My friend Kathy was commenting on the noise people make on their phones when their keyboard sound is on. Especially in restaurants. Especially when the sound is turned up. These people are mostly old.

First, let me say I sheepishly checked and sure enough my clickity sound is on. And turned up.

Old people do this because we don’t trust that the darn thing is actually working if it doesn’t make a sound.

Secondly, as we get older those sounds are harder to hear, thus the volume at full bore.

I will say that I keep all other sounds off–except the number pad for the phone for the same reasons listed above. But there are no sounds for all the Wordle games, Freecell, or the Nail Salon, Barbie Fashion Show or Panda whatever-that-is that the grands play on my phone. I’m sure the ghost in my house is glad of that. We like the silence.

But back to the keyboard sound. I keep my clickity sound on because it is the music of my life.

I taught myself to type on my mom’s ancient manual typewriter when I was 13. My first effort is a multi-page, single-spaced, moment-by-moment recounting of the Monkees Concert I attended. (Yes, I know you all want to read it, but that would require my tunneling into the attic. Not going to happen.) I was immediately hooked on keeping a diary (we call it journaling now), writing in general, and typing.

My thoughts have always raced past my ability to write longhand.

When I took typing in 9th grade, we used those same manual typewriters. I felt at home pounding the keys and hearing the bell at the end of the row, and the bang of the cartridge when I slammed it back.

I am a rough typist.

And I finally learned what fingers actually went where.

When I graduated from high school, I got a portable, electric typewriter. It was blue and came in a soft leatherette case. Best gift ever.

My brother Ted got a bright yellow Firebird.

I still have my typewriter. Just sayin’.

Of course, my career depended on typing and I graduated from manuals to electrics that used Liquid Paper by the gallons (fun fact: Mike Nesmith’s –of the Monkees– mother invented Liquid Paper) to self-correcting electrics, to word-processing typewriters that could remember a certain number of words and correct accordingly.

My dad actually got me my first true word-processor in 1984/5 when he began a consulting career after retirement and hired me as his secretary because I could type and translate rudimentary French. It sported a keyboard and early CPU and was hideously cumbersome (no mouse) but had some memory. I got my first full-blown computer in 1985 from a boss who wanted me to work from home learning to use it–rather ahead of his time, really.

Then I went to work at JCPenny as a catalog copywriter, then copy chief, then Internet marketing manager, all requiring the use of proprietary software on a parade of PCs and Macs.

And then Scott and I started Dallas Media Center, and at one time we could count thirteen computers in our possession. All PCs for reasons we have already discussed. I still have three of them.

But to circle back , , , as I have spent my entire career and nearly my entire life typing, I will admit that I love the rhythm of typing, the cadence of it, the feel of almost playing the keyboard, my fingers clicking the keys to create words that sing (hopefully) on the page. It’s like a symphony in my head when my fingers fly over the keyboard and when I come to the end of a sentence or paragraph, I sometimes bang my finger on the period as if it were the final note, lifting my hands from the keyboard in a dramatic flourish.

Just then . . . just then.