Cursive Foiled Again

I have been sharing my essays with readers from all over the world (those happy, happy few). I have made it a point to write pieces that are intended to be humorous. Some are even intended to be informative or thought provoking. I have also intended to write pieces that are family friendly. If a 9 year old child reads my work, I don’t wish for his parents to pull him away because my material is too “adult” in nature. My sister has even commented to me that I self censor my writing. This may be true but I feel I get my point across well enough.

Occasionally in my writing, I may even stand on my proverbial soapbox on a particular issue. Again, the point is to get my thoughts across and generate a laugh at the same time. I would like to address an issue that is really sticking in my craw. The issue of this writing is….well the issue is writing. To be specific, the issue is handwriting. Handwriting has been a talent I have sorely lacked all my life. I have always admired people who so seamlessly let their thoughts flow from their mind to a piece of paper. Legible handwriting has never been a strong suit of mine. As a result, the only thing I write cursively is my signature. If I actually use a pen and paper, I print everything else. Many of my teachers during childhood squinted, changed their eyeglass prescriptions, or shook their heads in disbelief. In spite of my obvious shortcomings in the area of writing, my teachers (and my parents) still insisted that I continue practicing.

This now leads me to an issue that I have found to be absolutely reprehensible. At the current time, some districts in the United States and across the world have decided to remove cursive writing from their curricula. Some other districts, while not removing it altogether, allow students to learn cursive writing AS AN ELECTIVE. That’s right. Cursive writing in some schools will be the same as taking drama, band, or a foreign language (such as written English).

I realize that technology makes it easier for kids growing up these days. I must admit that I am grateful for some of these advances. I have typed many a college paper in my adult years that would have costs my parents a lot of typewriter ribbon from all the editing. Remove the typewriter from the equation and you would have seen a lot of crumpled paper and pencils broken out of frustration.  Technology has also helped many kids with learning disabilities to more effectively complete assignments. This is not a bad thing.
Nonetheless, I still question the logic of removing such teaching from kids who do not have the aforementioned disabilities or disorders. While it’s true that I rely on my computer for a lot of things. I know that if my power went out and my computer was not available….

You may scoff and say: “That printed. It’s not cursive”. Touché, I say but the following is also true…..
I agree that it is not the most legible writing in the world. That’s OK. By my own admission, I am very out of practice. I would like to offer however that for a child to learn to do cursive writing there are quite some advantages. First of all, such writing can prove to be a great therapeutic exercise. When one writes in cursive, all the letters in a word are connected. There is less stopping and less less movement of the writing instrument from the surface. This allows much more flow with writing. Such writing also helps to build and improve eye to hand coordination. Also, such writing has a more personal touch if one does it well. This makes things such as greeting cards and thank you letters to appear more “from the heart” and less like a form letter. As I stated previously, I admire people who write their thoughts well with just a pen and paper. If schools refuse to teach this, parents should continue to encourage the practice to their children. I realize it can be a time consuming process. The same can be said for teaching a child how to play baseball, bake a cake, or drive a car.  I truly worry that we may become so dependent upon technology that kids will no longer draw in the dirt to plan a play of backyard football because their phone has an app for that. I worry that kids will not acknowledge gifts with a thank you card because their printer is down. I even worry that a kid will stand at the candy counter of a movie theater with a confused look because neither he (nor the kid helping him behind the counter) know how to break a $20 bill for a $19.47 purchase of a 6 ounce box of chocolate covered peanuts and a soda that could fill a cow’s bladder. I believe that technology should be a supplement and aid to a child’s education. It should never replace it.

I shall now step down off my soapbox on this issue (for now). I pray that five years from now, a young adults can use a pen to fill out a job application. I pray that young adults can balance a checkbook without a spreadsheet. I pray that parent’s will have the fronts of their refrigerators will have at least one creation from their child that was actually created with their child’s own hands. If schools and teachers continue to make decisions such as the removal of cursive writing. We may have little recourse other than prayer.
In conclusion, to my parents who insist that I not do my writing homework on the school bus (or math with a pen) and to all my teachers who insisted that I practice to improve my handwriting, I’d like to say…

IPSBS (Invisible Passenger Side Braking System)

