Tuesday, June 12: High-Heeled Gumshoe
NUM LOCK
by Melodie Johnson Howe
There is a key on my computer keyboard called Num Lock. I only use it accidentally. Usually when I’m scrolling and glancing at my hard copy at the same time. When I look back at my screen I find:
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I love this key. I love its name. I have begun to project my emotional state on to it. I now of think of it as Numb Lock.
I finished my novel last Friday and sent it off to that world called Publishing. Now I don’t know what to do with myself. While I was writing there were all kinds of things I had to get done. The house needed repairs. But what? I wanted to clean out my closet. But why? I wanted to cook new dishes. But what were they? I have plunged from constant work into inertia. I am a blob. Blonde blob. In fact my brain has gone blonde. To echo Deborah . . . is this what a writer looks like?
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I know this is the fallow period. Soon ideas will come . . . or maybe they won’t. I pick up the phone and call my friends, the few I have left. I tell them I don’t know what to do with myself. They tell me this is natural. This is the process. I keep them on the phone even when they hint they have a life. What has happened to me? I could hardly wait to finish my book so I could relax. Do nothing. Be a human being again. Do what humans do. But I don’t know what they do. I think I’ll garden. I go outside. Everything that is green looks daunting, I retreat inside.
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I decide I have two options: take the dog for a walk or get trapped in the Lifetime TV channel. I opt for the dog. He sees me take his harness from where I keep it. He begins to do double axels. The harness is a new addition to his life and mine. And suddenly I can’t remember how to put it on.
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It is tough black nylon and all crumpled up. I shake it out. The dog is performing jumping jacks. I tell him to sit. He does a swan dive. I pick him up and put him in a chair. He is a furry, seventeen pound, coiled spring faking a sit. I get the harness over his head. His tail, which equals Cyrano de Bergerac’s panache, keeps slapping me in the face. Next come the legs. He has suddenly acquired eight of them. I get them all through the openings. But I can’t fasten it. I accuse him of gaining weight. He bats his very long lashes at me. Then I realize I’ve got it on backwards. I reverse it. It snaps! But I can’t attach the leash to it because I have it on inside out. I take off again. The dog leaps off the chair and is now doing triple axels. I managed to get the damn thing on him and we are out the door. Both of us have our tongues hanging out the side of our mouths. We start up the lane. I attempt to breath in the air. Admire trees. But why? I forget.
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Then I see the woman in the Hummer at the top of the hill. It’s almost as if this face-lifted, frozen blond is waiting for me every time I go for a walk. I begin to think she is put on this earth by God to thwart me. Maybe she’s my evil twin. Anger stirs, making me feel wonderfully alert. She is storming down the lane, good little trooper that she is. Her skeletal hands are gripping the steering wheel. Her hair is not moving an inch. I can see the stringy tendons in her neck. Her mouth is a hard line. She has no double chin. I feel the softness under mine. For a moment I think she’s aiming at me. I pick up the dog and step back off the road. She does not see me as she passes. She never does. A rush of wind from the Hummer tangles my hair. I brush it out of my face and order my dog to, “Sic her!” He bats his lashes. I laugh and give him a big smooch and put him down. In the filed across the road, a mule and a horse are leaning into one another for comfort. It touches me.
I sit down at my computer and stare at the empty screen. I can see a hint of my reflection. My hair is still askew from the blond and her Hummer. And I thank God my favorite key is not the Insert key. When I accidentally strike it, I write over the words that I actually want to keep.
Your article had me laughing myself silly.
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Oh, the fallow period. It’s scary until you recognize it, isn’t it? Years ago I figured out that the uncomfortable feeling that I hadn’t written a song in a long time and maybe I had dried up — was a sign that a new song was about to come.
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Speaking of keys, I wish the “Esc” key would actually work! No matter how many times I hit the thing, I can never escape from writer’s block, deadlines, etc.
Great article. I loved the hummer story…..
The computer pitfall that drives me crazy is the “search and replace” function. I almost never end up with the same character names that I start with, and will usually do a global replacement of one name for another at some time during the crafting of a story. So if “Ed” gets turned into “Sam”, a bit like
“Ed waited for the bus, harried and worried and fed up with the crowded traffic and uneducated mob. When the driver demanded exact change, he pled in vain, and was forced back on to the sidewalk, angered beyond endurance. He caressed the gun tucked into his plaited waistband, wondering what had led him to this dreaded moment . . . ”
becomes
“Sam waitSam for the bus, harriSam and worriSam and fSam up with the crowdSam traffic and unSamucatSam mob. When the driver demandSam exact change, he plSam in vain, and was forcSam back on to the sidewalk, angerSam beyond endurance. He caressSam the gun tuckSam into his plaitSam waistband, wondering what had lSam him to this dreadSam moment . . . ”
Sigh.
Now James, I KNOW you know the solution to that.
But it’s more entertaining when you pretend not to.
Like it’s never happened to you.
New issue of EQMM arrived today, and Melodie is in it. (To be more precise, her character Diana Poole is in it). Congrats. It’ll be the first one I read tonight.
I get numb-lock when I set a book down too close the the keyboard. Except the book usually presses the “-” the “+” or the ENTER key.
When I’m on my laptop, my thumb has a habit of lightly touching the touch-pad, and moving my cursor to God-knows-where. (Call it “THUMB-LOCK”). I had the laptop for a year before I discovered there was an easy keystroke to temporarily disable the touchpad.
lol – that is my problem. I type on my laptop for my regular job and in the middle of a sentence, I realize I’m typing in something already typed and trying to figure out how the heck I jumped back up there – but those touch pads are so each to touch and jump you back. I don’t know that I know the keystroke to disable it but I’m so reliant on mine that I don’t think about it. Just backspace out what I’ve inserted accidentally and then go back to my place and start again – E 🙂
I’m so glad to hear I’m not the only inept person with a keyboard. I was told that the Apple doesn’t have a num lock key. I was toying with buying one, but I didn’t. I’ve grown to love my Numb Lock so I got a Dell. One of the reasons for the new computer is that my Enter key keeps sticking down. When that happens the computer begins to relentlessly scroll adding empty page after page. If you don’t know the key is stuck down, nothing you do can can stop it. Steve, thanks for mentioning the story.
Steve, I used to do computer consulting and some it was in Minneapolis, the land of 10,000 (at least) very busty Scandinavian blondes. Twice, I encountered situations involving said very busty data entry blondes and ‘key chatter’. When data entry girls would lean forward to flip a document to the next page… Well, observing the problem was more entertaining that the description, I’m sure.
One of the clients, Vincent Metals, took ordinary washers from their warehouse and placed under the unnecessary function key at the lower left corner of the keyboard, disabling it.
No doubt Deborah’s friends who write in the nude have troubles of their own.
Actually, Melodie, most Macs do come with Num-Lock keys, depending upon the model you choose. Even the most compact laptop that I use had a Num-Lock key on it.
Leigh, wait a sec. Busty blondes and ‘key chatter’? My mind Shifts into Caps Lock at the imagery. What is ‘key chatter’? Don’t tell me. I don’t think I can handle it.
I’m glad to know a Mac has a Num Lock key. That means it has a soul. I guess it also means it can do math.