Classes at the Temple of the Written Word

There was once a woman who watched in awe as her husband and children played games and wrote school papers on a magical machine called a computer. She thought it would be wonderful to know how to use it to write all the stories that swirled in her head. But the computer did not like the woman. Whenever she tried to befriend it, bad things would happen, and the family would grow angry with her because she had pushed the wrong buttons. This made the woman sad. She stayed far away from the unfriendly machine and scribbled her stories at the kitchen counter between tending to the cooking and the other household chores.

In the fullness of time the children grew, and slowly drifted off to their own lives. The woman missed them and wished to communicate with them, but letters were slow. And already the Age of Instant Gratification had descended upon the land. So the woman went to the Temple of the Written Word and asked to be taught the mysteries of E-mail. The teachers at the Temple were gentle and kind. They did not shout at her when she made a mistake, or call into question the intelligence of her ancestors. And she understood their teachings and all was well.

For several years the woman wrote E-mails and was happy. She even started to write her stories using the great machine. But she was wanting in skill and became dissatisfied. And so she returned to the gentle teachers at the Temple of the Written Word, in search of further knowledge. Miss Robin and Miss Jeannie, the teachers at the Temple, unraveled for her the mysteries of the Word, the talents of the Toolbar, the delights of Cut and Paste and the wonders hidden beyond the Buttons. The woman was grateful, and enormously pleased, and went home from the Temple and wrote this post.