Large Y loops are linked with large imaginations.

"I'm trying to be human here."

-Shotty

If you never had to copy off me, you might have expected me to have neat handwriting. You might have expected me to have small, streamlined writing, omitting some letters, virtual shorthand -- the writing of a busy intellectual. Or you might have pictured middle-sized, perfectly straight, somewhat loopy letters that fit perfectly between the lines -- clearly an honour roll student.

Then you probably tried to borrow my biology homework. You very quickly regretted this action, because you could not make out anything past the date at the top right corner of the paper. My handwriting is not straight up and down, it is not streamlined, and it certainly does not fit between the lines. It is very, very angular, and it is incredibly messy.

On a single sheet of paper, one letter may vary in shape and size many times (I have particular trouble with m's, tending to add surplus bumps). I also have a certain penchant for writing directly over the lines, so that I take two spaces to write one line. Yet I don't really like to waste paper, so when I come to the end of the line with a long word, I do not divide it with a hyphen -- I cram it in at the end, usually distorting the shapes of the individual letters to the point when it is no longer discernable as one word.

I take notes with alarming speed and apparent efficiency. However, I alone am capable of deciphering my scrawl. Letters jostle each other, battling for space. Slowly the paragraphs begin to creep to the sides of the paper, sliding off the lines and forming a tangled mass on the ground. Lines, appearing to divide sections but in reality merely cluttering what remains of the paper, are present in abundance. I cross sections out, I insert entire chapters by means of the margins. And all this has much improved since Grade Seven.

I have begun to practice writing with my left hand, because I figure it won't be any worse. (Ambidextricity, if that is a word, runs in the family. I suppose that's another post though. Things that Run in My Family...besides being born in the wrong generation of course....) My writing is very distinctive, so don't ask me to forge something for you (Kaj).

This belief that what one thinks about one's handwriting is the equivalent of one's perception of oneself/one's looks is what baffles me. What would that make me? Widely detested? Sharp? Impossible to read?

I had a dream last night.