The printing machine, the process, and I

I was certain that I pressed the 'print' button twice. Maybe trice? I waited in agony and hoped that this school printer would actually wake up. "Hmm just give it a moment," the IT staff said, "you're too impatient!" I politely laugh to hide my embarrassment; deep down, though, what mattered at that moment was the 216 pages to be printed. After silently praying for something to happen, we finally heard the printer jizzing. "Listen, I hear it starting up! I'll be inside if you need anything." "Thank you, chú." As soon as he'd walked into the room, the jizzing stopped, followed by my light cawing on the glass wall to grab his attention again. This scene basically sums up my summer of junior year. That cyclical internal pain when the printer refuses to comply, but the rare and exciting moments when it does eject those tattooed, slightly warm 382 pages. When it was a bad day, of course, I had to take matters into my own hands. This meant bringing home the package of 500 pieces of paper and refilling the house printer so my dad wouldn't yell. However, the home printer can't print double-sided. This meant I'd have to split everything in half, wait by the printer to spool and straighten the second-run pieces that were double-sided, then figure out the pages' order because the machine printed faster than I could organize. The iconic burnt ink smell meshed with my internal flustered state, and these simple moments are truly what's worth living for. Ultimately, moment when I'd compiled the book (almost) perfectly, that deserving sigh of relief escaped.

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