I love it when other people have ideas I would never have!

[flexagon]

Went out to brunch this morning with a nice couple, basically work-friends who I wouldn't mind turning into "real friends" (I have six months in which to do it, if I'm doing it, and then they're having a baby... tick tock, tick tock). We were talking about different systems of handwriting, and how cursive isn't taught as much in schools anymore, and how my best friend say_shazam got to learn italics in school and I bet nobody does that anymore at all. It turns out the woman wasn't interested in handwriting very much at all until college -- there, she started entertaining herself in lectures by trying to take class notes in the professor's own handwriting style.

That's so freaking clever and fun!

It makes me wonder, how many formal systems of handwriting/calligraphy do you know?
I usually write in block all-caps because it's most legible, but I can also write in:

• mixed-case block letters
• cursive
• italics (I taught myself as an adult, just to satisfy that niggling childhood jealousy).

(I made an abortive attempt once in high school to learn Pitman shorthand, somewhat under the influence of one of my favorite books, and also because the picture on the front of the Pitman book showed an elegant hand with long, glossy black nails. But that balloon never really left the ground -- it was too hard for me to make distinguishable light strokes and heavy strokes using the same writing implement.)

Comments

[miyyu.livejournal.com]

My sister, who is extremely bright, was so bored in elementary school that she needed an outlet. She taught herself to write with her left hand (she is right handed) and is to this day still functionally ambidextrous when it comes to writing. I think that's both cool and sad.

[flexagon]

That's impressive, yeah... ambidexterity is really neat. At my last job I used to practice writing left-handed in meetings but only got as far as shaky, slow block letters.

[dilletante.livejournal.com]

i used to take notes in classes starting in college with my left hand, for similar reasons. my handwriting was always noticeably worse and slower, but it was fun. i must have eventually made some amount of progress, because i've at least once realized i was writing with my left hand only after putting the pen down (on the whiteboard in our kitchen, which is in a position that makes writing on it with the right hand less convenient).

in japan, where we spent our delayed 5-year anniversary, moominmolly and i spent a while wrestling with how to think about katakana and hiragana before realizing that we'd learned two similarly separate but equal writing systems in our own native language (cursive and print)... it seemed to often be a good analogy.

i still remember being very young and able to read print but thinking of cursive as a mysterious separate adult language.

[godream.livejournal.com]

I had to learn cursive in school, but I actually never knew italic meant anything more than, you know, what <i> produces. Ten seconds on image search have now educated me... very pretty. Tempts me to go buy fountain pens. ;)

[flexagon]

The good news is that felt-tip chisel-tip pens are available now, if you want to avoid the whole ink-dipping thing. :-) I kind of like doing italics even with just a regular pen or pencil though... if you're interested, I learned from this workbook, though there are plenty of others.

http://www.amazon.com/italic-beautiful-handwriting-cursive-calligraphic/dp/002534580X

[niralth.livejournal.com]

Do people stop making new friends after they have kids? I'm confused as to why you perceive a deadline.

Oh, and, my handwriting has always been so bad that in high school I was required to type my papers, unlike all of my classmates. :/

[flexagon]

I personally have never succeeded in solidifying a new friendship with someone who has an infant -- it's hard enough to maintain an established one during those first couple of years. In my experience, the person is so legitimately busy and sleep-deprived that forming new friendships just isn't a priority.

So, I don't perceive a deadline, really, but there is a gap in availability coming up, and it seems unrealistic to pretend otherwise. I'd be interested to hear counterexamples.

in high school I was required to type my papers

That's pretty funny. :)

[rifmeister.livejournal.com]

I also find that making friends with people with young kids is difficult unless you have kids approximately the same age yourself. Kids become the single dominating major topic of conversation, and having other kids allows for shared experiences and play dates.