another new beginning
Hi everybody!
I gotta tell you, until now I have resisted blogging like a kid squirms at vaccination time. I was et up (as my Louisiana grandmother used to say) with performance anxiety. Although I have written five books, I was intimidated by all the terrific blogs I’ve seen elsewhere.
Then I realized that I love to write letters and a blog is just a letter without the Dear Carolyn, and thereby I gave myself permission to just go for it! So here goes.
This week I was reminded of an old, delightful relationship from which came my very first book — a computer manual, believe it or not. It was the result of an evolution that began with manual typewriters, then electric ones, then the Selectric and its wondrous rotating ball that kept me from stacking up letters. THEN came programmable typewriters, and I decided instead to get a home computer and use it as a turbocharged typewriter.
This was in the early 80s, and there were three “luggable” home computers available: the Compaq (still around after many more generations); the 5-inch screen Osborne (long deceased); and the Kaypro II, designed by the guy who invented the field oscilloscope. It was all steel, very heavy, but had an enormous (!) NINE-INCH GREEN SCREEN. I bought it, brought it home, and started trying to remember what the salesman told me to do. First, put in two floppy discs: the program disk and the target one. So far, so good. A blinking cursor appeared.
I excitedly typed The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. The computer replied The quick? I later learned that it was looking for a program with that title, but then I hadn’t a clue. I typed Start. Reply: Start? I continued in that vein through Begin, Open, Boot (a word the salesman had used), Sesame — and each time the computer would answer by repeating the word and adding a question mark. Finally I screamed F*** YOU! (only I didn’t bleep it), and the Kaypro said innocently, F***? I hollered to Robert, “Help! The thing’s alive! It’s cursing me back!”
Clearly I needed help, and the manual was incomprehensible. Back in those days manuals were written by programmers for programmers. I kept going back to the store but wasn’t getting anywhere … except I made friends with another new Kaypro owner, a brilliant programmer who agreed that the manual sucked. Over many a cup of coffee we finally agreed that we had to write a new manual that would translate that arcane language into the way people actually talk. My contribution was to ask him what the HELL a phrase meant, he’d explain it, and I’d translate it into People Talk. That’s what we named ourselves: PeopleTalk Associates.
Stay tuned. Next time I’ll tell you how we became baby publishers, marketed via a stolen dealer list, and for a short time were a meteor across the sky. A very short time, actually. Well, and a very small meteor. But still….
Cheers! Roz
