Wrong Write?

Where has penmanship gone? I didn’t feel its loss until I recently received a letter in beautiful calligraphy. It brought back memories of 2nd Grade, learning cursive, bending over my paper, tongue perched over my lip, diligently and intently creating those smooth round letters that flowed together making me feel so very grown up. (smile) And how through the years of school, college, pre-computer era term papers and writing, writing, writing. Writing fast and furious to make the deadline of a final; writing Christmas cards, writing to friends, writing in my journal. And slowly over the years watching my finely honed script degenerating into scratches and marks and almost indecipherable ticks. And today most of my writing is done on a computer at lightning speed, sometimes faster than I can think, putting down words and thoughts before I think they come into my head.

There is a grace and elegance in calligraphy. It culls up a style and poise that seeps through the eyes like comforting elixir. The writer is more thoughtful in his words; they are carefully chosen and a phrase is eloquent and almost musical to the reader.

It’s a shame, really, that we have become so enmeshed in our computers and the wide world of the internet that nearly all our written word is through a keyboard and not through such a skilled artist’s venue as one holding an ink pen.

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