I can remember when my parents were teaching me how to drive. This process around the age of fifteen for most kids back then. When I say “back then”, I am referring to the early 1980’s. One of my friends reminded me that this was part of the Paleolithic Era when he and I attended Pangea High School. At any rate, this training process started to prepare a young Pangean teen to acquire his driver’s license at the age of sixteen. This also allowed parents a full year of therapeutic counseling to prepare them for the emotional transition of this great milestone of childhood. It also allowed parents to obtain a years worth of supplemental employment to financially prepare them for the rise in their auto insurance premiums.
At the time, we lived in a nice quiet suburban neighborhood on the south side of Savannah, Georgia. There were a lot of nice little side roads to go down with little to no traffic on the weekend. My mother worked for a bank in the area. There was an occasional perk to her job. We lived some distance from the bank where my mother worked. Due to this distance, she would occasionally be provided with a vehicle that the bank had recently repossessed. This usually happened for a weekend until the paperwork on the vehicle could be processed the following Monday.There is an important reason why I am given you this little snippet about my mother’s occupation. I had asked my mother if I could practice driving around the neighborhood one Saturday. I was expecting to use our family’s 1967 Ford Falcon. However, my brother had the use of that car. This meant that I got to have my first driving experience in a repossessed car. I was initially less than thrilled about this. This was until I realized that this same vehicle was a 1975 Cadillac Sedan De Ville. That’s right, folks. I got to drive around my neighborhood in a CADDY.
I sat in the Caddy while I waited for my Mom to get in the car. I decided use this time to work on the proper way to lean my arm on the back of the seat and complete my cool look. After all, it’s a Cadillac. You MUST lean. The best way to complete the look is to wear some cool sunglasses and let them hang down on your nose a bit. My mom got in the car. She started off by telling me to fix my sunglasses. She said she had no desire to ride with Marlon Brando. I asked if she was talking about the old dude in “Superman”. I knew who Marlon Brando was but I couldn’t resist taking a poke at my Mom’s age (who was younger than I am now). She then told me to put BOTH hands on the steering wheel and dispense with the lean. I tried to explain the need to look cool. She wouldn’t budge on the issue. She firmly replied: “You can look cool when it’s YOUR car. Until then, put your hands at 10 o’ clock and 2 o’ clock.” I asked her if that meant I had four hours to drive the car. “You know what, boy? I COULD just go back inside right about now.” I decided this was a good time to put my sense of humor aside.
I backed out of the driveway and drove down the side streets as my mother instructed me. Overall, things seem to be going well. My mother decided to up the ante a bit at this point. She directed me to take my main street out of our neighborhood. Check it out, people. I was driving down White Bluff Road in Savannah, Georgia. You couldn’t have gotten rid of the grin on my face with a belt sander. It was around this point that I discovered something about driving that I did not know previously. As we were moving down the road, my mother noticed a car backing out of the driveway into the street. My mother apparently did not think that I noticed this vehicle as quickly as she felt appropriate. My mother then very quickly pressed her right foot down to the floorboard. The car had been equipped with an invisible passenger side braking system. I knew that it worked because when she did this, I firmly and quickly pressed on the brake pedal on the driver’s side (producing a very audible and visible skid). This prompted a very brief exchange between me and Momma. “Shane, WHY did you slam on the brakes like that?” BECAUSE, you slammed on YOUR brakes, Momma. “Well, I didn’t think you saw that fella backing out.”  Momma, it’s a Ford pickup. Did you think I suddenly went blind? “Boy, if you keep talking to me like that, you’re gonna be blind for a couple of days.” At this point, the gentleman in the pickup drove by and gave my mother a sympathetic smile as he shook his head at me. At this point, my mother offered to take the wheel. When I say she offered, I mean she said “How about I drive now?” and got out of the passenger side before I could respond.
There would be other driving lessons over the months that followed. I would discover that there were other parts of the car to engage the passenger side braking system. Sometimes my mother would just use the floorboard. Other times, she would also put her hands on the dashboard or on the roof (or both). She even once used a unique braking system by using the floorboard, one hand on the dashboard, and the other hand over her mouth. I take pleasure in telling you all that a few short months later. I acquired my first drivers license at the age of sixteen. I couldn't help but notice that the instructor had BOTH of his feet pressed into the floorboard for the entire test.

Thank You, Mr. Twain

The first week in October marks an annual celebration called Great Books Week. To honor this week, The National Association of
Independent Writers and Editors (NAIWE) is holding the Great Books Week Blog Tour. The tour invites bloggers to post their own blog using their topic suggestion for the day. My submission for Tuesday is below. For more information, go to http://news.naiwe.com/2009/10/03/great-books-week-blog-tour-october-4-10-2009/

When I was a young boy, my favorite book was The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. This story was commonly read in elementary schools by teachers. My mother even got me a 45 record of the story. I wore the grooves off that record. I cannot begin to tell how much this Southern boy loved living vicariously through Tom Sawyer. Tom was a very mischievous young boy. Tom did all of the things a Southern boy wanted to do (but most wouldn't dare). He wasn't a delinquent in the truly criminal sense. He was just a boy who wanted to have fun. For Tom, that meant breaking rules.

When Tom had to whitewash a fence as a form of punishment, he hoodwinked every boy who passed by to do it for him in trade. As shocking as it was to this young Southern boy to see Tom once again buck his Aunt Polly's authority, I couldn't help but admire his cunning entrepreneurial spirit. I loved the idea of Tom and Huck running away to become pirates on the Mississippi River. I also admired Tom's prodigal spirit when he decides to return home (interrupting his own funeral). I could even feel my heart in my throat as Tom stood up for the town drunk, Muff Potter, who had been framed for murder. Tom testified in court on Muff's behalf knowing his life was in danger for doing so. Tom WAS a rule breaker but he had a strong sense of right and wrong.

I remember seeing a movie about Tom Sawyer that showed him wearing overalls. He wore no shirt and no shoes. My mom told me that my Dad often dressed in the same fashion as a young boy. Needless to say, I dressed in that same fashion a few times that summer. Thank you, Mr. Twain for allowing me to live Tom' adventures (and not get a whippin' for doing it).