Continued from last Tuesday:

There are not many material things I cherish so much that I would think thrice before, if asked, surrendering them.  Indeed, there are so many material things I would not miss if I were to suddenly lose them. Sure, for some things I’d note their absence, but the next hour or morning won’t find me mourning them. I’d think, “…well, that served its purpose while it was still mine” or “you know, I never really knew why I held on to that.” 

There are even other things I would go out of my way to surrender, almost as if they were cursed objects. But, it’s not nice to give up your cursed objects to others- no matter how innocent or guilty you may deem that person to be.

My laptop is not one of these things; I wouldn’t give up my laptop without a third-world-war of a fight.  He and I have made it through some tough times (I could never think of him as a “she”). When I was younger, and hadn’t yet grasped the idea that my words could matter, I’d lose myself in some book when tough times hit. While the world raged outside, I’d be safe chewing on some magical toffee with Silky, Moon-face and the rest of the Enid Blyton crew. 

But that was when I was younger.  Now, I’m older with a laptop that has seen me through the treacherous world of university texts and notepads to the treacherous world of work (and may soon take me back).   When tough times hit, I sit in front of him and type up a storm- my own stories.

Not work stories- just pleasure stories that no one or just one someone else might read. I’m glad I’ve gotten over the idea that I haven’t stories as fantastic as the ones I used to read when I was younger and tough times loomed. Because, I do have stories as fantastic, like this very story (and the next)- the story of my laptop: how one day while working on work stories, it got injured and how that might have been the beginning and the end of it all.

So, my would-be full-time employers were busy procuring things for me as a sign that they were ready to welcome me into the fold and I was busy working for them and others and waiting on a contract I could sign. A proper contract was really the only thing which would make me feel welcomed.

The reworked contract finally came, and, again I was hit with that feeling that employers tend to get a bit confused. Their written offers sometimes (or maybe always) will read a tad bit or a whole lot differently to their previously uttered verbal ones. So again, I must haggle. Again, I must remain a freelancer. And while, there was no great sorrow over this, real (and not amused) irritation  was beginning to take root.

Then it happened. He (the laptop) got badly injured while being used to fulfill tasks for this very online news company I was supposed to join as a staff writer. The injury came just days after I’d installed in him some not-so-cheap programs I’d been pining after for a while.  I notified the new editor of his (the laptop’s) mishap.  I was neither seeking sympathy or solution from him (the editor) nor my employers.

He (the laptop) was mine, I was freelance and I understood that I (not anyone else) was responsible for the well-being of my equipment. If my equipment was hurt, then, I had to pay, out of my own pocket, to have him tended to and lose out on any money I would have made if he hadn’t been injured. I’d not been a freelance writer for a long time, but at least this, I understood.

What I could/did not understand or stomach were the callous reactions to his (the laptop) injury and the note sent to me late that night....

Coming next Tuesday: #31 The Beginning of the End.