Collected Prose

did, poverty would still exist (and have one more member among its ranks).
    At the same time, it’s our responsibility as human beings not to harden our hearts. Action is necessary, no matter how small or hopeless our gestures might seem to be.
    Stock up on bread and cheese. Every time you leave the house, make three or four sandwiches and put them in your pocket. Every time you see a hungry person, give him a sandwich.
    Stock up on cigarettes as well. Common wisdom says that cigarettes are bad for your health, but what common wisdom neglects to say is that they also give great comfort to the people who smoke them.
    Don’t just give one or two. Give away whole packs.
    If you find your pockets can’t hold enough sandwiches, go to the nearest McDonald’s and buy as many meal coupons as you can afford. Give these coupons away when you’re out of cheese sandwiches. You might not like the food at McDonald’s, but most people do. Considering the alternatives, they give pretty good value for money.
    These coupons will be especially helpful on cold days. Not only will the hungry person be able to fill his stomach, he’ll be able to go inside somewhere and get warm.
    If you can’t think of anything to say when you give the coupon to the hungry person, talk about the weather.
    CULTIVATING A SPOT

    People are not the only ones neglected in New York. Things are neglected as well. I don’t just mean big things like bridges and subway tracks, I mean the small, barely noticeable things standing right in front of our eyes: patches of sidewalk, walls, park benches. Look closely at the things around you and you’ll see that nearly everything is falling apart.
    Pick one spot in the city and begin to think of it as yours. It doesn’t matter where, and it doesn’t matter what. A street corner, a subway entrance, a tree in the park. Take on this place as your responsibility. Keep it clean. Beautify it. Think of it as an extension of who you are, as a part of your identity. Take as much pride in it as you would in your own home.
    Go to your spot every day at the same time. Spend an hour watching everything that happens to it, keeping track of everyone who passes by or stops or does anything there. Take notes, take photographs. Make a record of these daily observations and see if you learn anything about the people or the place or yourself.
    Smile at the people who come there. Whenever possible, talk to them. If you can’t think of anything to say, begin by talking about the weather.

    March 5, 1994

THE STORY OF MY TYPEWRITER

    ( with Sam Messer )

     

Three and a half years later, I came home to America. It was July 1974, and when I unpacked my bags that first afternoon in New York, I discovered that my little Hermes typewriter had been destroyed. The cover was smashed in, the keys were mangled and twisted out of shape, and there was no hope of ever having it repaired.
    I couldn’t afford to buy a new typewriter. I rarely had much money in those days, but at that particular moment I was dead broke.
    A couple of nights later, an old college friend invited me to his apartment for dinner. At some point during our conversation, I mentioned what had happened to my typewriter, and he told me that he had one in the closet that he didn’t use anymore. It had been given to him as a graduation present from junior high school in 1962. If I wanted to buy it from him, he said, he would be glad to sell it to me.
    We agreed on a price of forty dollars. It was an Olympia portable, manufactured in West Germany. That country no longer exists, but since that day in 1974, every word I have written has been typed out on that machine.
    *

    In the beginning, I didn’t think about it much. A year went by, ten years went by, and not once did I consider it odd or even vaguely unusual to be working with a manual typewriter. The only alternative was an electric typewriter, but I didn’t like the noise those contraptions made: the constant hum of the motor, the buzzing and rattling of loose parts, the jitterbug pulse of alternating current vibrating in my fingers. I preferred the stillness of my Olympia. It was comfortable to the touch, it worked smoothly, it was dependable. And when I wasn’t pounding on the keyboard, it was silent. 

    Best of all, it seemed to be indestructible. Except for changing ribbons and occasionally having to brush out the ink buildup from the keys, I was absolved of all maintenance duties. Since 1974, I have changed the