Sunday, September 15, 2024

Typing skills come in handy

 In high school in the 1950s, the only meeting I had with the high school counselor was about what types of jobs I wanted after graduation. Every single job I was interested in, the counselor told me was only for boys and men/ no girls or women allowed.  

So my mom said I should train for secretarial work. (notably a woman's job) I agreed, but only if I could do it at a Junior College. (now called community college).  

After one year of that, I transferred to the academic course and went on to the state university, working part time with my secretarial skills eventually using one of the world's first word processor - IBM MT/ST (Magnetic Tape/Selectric Typewriter).  

Soon afterwards companies began putting computers onto executive's desks and fired the secretarial pool. Those poor (mostly men) suddenly found that they had to do their own typing, not just throw a scribbled pack of paper at the secretarial pool for them to figure out and type up. (yes, I laughed at this)

Eventually I could type almost as fast as people talked, so in later years I was always asked to take the notes of any meeting I attended. (which got me in trouble when I quoted a higher up and she complained, claiming she never said those words. (sorry, she did and I had typed them as she spoke them)

My typing skills also came in handy when I began writing books, eventually having 45 published books. (most of which are out of print now, but some are still available - Yay!)

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