Charlie Brown had a Pencil Pal

I had something very simple, yet rather profound, strike me this morning. One of those thoughts that crosses your mind and you can’t believe that it is in fact true until you spend a good five minutes contemplating it. But after a lot of thought I have come to the following conclusion: I don’t think that I can write in cursive any more.

Mainly because outside of my signature I have not written in cursive for almost twenty years. In college I started to write by printing because I found it more efficient and much easier to read while studying at two in the morning. My handwriting is notoriously bad. Even my printing is difficult to decipher and causes many people to question how I ever received an engineering degree. (The reason behind that is that electrical engineering was the one engineering major at Illinois that did not require a drafting class. I refused to take a class where one could lose points by how they wrote their name on the test.)

Here is a true story about my handwriting (and myself in general). When I was in second grade my mom went to a parent teacher conference and asked what the teacher was doing about my penmanship given that it was so awful. The teacher said, and this is a direct quote, “Someone is going to get paid to read Chris’ handwriting someday.” This tells you three things about myself: 1) I’ve never been able to hold a pencil correctly, 2) I was frighteningly intelligent as a child and 3) It’s highly questionable that I have ever lived up to my potential unless hanging out at bars is now considered an even more noble profession than I previously thought. Though on the last point after reading the New Yorker’s profile on my idol, the late David Foster Wallace, I’m rather happy that I did not take the tortured genius route.

But it is true that I have never been able to hold a pencil correctly. I’m right handed but when I write my hand twists inwards. I have been told that this is a sign that the right side of my brain (the creative side) is struggling for control with the left side of my brain (the logical side). This means that I am one of the few people who can be very mathematical and very creative, which when you look at my life is pretty spot on. I’ll take my writing being illegible as a cost of doing business.

The interesting thing though is I can’t think of a moment in my life where writing in cursive would be a useful skill. The only time I write anything longhand is when I take notes for myself. The last time I wrote a letter, meaning using an actual paper and pen letter, was in college. Everything in my entire life is now computerized with only the rare Christmas card and wedding invitation showing proper cursive print. This makes me wonder just why writing in cursive was considered so important when I was in grade school. Months of my education were taken up learning how to write all of the letters and I really wonder just how much of that muscle memory is still with me. Maybe it is a little sad that in the future kids simply won’t know how to write longhand other than by printing. That the only people who learn how to read cursive are historians studying past documents. That is what happens as slowly the western course of the empire makes its way.

Wednesday Night Music Club: I had someone mention Keane to me today and I don’t think I ever had a chance to post this video. I totally dig this song.

Keane MTV Music