The art of writing - penmanship

For a lot of us, penmanship has been taken over by the computer keyboard. If I ever had it, it has gone the way of past forms of communication.

I have realized for sometime my inability to write distinctly. As a reported, six years ago, I had to be very careful in my taking notes. Oftentimes, I would get back to the news room and have to study real hard about what I had for notes. Sometimes, it was useless to try to figure it out. Fortunately, there were enough words I could make out to where I could kinda put the story together. That was six years ago. Now it is much worse.

Most things I do are on the computer. I write newsletters for the church and have no problem reading my write. Forms, even, have the capability to be filled out on the computer. No hand writing needed.

Recently, I was working with an organization where we in my club needed to fill out a signature change. Four people had to sign, print name, and put the date, plus social security number and date of birth. My, my! What a bunch of hen scratching. Nobody can write. No one has a knack of penmanship, I determined. Turned out the recipient had to email me to get me to fill in the blanks.

Additionally, I can't read right. ha. The lady who got the form asked me to send the first five digits of my SSN. I read it the last five digits, and that is what I sent. We (I) finally got it right. I had also to call a couple of other signatories to get clarification.

My point is that all of us would have written much better before the days of the computer keyboard. And, with that, I just learned how come I am so bad at penmanship. I don't do it. I need to practice, perhaps standing at a chalk board and writing a hundred times I will write better.

Now, there is not much need for penmanship anymore, but it is something we need to keep doing pretty well. No telling when somebody might send a form that has to be completed in long hand. How about that!

Sure glad this puter has a spell checker, which is another subject.