The Traveller is a great little typewriter, everything you really need and nothing more.
Here we never experience an outage for more than a few hours. Even then, we’re freaking out. We haven’t had an outage in the time I’ve been collecting, but I was glad to live vicariously through you with the visual of typing with a headlamp. I can see how it would be uncomfortable to type in a vehicle. I’d still love to see Joe do a video about it. Or maybe you will! 😜
While some prefer yoga classes, others simply contort themselves while attempting to type from the cab of a pickup. Instead of a graceful “downward dog”, think of Scooby Doo getting a major cramp.
As far as the videos go, let’s face it — Joe is the master. Perhaps rather than placing his face between the upright branches of a fork in a tree for his video intro, he could be peering through the steering wheel of a car instead.
This is exactly why we have 3 different sizes or portable generator (including a recently added inverter unit for the electronic stuff), 6 oil lamps scattered around the house and a wood burning stove in the basement. I would like to add a kerosene heater to the fleet, but they seem to be getting very hard to find these days.
A few years ago, My wife was at her computer and I was typing in the basement when the power went off. I heard a loud swear word come from upstairs, so I hollered back,
“My typewriter still works”. The response I got back is not fit to quote on this blog. I simply lit and oil lamp and finished off my letter.
It was still September, so not cold enough to have to worry about lighting the wood stove, we have a natural gas stove, so supper that evening was a bowl of hot soup. The power came back on about mid-morning the next day. All the best,
William
It sounds as if you are definitely prepared for whatever might come your way William. What’s the old saying, something to the effect of “a gallon of prevention is worth 33.5 kilowatt hours of cure”.
It sounds as though it was a good thing that you and your wife were separated by an entire floor in your home when you lost power a few years ago. There’s certainly something to be said for typing in the basement.