The Typewriter

a Vermont sabbatical story

In the summer of 2020 we moved to a small town in Vermont where we lived for eleven months. Every Saturday, we hauled our trash and recycling to the local recycling center, which turned out to be quite the social hour for our small town.

From eight to noon, townspeople gathered to throw away their plastic bottles, cardboard boxes and aluminum cans, to chat about the weather, and, my favorite part, to shop from the small three-shelf thrift area, where we could donate our unwanted and often unused trinkets. The thrift area was right beside the bookshop, where books came and went throughout the year, another incredible gift in a small community.

On the first Saturday in September, I took a few things straight to the shelves—some soup bowls we’d hardly used and an old clock. As I placed my stuff on the shelves, I took in what had already been gathered there: a pair of ice skates, some life vests, old wine goblets and Christmas odds and ends. A woman appeared next to me, and, through her mask, said, “Don’t you just love this? I call it the Town Emporium. When someone asks where I get something, I just tell them, the Town Emporium! Most of them don’t know what I’m talking about, but I do.” I smiled through my own mask at her kindness and charm. The Town Emporium.

I looked down into a cardboard box on the ground and pulled out a black, square case that was nestled inside. I had an idea of what it might be, but assured myself that no one would give away an old typewriter for free, not at a time when people my age are buying old typewriters to decorate their bungalows with. But this was Vermont, and there were definitely no bungalows nearby.

So, there it was, a 1960s Olympia Splendid 33 inside a black leather case with a broken zipper. I’d wanted a typewriter since I was little--my brother Tyler had one when we were young, a mustard yellow and ketchup red-colored one that I greatly envied. I still remember his hands busily typing away, writing creative works of fiction.

All three of us kids were creative back then, and today, we’re still creating. My sister, a mother to four, is a chef and avid reader; my brother is a film critic and creative writer; and I use words to explore the world around me through my books and poetry.

I’ve imagined myself throughout the years, as perhaps many writers do, forsaking the laptop or the journal and opting for the old-fashioned tap of the keys and the fresh ink on the page. Finally, I had a typewriter, this thing that would sit in my home, that I’d use if it actually worked, this little tool that would help me find my way in my own mind and back out again, that would, potentially, take in a dream or two.

The original documents were still with the typewriter, which gives me reason to assume it was dearly taken care of by the man who bought it. Dear Sir, the letter from the German manufacturer read:

In the USA arrangements have been made for your OLYMPIA-typewriter to be looked after…Thus for the maintenance of your OLYMPIA-typewriter bought in Germany care is taken as far as the remotest parts of the world.

Not only had I found a typewriter, but one with a story, with a history, one that had traveled the world. I don’t know who Sir is, but I assume, like all of us, that he had stories to tell. I wonder if he worked for the government, typing up documents that weren’t meant to be read by any everyday citizen. I wonder if he wrote tear-stained love letters from it, or letters of anger and regret. Maybe he wrote poetry about animals and weather, or the script for a movie that would never be filmed.

I sat down on the couch in the living room when we returned home, and typed out my name, for some reason reverting back to my maiden name, Kaitlin Downing. I typed it again: Kaitlin Downing. The ink ribbon barely had any black ink left, but there was a little. I typed the opening words from my book, Native:

Indigenous bodies are bodies that remember.

I stared at the words, at how different they looked there, barely seen, a lot like our bodies, faded like the ink, stretched thin like ribbon, but still there.

photo by Amy Paulson

When we moved to Vermont, I decided to take a “semi-sabbatical,” because I was tired, burnout, and ready for a break. I’d published two books in four years, become a public figure on social media, often speaking on colonization in the American church, traveled around the country as a public speaker, and in the midst of COVID, released my second book into a world on fire in more ways than one. I needed the break, the breathing, the stepping back. I needed something like an old typewriter to remind me that there are more ways to get to words, ways to remember who we have always been. 

I bought a new ink ribbon for my Olympia and took an afternoon to replace it. Then I began typing a few words, immediately thrust into the reality that using a typewriter to type actual words takes a lot of patience and skill that a laptop simply does for you. So on the days I don’t use it, the typewriter remains a symbol of not giving up on words, on stories, on myself.

Maybe I will write poems about animals and weather, or the script for a movie that will never be filmed. Maybe I’ll write about the government or type a long love letter. Maybe I will write what “sabbatical” means to me, or why rest is so hard to come by. Maybe I’ll just write my name over and over again, the name given to me at birth, the name that ushered me into the world as who I’ve always been and who I continue to become.

Kaitlin Downing. Kaitlin Downing. Kaitlin Downing.

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Onward, friends, into rest.