I once vowed never to touch a computer! When I was a teenager, our Headmistress proudly announced the school had bought our first computer. Hands shot up, my classmates desperate to be the first to use the massive plastic and metal machine. I also put up my hand. “Do I have to touch it?” My teacher raised her eyebrows in disbelief, but I knew that computers and I had nothing in common. They felt alien. I wasn’t technical or mathematical and had no interest in learning how to use one… so I didn’t touch it during the rest of my school career!
You wouldn’t get away with that nowadays of course as IT has taken over the world. My friends couldn’t understand my avoidance tactics, my teachers couldn’t understand, even my mum couldn’t understand. As a young Wren during the latter stages of World War Two, she had worked at Bletchley Park, part of the team helping to decode the Enigma Machine. For years, she would never talk about it, just quote the Official Secrets Act and look over her shoulder, as if she was being spied upon. Later, she told me, “I was just a cog in the wheel,” but I know that every person made a difference, so in my eyes, my mum was vital to the war effort!
I was still wary of computers, but slowly and stealthily, they crept into my life and the school where I taught. “A handwritten report is so much nicer, more personal,” I declared, but the new regime was in place and school reports were formatted on computer. Then interactive whiteboards were invented. Give me an old fashioned blackboard or normal whiteboard any day. I entertained the pupils with my inability: trying to wipe a word off the board with my finger, then forgetting to press the pen icon to change the feature! Thankfully, there was always some eager child who would volunteer to help Miss, and to show that they knew that I knew that they knew more. But as it’s part of the learning process to let pupils demonstrate their strengths and achievements, that was fine by me.
Then came the dreaded School Inspection… how could I avoid an interactive whiteboard disaster? Play to your strengths came to mind so I planned a creative activity: the children acted in one of my plays, then made up their own fun sketches. The strategy worked and the lead inspector even forwarded my plays to a publisher friend, but unfortunately he didn’t have space in his list. The main objective had been achieved however: the pupils had been excellent and I had survived without using the interactive whiteboard!
My journey has taken twists and turns and no-one could be more surprised than I, that now, as a writer, I’m using the computer every day. I’m convinced it remembers my antipathy towards its ancestors, because it suddenly refuses to work and keeps me waiting while that little half circle tries to hypnotise me as it slowly goes around…and around…and around. But nothing is ever wasted; experiences can inspire new characters and plots and feelings can be captured on paper. Or, dare I say it: ‘computer!’
I can sympathize as someone who still writes letters on paper with a fountain pen. I started my career as a journalist using an old Remington and three carbons and was appalled when my newspaper started using IBM electric typewriters a few years later… Alas, I too use computers these days and I lament the fact that I long ago lost a disk that allowed me to hear the sound of a typewriter when I press the keys on my laptop… it was such a comforting sound 🙂
Thanks for your interesting reply. My children are amazed that I typed all my university essays and short stories on a typewriter. Isn’t it a shame that so many of the younger generation have stopped writing letters? Emails are like a ready meal, whereas letters can be like a three course dinner! I still have letters from my parents and one special letter from my grandfather which I treasure.
A good article to put the modern teacher and ‘computers’ in perspective. Following my military career ’69 – ’92, our son got a computer which was mainly used for games, but also for his school studies, When he left home to go to university I inherited the PC and tried my hand at typing – which I hadn’t done since being taught twenty-five years before (transcribing morse code). Maybe similar to your mum’s tasks.
I wasn’t keen on typing and having a screen at first, but as a practice, I start writing my memoirs, which led me to trying my hand at short stories. For me, the attraction was having no need for reams of paper, and I could ‘save’ stuff at the touch of a button.
Three PCs and four laptops later I’ve got twenty-plus titles out there and I’m happy with a Mac. 🙂
Thanks very much for your reply to my blog about computers. I love the fact that your writing career started after inheriting your son’s computer! It’s also interesting that you used to transcribe Morse code. My mum is still alive at the grand old age of 92, enjoying well-earned rest, so I don’t expect she would fancy working 4 hours on and 4 hours off which she had to do in the Wrens! Thanks again for taking the time to reply and many congratulations on becoming a very successful author.