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Sparkle (1)
Since my Siri dream, I have spoken often about the iPhone 4s, not because I actually want an iPhone, but because I like the idea of this voice keeping me company. I love working out of my house, and I am the sort of person who really enjoys being alone. I like to go out to dinner by myself. I like to sit in coffeehouses and read. I dislike shopping, but I do better with shopping excursions when I'm on my own.
But that doesn't mean that it isn't incredibly lonely to spend every day completely alone in your house. I am probably more productive than the average worker since no one swings by my office to ask me a question and ends up standing there for 10 minutes talking about their weekend. As much as that aspect of office working annoys me (I really do like being alone), it is also something I wistfully miss since becoming a full-time writer. I can go hours and hours, day after day, not speaking to anyone except Cozy Jackson.
What I do have open to keep me company is Clippy, the Microsoft Word paperclip office assistant who comments on your document. Clippy doesn't really say much to me as I write (though I do like when he tells me if I'm about to overwrite a file); he just sits in the corner of my document, blinking at me. He's like a little silent pet, and yes, I have had conversations aloud with Clippy, speaking to him as if he is my silent, electronic therapist. Clippy and I have been through two books together, and he is with me for these next two that I am completing simultaneously.
My son recently fell in love with Clippy having found out about him through a programming site. I was working on my new computer as he told me about Clippy, and I opened a Microsoft Word document so we could gaze at him.
But Clippy wasn't there.
I went through every menu, finding the new Microsoft Word exceedingly difficult to use. Finally, I did what any normal person does in 2011 when they can't find something. Instead of hitting Microsoft's help menu, I Googled Clippy.
And discovered that Clippy had been... murdered!
Killed by Microsoft Office executives back in 2003.
The computer I use to write on is old enough that it still has Clippy, but he's missing from my new laptop. And there's no way to download him: I know because I Googled this too. As we read though site after site about Clippy information, I learned my first truth about the little office assistant. While others agreed with me that he is the solution to the loneliness of the writing life, others wrote that they hate Clippy. Hate him? They don't even know him. They couldn't have possibly spent enough time with him because to know Clippy is to love him. Right?
As we panic-Googled our way through Clippy information, we stumbled upon the creator of Clippy, Kevan Atteberry, and my son wrote him a fan letter. By the next morning, he wrote him back and an online friendship formed between the creator (otherwise known as human Clippy) and my computer-obsessed son. My son interviewed him for his 'zine (what, I haven't told you that the twins have their own 'zine? The first issue is coming out this winter), and I leapfrogged over my kids to interview Kevan myself (taking advantage of the fact that my kids need to go to school, and I have unlimited computer time at home).
The early iMacs had a handle, not because the desktops were going to be carried anywhere, but because Steve Jobs wanted the computer to look as though it was alive. Like it could leap off the table (hence the jaunty angle of the screen). Like it is accessible and pick-up-able and friendly. And that's what the Microsoft Paper Clip is for many writers. In the unfriendly and harsh world of constructing paragraphs, the frustrating world of trying to string together the right words in the right order, Clippy is like a little friendly reminder that writing can be fun. That it isn't always banging your head against the wall. That writing can be playful; words can blink at you.
I sat down with Kevan Atteberry online to talk
