Tom Hanks - Uncommon Type - Some Stories

She continued. “I have loopy penmanship, like a little girl, so anything I write looks like a motivational poster in a health clinic. I’m not one who types between sips from a tumbler of booze and drags from a pack of smokes. I just want to set down what few truths I’ve come to know.”

She went back to the service counter and grabbed the leatherette carrying case. She yanked the plastic typewriter from inside, carried it over to the shelves, and nearly threw it beside the Royal Safari. She pointed to the sticker on the top.

“I want my yet-to-be-conceived children to someday read the meditations of my heart. I will have personally stamped them into the fibers of page upon page, real stream-of-consciousness stuff that I will keep in a shoe box until my kids are old enough to both read and ponder the human condition!” She heard herself shouting. “They will pass the pages back and forth between them and say, ‘So that’s what Mom was doing making all that noise with all that typing,’ and I am sorry! I’m yelling!”

“Ah,” he said.

“Why am I yelling?”

The old man blinked at the young lady. “You are seeking permanence.”

“I guess I am!” She paused long enough to take a deep breath, letting her lungs empty in a cheek-puffing sigh. “So, how much for this Jungleland typewriter?”

The shop was quiet for a moment. The old man held a finger to his lips, thinking, wondering what to say.

“This is not the typewriter for you.” He picked up the two-tone Royal and placed it back on the wall-mounted shelf. “This was made for a young girl going off to her first year of university, her head filled with nonsense, thinking she would soon find the man of her dreams. It was meant for book reports.”

He pulled down a compact typewriter with a body the color of green seafoam. Its keys were just a shade lighter.

“This,” he said, again rolling two sheets of paper into the carriage, “was made in Switzerland. Along with cuckoo clocks, chocolate, and fine watches, the Swiss once produced the finest typewriters in all the world. In 1959, they made this one. The Hermes 2000. The apex, the state of the art in manual typewriters, never to be bested. To call it the Mercedes-Benz of typewriters is to inflate the quality of Mercedes-Benz. Please. Type.”

She felt intimidated by the green mechanical box in front of her. What in the world could she possibly say on a sixty-year-old marvel of Swiss craftsmanship? Where would she drive a vintage Benz?

“The typeface is Epoca,” he said. “Look how straight and even it is. Like a ruled line. That’s the Swiss. See these holes in the paper guide, on either side of the vibrator?”

So, that’s the vibrator.

“Watch.” The old man took a pen from his shirt pocket and put the point into one of the holes. He released the carriage, sliding it back and forth, underlining what she had written.

“You can use different-colored inks for different emphasis. And see this knob here on the back?” There was a thimble-size knob with a softly serrated edge. “Tighten it or loosen it to adjust the action for the keys.”

She did. The keys stiffened considerably under her fingertips and she had to muscle through.

Cuckoo clocks.

“When carbon paper was needed to make three or four copies of a letter, the firm setting would strike all the way to the last page.” He chuckled. “The Swiss kept a lot of records.”

Turning the knob the opposite way made the keys feather light.

Clocks. Mercedes Hermes 2000000

“Nearly noiseless, as well,” she said.

“Indeed, yes,” he said. He showed her how easy it was to set the margins by pressing the levers on each side of the carriage. As for tabs, they were set by pressing TAB SET. “This Hermes was made the year I turned ten years old. It is indestructible.”

“Like you,” she said.

The old man smiled at the young lady. “Your children will learn to type on it.”

She liked the idea of that. “How much is it?”

“Never mind,” the old man said. “I will sell it to you with one condition. That you use it.”

“Well, not to be impolite,” she said, “but duh !”

“Make the machine a part of your life. A part of your day. Do not use it a few times, then need room on the table and close it back into its case to sit on a shelf in the back of a closet. Do that and you may never write with it again.” He had opened a cupboard under the displays of old adding machines, searching through spare carrying cases. He pulled out what looked like a square green suitcase with a flap clasp. “Would you own a stereo and never listen to records? Typewriters must be used. Like a boat must sail. An airplane has to fly. What good is a piano you never play? It gathers dust and there is no music in your life.”

He placed the Hermes 2000 into the green case. “Leave the typewriter out on a table where you see it. Keep a stack of paper at the ready. Use two sheets to preserve the platen. Order envelopes and your own stationery. I will give you a dustcover—free of charge—but take it off when you are at home so the machine is ready to use.”

“Does that mean we are now discussing the price?”

“I suppose so.”

“How much?”

“Ah,” the old man said. “These typewriters are priceless. The last one I sold for three hundred dollars. But for young ladies? Fifty.”

“How about something for my trade-in?” She pointed to the toy typewriter she had brought in. She was haggling.

The old man looked at her with something akin to the Evil Eye. “What did you pay for that again?”

“Five dollars.”

“You were taken.” He pursed his lips. “Forty-five. If my wife ever finds out I made such a deal she will divorce me.”

“Let’s keep it between us, then.”

One thing about the Hermes 2000, it was a lot heavier than the toy. The green carrying case banged against her legs as she carried it home. She stopped twice, putting the machine down not because she needed to rest but because her palm had gotten sweaty.

In her apartment, she did as she had been instructed, as she had promised. The seafoam green typewriter went on her little kitchen table, a stack of printer paper next to it. She made herself two pieces of toast with avocado and sliced a pear into sections, her dinner. She pulled up her iTunes on her phone and hit PLAY, putting the phone into an empty coffee mug for amplification, letting Joni sing her old songs and Adele her new stuff as she nibbled at her meal.

She wiped her hands of crumbs and, finally, in the blush of ownership of one of the finest typewriters ever to come down from the Alps, she rolled two sheets into the carriage and began to type.

TO DO:

STATIONERY—ENVELOPES & LETTER PAPER.

WRITE MOM ONCE A WEEK?

Groceries: yogurt / honey/ 1/2 & 1/2 .

Juice variety

Nuts (variety)

olive oil (greek)

tomatos & Onions/scallions. CUKES!

Cheap record player/HiFi. Methodist Church?

Yoga mat.

Waxing.

Dental appointment

Piano lessons (why not?)

“Okay,” she said aloud, to herself, alone in her apartment. “I done me some typing.”

She pushed herself away from the table, from the seafoam green of the Hermes. She pulled the to-do list from the machine and put it on her refrigerator door under a magnet. She pulled the ice pop mold from the freezer and ran it under warm water in the sink, thawing free one of the pineapple pops. Knowing she would have another, she put the Tupperware into the refrigerator to remain cold until she was ready for seconds.