Penmanship

Jan 17 2012

We were graded on spelling, neatness

penmanship.

By the time I entered school

the stern guardians of English
who always smelled of chalk dust and lavender
had relented
permitting ball-point pens,

sparing us the mess

of ink, and nibs.

While my envied older brother

was far enough advanced

to have mastered the fountain pen,

a substantial thing

with the immense appeal

of mechanical parts.

The modern world

rushing into the space age

had little patience
for blotters, ink stains.

Picking up a pencil

the very first time

I gripped it backhand,

and have stubbornly clung to this habit

ever since.

I write like a leftie,

contorting my wrist in a tight overhand curl

smearing ink.

Grade school teachers scolded and scorned,

but couldn’t break me.

My printing is chicken-scratch

cursive horrible,

signature

easily forged.

I have heard that an early sign of dementia

is regression,

notes written in a childish hand

that betrays infirmity  —

the hesitation, and tremor

the simplified sentence

the glaring grammatical lapse.

But for better, or worse

my hand-writing has always been bad.

So when my time comes

it will be hard to tell

just how diminished I am.

A rare letter

recently arrived from my dad.

In a month, he will be 90

entering the 10th decade of life.

His scrawl is barely legible.

The effort looks painfully cramped,

as if the letters had shrunk

along with him,

like the closet of suits

he no longer needs

nor fits.

His hand-writing was never elegant,

but I could always tell

it was his.

Now, this looks like the work of a stranger,

decrepit, hunched, pinched.

But though his hand wavers

and his mind wanders

I can see his will is strong.

He writes me long-hand

on creamy paper

in dark blue ink.

Direct, and unsentimental

just as I remember him.

He wrote his own father every week

without fail

until the old man’s death.

A Sunday ritual, a means of connection,

when a long distance call

was a big event.

Now, every few weeks

we speak by phone.

That is, when my mother remembers

to call him over

say hello.