The Lost Art of Cursive… AKA My Chicken-Scratch Future!
Okay, so here’s something that genuinely blew my mind recently. Apparently, there is an entire generation of young people walking around totally incapable of reading (let alone writing) in cursive. I know, right? It’s like discovering the secret underground world of, well… people who will never know the pain of perfecting a capital “Q” (seriously, HOW was that considered a “Q”? It’s literally a curly number 2).
Now, I’ll be the first to admit, my cursive isn’t exactly a work of art. My chicken-scratch handwriting has definitely seen better days, thanks to a combination of speed, laziness, and, well, being me. But still, every single notebook I own is filled with cursive scribbles from top to bottom. Side note: I’m talking actual notebooks, guys. Not the notes app on my phone (which is reserved for my random 3 AM thoughts like, “Do ghosts wear pants?”). Cursive, for me, is just faster, messier, and – believe it or not – easier for my brain to churn out ideas without hitting the ol’ mental speed bump every 10 seconds.
I’ve tried printing, mainly because a small part of me hopes it’ll make my handwriting less of an aesthetic disaster. But, honestly, going from the nice flowy loops of cursive to blocky, rigid printing? It’s SO much slower, and I end up feeling like I’m writing with a crayon while wearing 20 pairs of mittens. I don’t have the patience to plod along like that! Although, to be fair, I’ve been swimming in cursive for so long, maybe I just haven’t given printing a proper chance. (Let’s be real though, if I can’t even “properly” brush my hair in the morning, I doubt I have the discipline to completely re-learn how I write.)
But what really messes me up is this: can you imagine 20, 30, 40 years down the line when my grandkids (or whoever) find my old notebooks? They’ll probably open them and think I wrote them in Wingdings font. Future generations won’t have a clue how to decipher what is, to me, just regular-old cursive. Like, “Grandma’s got some weird hieroglyphic code going on.” I’m already dreading the day someone looks at my notebooks like they’re staring at the Rosetta Stone, furrowing their eyebrows, probably using some futuristic auto-translate app just to figure out I was jotting down some random grocery list for lasagna.
In all seriousness though, it’s wild how cursive writing is gradually… disappearing? Who would’ve thought? I mean, I get that typing is way quicker, and kids today are typing almost as soon as they can walk. But cursive being on the “endangered species” list of skills just seems… bizarre?
And listen, I’m not saying everyone needs to be out here perfecting their penmanship like we’re all channeling our inner calligraphers. But it’s strange to think that something I grew up doing daily — without thinking twice — is becoming this relic of ancient adulting. It’s like cursive is turning into its own secret code. That, or my terrible handwriting is just doing an excellent job of future-proofing my journals from prying eyes.
Oh, by the way, random fact that’s kind of cool and relevant: Back in the day, a lot of important documents (like the Declaration of Independence) were written in cursive by people with serious pen game! Imagine John Hancock tossing out his signature in Times New Roman. No thanks. (Source: National Archives)
Anyway, just some thoughts about the slow, unnoticed death of cursive writing. Maybe it’s time I start teaching the younger generation how to write in cursive – ya know, for historical purposes… and for when they eventually need to decode my terrible handwriting.
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