And They Think I'm Slow, Eh?
Wednesday Lunch Lull Roundup of Cultural Trends. Okay, just one cultural trend.
In between pithy smackdowns of the Republicans' "Blame Clinton for North Korea" bullshit, Josh Marshall notes an interesting article about the decline of cursive handwriting, which kids are apparently learning less and less.
I have the feeling that this might be the first of the many inevitable subtle things that separate us from the Young once we get Old. Who would have thought that using cursive would mark you as one of the Old? I see a far-off premonition of grandkids saying "Grampa, I can't read your birthday card!" and me giving a crotchety impromptu lesson on how to write "r" and "s," and the grandkids not really understanding it and just being relieved when this all is cut short by dinnertime.
Actually, I've mostly trimmed "r" and "s" out of my handwriting, replacing them with slower but more satisfying printed letters that interrupt the cursive line. And I was never on board with the monstrosities that pass for capital letters — G, Q, S, etc. But still . . .
You know what else turns out to be weird? When I imagine having grandkids, however vaguely, I feel a lot of affection for them. But their imagined parents (i.e. my hypothetical grown children) look like the nondescript extras who portray extended family members in movies, and I'm pretty indifferent to them. Somewhat fascinating! . . .
In between pithy smackdowns of the Republicans' "Blame Clinton for North Korea" bullshit, Josh Marshall notes an interesting article about the decline of cursive handwriting, which kids are apparently learning less and less.
I have the feeling that this might be the first of the many inevitable subtle things that separate us from the Young once we get Old. Who would have thought that using cursive would mark you as one of the Old? I see a far-off premonition of grandkids saying "Grampa, I can't read your birthday card!" and me giving a crotchety impromptu lesson on how to write "r" and "s," and the grandkids not really understanding it and just being relieved when this all is cut short by dinnertime.
Actually, I've mostly trimmed "r" and "s" out of my handwriting, replacing them with slower but more satisfying printed letters that interrupt the cursive line. And I was never on board with the monstrosities that pass for capital letters — G, Q, S, etc. But still . . .
You know what else turns out to be weird? When I imagine having grandkids, however vaguely, I feel a lot of affection for them. But their imagined parents (i.e. my hypothetical grown children) look like the nondescript extras who portray extended family members in movies, and I'm pretty indifferent to them. Somewhat fascinating! . . .
3 Comments:
I don't write in cursive. Hell, I don't even use lower case letters when I print. I just use big capitals for capital letters and smaller capitals for lower case letters. Only 2 years difference between us, too.
Yeah, but you always had terrible cursive handwriting anyway, right? Weren't they keeping you inside during recess for penmanship? Maybe I'm thinking of speech class for the "pwwonouncing youw awws" problem.
Anyway, you can at least read cursive: it's not like you're totally unfamiliar with it.
yeah, I was held in from 5th grade recess for a while to do extra cursive writing practice. It never really helped any though - I had made the switch to all-caps by 9th grade or so, I think.
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