Spirituality Column: Amortize

I am amortizing. I may declare that my 2025 word for the year. An accountant would say, “No, you’re writing off fully depreciated assets.” But I like “amortizing” for the “mort” in it, the same as in “mortal.”

And it fits, because I’m killing computers. They’ve been breeding at church, in closets and clutter rooms. My coworkers are scared of them, and I can’t blame them. Who knows what cringeworthy “inspirational” materials might break out of those boxes and eat our brains?

More to the point, we don’t know what personally identifiable information for our members and students could be scraped from their data, so I’m securely deleting the files. This involves booting from a Linux CD because no one remembers the Windows passwords, checking to confirm we’re not torching anything worth keeping, and finally rebooting in Darik’s Boot and Nuke to fill the drives with lots of lovely randomness.

It’s a sober New Year’s thought to think, but I wonder at how quickly an asset can turn into a potential liability. In the case of a personal computer, not long at all. When Windows 10 support sunsets next Oct. 14, even more of our machines will have to die the death. It’s too risky to run them unsecured.

While I amortize, also up for consideration is a modest-sized case I’ve been carting around for 40 years after rescuing it from a waste bin in a graduate student dorm. Nestled inside is a 1960 Olympia SM4, which some enthusiasts consider the finest manual typewriter ever made. A masterwork of German engineering, it needs a cleaning and new ribbon, but types perfectly well. I don’t know why its previous owner threw it away, though the grind of typing and retyping drafts was just then getting relieved by computers. That’s why I never used the Olympia; I just kept moving it through a succession of office closets in case I followed in Thoreau’s footsteps someday and retreated to a cabin off the grid.

Some writers love writing with old typewriters. They claim they impose a slower pace, a deliberate care that’s missing from the generation of ephemeral bits and pixels. I see the appeal, but haven’t converted. While I’m disposing of old computers, is it time to let the typewriter go, too?

One human value is how one assigns value. I could sell it on the online used market for a couple hundred bucks. Leaving aside the question of how to depreciate something I got for free, the typewriter still has cash value. But that’s not how I value it. Rather, I appreciate it as a work of utilitarian art. Except — I don’t use it.

Another way to understand what something is worth is how much we want it. Computers depreciate because their cash value declines month by month, but their worth to us is amortized because we want them less. Amortization recognizes and reckons the death of desire. It’s not just due to obsolescence. Early PCs came in a warm beige that fit in corporate color schemes at the time. We wanted new computers when those came out in cool light grays, then darker grays and blacks. (Especially when their plastic parts faded to the color of cat urf.)

The Olympia’s finish still looks factory-fresh, but do I want it?

I think not. I find I don’t want to write with the typewriter so much as I want to see it wanted and used. So I’ll sacrifice a carton of Q-tips to clean it and hope it can find a new life with someone whose words will sing over the clatter of keys.

What’s the opposite of amortize? Accountancy might propose “invest.” But for my use, I like “vitalize.” Maybe that should be my 2025 word of the year.

The Reverend Doug Job does interim ministry for congregations in transition and keeps good memories and friends made while serving a church in Cape. At present, he lives in Hannibal, Mo. You may tell him your 2025 word of the year at revdarkwater@gmail.com.