In the early 1980’s my husband decided we needed a computer. His face glowing with excitement, he tore open the box that contained our brand new Radio Shack TRS 80. Trash 80.
“You spent how much?”
Another big boy toy. Just what we needed. And it didn’t stop there. The next wave was the Commodore 64 complete with dot matrix printer and Koala pad. Or does anyone remember the Kaypro, or as I call it, the Commodore in a can.
By the end of the decade I wrote poetry and inherited my own computer, a used Leading Edge with a 5″ floppy drive. I found typing cathartic and Word Perfect with its built in thesaurus became my best friend.
At my brother’s urging we joined AOL so we could keep in touch online. Soon I joined the ranks of internet junkies. Ten years later we went from dial-up to broadband.
Just like our cars, Jan and I own separate computers. Oh, but not just desktops. He has a laptop for his music and another just because.
But who am I to criticize? In addition to my new HP Touchsmart I still retain my last desktop in another corner of my office. There are just certain things that wouldn’t transfer to the new one. And let us not forget my pink netbook. So portable. Great for taking to conferences or on trips to see my gorgeous grandbaby.
And floppy disks? Forget about it. I have four flash drives and an external hard drive so nothing’s lost. Well, nothing except, maybe, those 400 plus poems I saved on 5″ floppies.