The Other Typist

It is interesting to me how technology has in many ways facilitated and refined the practice of deception

But that's the funny thing about treasure—we assume everyone wants what we hold most dear.

The slope that leads toward insanity has the paradoxical distinction of being both steep and yet undetectable to the person sliding down it.

Which is just to say, be careful when choosing what you're proud of--because the world has every intention of using it against you.

You see, doubt is a magnificently difficult pest of which to try and rid oneself and is worse than any other kind of infestation. It can creep in quietly and through the tiniest of cracks and once inside, it is almost impossible to ever completely remove.

That evening, she went from knock-kneed tomboy to Greek goddess in the space of twenty-two short, red-carpeted steps.

It would seem this is the gift modernity has bestowed upon our generation: the practice of "dating," an awkward procedure where a man and a woman find themselves talking rot to each other in a darkened room. If it were up to me, I would say modernity can keep it, as I want no part.

The typewriter is indeed my passport into a world otherwise barred to me and my kind.

There is something darkly thrilling about standing on the balcony of a very tall building and looking over the edge with the silent knowledge that it is in one's own power to jump. Jumping is, of course, very unwise --- an act fated to resolve itself in total self- annihilation. Let there be no illusions in that. And yet one is nonetheless tempted to consider the dare.

The modern world is a strange place indeed, and I fear it is one in which I do not belong.

The heart is a funny organ, with such stubborn biases.

...it is our animal nature to judge the wake more harshly, owing to how survival depends upon weeding these creatures out.

[t]here's a rather large difference between brave and reckless.

Perhaps it’s rather revealing to say so, but while I cannot for the life of me recall what I was wearing that evening, I nonetheless remember every little stitch of black embroidery on her red dress.

They said the typewriter would unsex us.

If I had to make a conjecture on the matter, I would guess lying is very likely less difficult when it is done over the telephone. It is interesting to me how technology has in many ways facilitated and refined the practice of deception.

She was called Helen - a name, I fear, that may have gone to her head, for she frequently acted as though she had confused herself with Helen of Troy.

They said the typewriter would unsex us. One look at the device itself and you might understand how they - the self-appointed keepers of female virtue and morality, that is - might have reached such a conclusion. Your average typewriter, be it Underwood, Royal, Remington, or Corona, is a stern thing, full of gravity, its boxy angles coming straight to the point, with no trace of curvaceous tomfoolery or feminine whimsy. Add to that the sheer violence of its iron arms, thwacking away at the page with unforgiving force. Unforgiving. Yes; forgiving is not the typewriter's duty.

With each mile we put behind us, I felt the air grow lighter in my lungs. It was as if the city had been one large pressure cooker, simmering in its own juices. With the top down on the coupe and a stalwart, man-made breeze blowing steadily in my face, I tallied the city's many summertime brutalities: the heat that radiated from the gray asphalt and made the air dance in wavy shimmers; the stagnant ponds in Central Park that turned a milky, putrid, almost phosphorescent green and incubated countless mosquitoes; the blasts of hot dirty air that breathed upward from every subway grate; oh, and how the loud noises pouring from construction sites even somehow seemed to further agitate and heat the air!

What was justice, after all, but a particular outcome?

The appearance of one's innocence is a funny house of cards; you start by shifting the smallest thing, and before you know it the whole structure has come crashing down.

But that’s the funny thing about treasure—we assume everyone wants what we hold most dear.

...it is our animal nature to judge the weak more harshly, owing to how survival depends upon weeding these creatures out.

Only the very rich and the very poor enjoy sex with a careless, indifferent abandon....only those of us in the middle class are obliged to maintain an attitude of modesty and discretion when it comes to sex.