The first time I took a peek at an Android phone I knew I wanted one. To me, then, it was the best invention that anyone could have produced and the fact that my mother owned one made it easier for me to explore. I was already used to the archaic method of writing with my paper and pen, while it was advantageous in so many ways, it was also very strenuous.
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I couldn't write as much as I wanted to because at some points my wrists became swollen and my fingers knotted up painfully. Some other times I couldn't afford to get a notebook and pen so whatever inspiration I had would just slip away and I would be left frustrated. However, with this new technology of an android phone which I was exposed to, I realized that I was never going to have a single writing problem again.
There was nothing I didn't try out with my mother's phone. I wrote on her notepad and saved it, running back to check if it had somehow magically disappeared or if she had mistakenly deleted it from her phone. As the days went by, I discovered that this phone was more formidable than I thought and I could trust it with my ideas.
It sparked up a love for technology I didn't even know I had.
From that moment on, I began to crave a phone of my own. While my mates wanted to be taken to amusement parks, or for shopping sprees, I wanted to be left alone during family outings just so I could write on my mother's android phone.
Of course, she would not hear of it, but it woke something within me. As if that was not enough, I took my dreams from simply wanting to write with an Android phone to want to write on a laptop.
I had seen several people in the printer's office at my primary school furiously typing away at laptops. I didn't know how to move my fingers on the keyboard but my father had an old detachable keyboard in the house, so I was going to practice with that.
On one of those rare days when my father was home, I asked him to help me take out the keyboard and he did so without question. That was how I began to run my little fingers along the keyboard, imitating those people I had seen in the printer's office.
Twice, my mother had to seize the detachable keyboard because it made me not want to come out and spend time with other members of the family. I wanted to eat my meals before the keyboard, sometimes pouring grains of rice or drops of tea into it. My mother got upset with my latest obsession and banned me from using the keyboard. According to her, dolls and teddy bears were toys for girls, not keyboards.
When I was twelve, my father saw that I wasn't relenting with my desire to learn how to type so he installed Mavis Beacon typing lessons for me on his own system and permitted me to use it once every week. It was the best experience of my life.
The highlight was when I finally got an Android phone and I discovered that through communication technology, I could receive and disseminate information to millions of people across the world.
I asked my older brother to create a 2go account for me but since I couldn't get to post my stories there, he decided that a Facebook account was better so he created one for me.
It took me a while to get a hang of how Facebook worked but then I saw that I could locate people I knew from different places so long as they had a Facebook account and I was elated. My secondary school friends who loved to read the short stories I wrote in class during breaks and short periods became my first target. I made sure I added as many as I could find on Facebook and reached out to them in their inboxes saying that I was going to start posting those stories they loved so much on my timeline.
I didn't struggle for followers. I started up a series the very next month after creating my account and it remains one of the best seasons of my life. My lifelong dream was fulfilled with extra perks like fame and followers that I didn't even know technology could afford someone.
Technology just finds a way to make the work easier and faster for everybody. I don't know how writers of old spent days writing thousands of words and never got discouraged but I don't think I can do that anymore. Not when there is a better option in technology.
Facing writer's block? Join the lnleo September Writing Prompt today and say goodbye to, "I don't know what to do write about today".