Digitization

I felt dirty
without a qwerty
forsaking my typewriter roots
but I like Swyping
instead of typing
for future writing pursuits.


***As anyone familiar with this blog knows I prefer to let the poems stand on their own and seldom get into my inspiration, but the genesis of this poem is truly the evolution of how I record my thoughts. I started as any person exploring language would, with a writing implement and paper, whatever kind I could find. I obtained notebooks and filled them with my less than flowing scribbles.
Then my first adaptation - someone gave me an old portable typewriter. I began playing with it's keys (plus 5 quarts of white-out) and soon decided I should keep my notebooks by year and called them OT (original typed) then the year, like OT95. I even had them color coded: Yellow-typed poetry, Red-hand written poetry, Green-songs and Blue-stories.
Then my second adaptation - I experienced my first computer at work, hey now. This was something I immediately saw the potential of and quickly switched my notebooks to OD (original digital). My output began to increase because it's so much easier on a computer than a typewriter, and soon I didn't even print them out anymore, just made new folders on my computer. But once I got one at home it turned confusing because now my folders were on up to 3 different CPUs and it was messy.
Then my third and final adaptation on the way to where I am now - I got my first smart phone a couple of years ago. Once I found a word processing program and learned how to use it, my phone became my main tool for recording and storing my work. My first such phone had a keyboard as told here, but now I'm keyless and loving it. Being able to record my ideas anytime, anywhere has enabled me to not miss a day's posting in almost a year and a half - woohoo! And I also plugged into all hard drives saving my files and consolidated them on my phone, it's unbelievable. If you told me twenty years ago this is how I'd be doing it I would have laughed, but the bigger question is: what does the future hold? Thoughts streaming directly onto a grid of universal conciousness? could be tricky to keep your private thoughts private. Or will it all crash and burn starting the cycle anew? It's tough to say at this point, but until then I hope I can occasionally post something that people find worthy to peruse - are you reading me?***