Okay so I have sentimental objects and I will probably post about those in the next two days but I have to be honest, the topic first brought to mind an object in the most base meaning of the word, so I’m going with that, because it’s true: my computer.

This is my little set up. You can see the sticky notes of things I have to do asap. There is dentyne fire gum- its sugarless and gives me a kick and sometimes I chomp through it like it’s candy. But I don’t suffer from the writer’s caffeine addiction, though I do succumb to chocolate. I don’t smoke either and never have so gum it is. There’s also my little black book for notes of ideas and I have books like this in some form almost everywhere. Ah the writer’s mind.

But we’re talking about objects here and the truth is, minus sentimental value (of which I have many things) the computer is my most beloved. Since the advent of the home PC, in my own lifetime, I’ve become more and more addicted. [Tangent: I typed high school and college reports on a typewriter. Yes, I’m old. Yes, it sucked. Yes, even then I knew I was waiting for something like a computer, I knew that concept already existed somewhere and I was damn pissed off that I still had to type 20 and 30 page reports on a typewriter. You have no idea unless you went through it..putting the white erasing tape in the cylinder to erase mistakes….so happy when my dad could afford and passed down to me his Selectric which could erase on its own, you just had to type the buttons to do it.] But I digress.

In a long power outage, I would actually read more books, but I get my news, a portion of my entertainment and most importantly my connection with others in a large part from my computer. Many of my relatives that I never see are at least in contact via Facebook. Many of my intellectual, networking, and supportive connections have been made over the internet. Without it I would kind of be lost.

So here’s to Gates, Jobs, Turing, Babbage and everyone else who led me to this desk. A desk and bookshelves my husband built for me (if you want to get sentimental) all as a place to rest my favorite object, in the dictionary sense: my computer.

PS. Yes, that’s Grant Morrison’s “The Invisibles” graphic novel series, all bound into one collection. The whole series. I highly recommend it to readers even beyond comic and graphic novel lovers. It is as dynamic and imaginative as any novel.

PPS. Yes, that’s a Dr. Who Tardis on one of the shelves. : )

PPPS: That’s Borges peaking out on the spine of one of the books. That side of the shelves is my poetry collection.