BORED
I have this love/hate relationship with adults who write like four-year-olds-not necessarily in content, but in the way their letters are formed.
In the way i’s are dotted and t’s are crossed.
In the way descenders descend and the way words are slanted.
ON THE ONE HAND,
I think bad handwriting is exciting and fun! It’s as if half of an entire lifetime was spent trying (earnestly) to perfect this art. AND IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO DO (for that individual, at least). So the rest of the lifetime was spent coming to terms with writing like a child and just not caring. AND REGRESSING! Can you imagine writing like a kid forever? Never being taken seriously? Forever? I can’t. I spent years trying to make sure that my handwriting looked grownup-ish and sophisticated (but edgy). “Cool.”
And then in high school, I met this girl who changed my entire outlook on the way handwriting should appear. She disregarded margins and just wrote and wrote and wrote. She only used college-ruled paper so everything was just condensed . . . jam-packed. She had the handwriting of a seven-year-old boy-it was very attractive. I always admired it. It was so . . . bad but good. And she didn’t even care! And it tore me up inside because her handwriting established who she was-carefree. Almost manic. And it was so reassuring. And it was so good.
Meanwhile, I had spent years and years cultivating looks and styles I thought made me look cool and interesting. And because I was trying to re-create who I was (I was TRAGICALLY LAME in middle school), I thought the best way to transform, at least in the beginning, was by emulating her penmanship (highest form of flattery, right?). Her whole writing aesthetic-refreshing! Handwriting, although in the grand scheme of things is a small component to a person, weighs very heavily on a person’s makeup . . . at least to me. I thought by making some adjustments to my style, my entire personality would reflect those tiny, and sometimes big, adjustments. I’d be more carefree? More relaxed? Less uptight. Fun to be around!
I traded in my very angular handwriting for this sloppy, yet consistently slanted, form of expression. And I was happy. But looking back on it now, I feel like such a lemming.
My handwriting has undergone major changes throughout the years. I was always heavy-handed and would tear up paper with my angry pencil st(j)abs. And then I tried some cursive. HORRIBLE. Utterly horrible. So then I modified my cursive and print to be more angular (copying this boy I knew in middle school). I was very happy with the results. Then the writing went to sloppy-chic, and then back to very upright and pointy (like fangs), then to a weird hybrid of the two styles. And now I write however I feel looks best (in terms of the type of materials (pen and paper) I have-in terms of how I’m dressed and how I’m feeling and what the project demands) . . .
ON THE OTHER HAND,
It infuriates me that bad handwriting exists among adults. You have your entire life to work on how you present yourself to the world, and this is the best you can do? How can people be so lazy? How can people not care about “keeping up appearances” and being all they can be in every imaginable way?
Lots of people that I work with have poor handwriting. I never understood how editors could have the audacity to submit chicken scratch to their writers. It’s the ultimate insult, I feel. How can anyone take advice from people that just scribble a;lskdjf;skldjf in the margins? It’s usually the younger editors that have this bad handwriting. And when I say bad, I mean that this handwriting has absolutely NO redeeming qualities. It’s not the “endearing” bad. It’s just disgusting. Like someone who’s chronically ill coughed up a bit of blood, some rotting chunks of meat, and his or her's entire print/cursive suitcase. The older folks at my jobsite are from a variety of careers that probably required them to care (just a little) about how their words looked. Their handwriting is decent-it looks like old schoolmarm writing, but it’s good for what it is.
Pride.
It’s nice sometimes.
But anyway, I wonder what a graphologist would have to say about all my different kinds of handwriting. I, very loosely, studied graphology and came to the conclusion that someone in the aforementioned field would probably consider me to be a head case. There’s a lack of consistency that could lend to instability?
Who will take care of me when I’m old and nuts, coughing up blood, rotting chunks of meat, and a patchwork of personal fonts that only my arthritic hands can produce?
In the way i’s are dotted and t’s are crossed.
In the way descenders descend and the way words are slanted.
ON THE ONE HAND,
I think bad handwriting is exciting and fun! It’s as if half of an entire lifetime was spent trying (earnestly) to perfect this art. AND IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO DO (for that individual, at least). So the rest of the lifetime was spent coming to terms with writing like a child and just not caring. AND REGRESSING! Can you imagine writing like a kid forever? Never being taken seriously? Forever? I can’t. I spent years trying to make sure that my handwriting looked grownup-ish and sophisticated (but edgy). “Cool.”
And then in high school, I met this girl who changed my entire outlook on the way handwriting should appear. She disregarded margins and just wrote and wrote and wrote. She only used college-ruled paper so everything was just condensed . . . jam-packed. She had the handwriting of a seven-year-old boy-it was very attractive. I always admired it. It was so . . . bad but good. And she didn’t even care! And it tore me up inside because her handwriting established who she was-carefree. Almost manic. And it was so reassuring. And it was so good.
Meanwhile, I had spent years and years cultivating looks and styles I thought made me look cool and interesting. And because I was trying to re-create who I was (I was TRAGICALLY LAME in middle school), I thought the best way to transform, at least in the beginning, was by emulating her penmanship (highest form of flattery, right?). Her whole writing aesthetic-refreshing! Handwriting, although in the grand scheme of things is a small component to a person, weighs very heavily on a person’s makeup . . . at least to me. I thought by making some adjustments to my style, my entire personality would reflect those tiny, and sometimes big, adjustments. I’d be more carefree? More relaxed? Less uptight. Fun to be around!
I traded in my very angular handwriting for this sloppy, yet consistently slanted, form of expression. And I was happy. But looking back on it now, I feel like such a lemming.
My handwriting has undergone major changes throughout the years. I was always heavy-handed and would tear up paper with my angry pencil st(j)abs. And then I tried some cursive. HORRIBLE. Utterly horrible. So then I modified my cursive and print to be more angular (copying this boy I knew in middle school). I was very happy with the results. Then the writing went to sloppy-chic, and then back to very upright and pointy (like fangs), then to a weird hybrid of the two styles. And now I write however I feel looks best (in terms of the type of materials (pen and paper) I have-in terms of how I’m dressed and how I’m feeling and what the project demands) . . .
ON THE OTHER HAND,
It infuriates me that bad handwriting exists among adults. You have your entire life to work on how you present yourself to the world, and this is the best you can do? How can people be so lazy? How can people not care about “keeping up appearances” and being all they can be in every imaginable way?
Lots of people that I work with have poor handwriting. I never understood how editors could have the audacity to submit chicken scratch to their writers. It’s the ultimate insult, I feel. How can anyone take advice from people that just scribble a;lskdjf;skldjf in the margins? It’s usually the younger editors that have this bad handwriting. And when I say bad, I mean that this handwriting has absolutely NO redeeming qualities. It’s not the “endearing” bad. It’s just disgusting. Like someone who’s chronically ill coughed up a bit of blood, some rotting chunks of meat, and his or her's entire print/cursive suitcase. The older folks at my jobsite are from a variety of careers that probably required them to care (just a little) about how their words looked. Their handwriting is decent-it looks like old schoolmarm writing, but it’s good for what it is.
Pride.
It’s nice sometimes.
But anyway, I wonder what a graphologist would have to say about all my different kinds of handwriting. I, very loosely, studied graphology and came to the conclusion that someone in the aforementioned field would probably consider me to be a head case. There’s a lack of consistency that could lend to instability?
Who will take care of me when I’m old and nuts, coughing up blood, rotting chunks of meat, and a patchwork of personal fonts that only my arthritic hands can produce?