DePaul: If you can write in cursive, you're something special

It was a conversation with a younger co-worker the other day that alerted me to his impending ability to write in secret code.

Of course, it started out as something completely different. I was lamenting to him my inability to do mathematics with anything nearing competency. (There's a joke about math in journalism that goes something like, "Why do you think I went into journalism?")

That led to an observation by me that I realized I no longer know my multiplication tables cold like I did when I was in elementary school. (I've decided to start practicing them again much like we were schooled to do while sitting at our primary school desks, chanting them loudly in order: "Eight times seven is 56. Eight times eight is 64. Eight times nine is 72.)

He mused that he learned the times tables when he was in second grade, the same year he learned cursive writing.

"Cursive ... I understand they've stopped teaching that now," I replied, feeling a bit like my grandmother as soon as I said it.

He nodded, and added that because many schools don't teach cursive anymore, someday he'll be able to write in code, without even trying.

I thought about that for awhile. He made an interesting point, one that got me briefly excited about a new skill, before realizing it's probably too late for me. By the time I'm in my dotage, there will likely still be plenty of people around who were taught to write cursive.

But one day, the last of the folks who learned to write - not print but really write - will be able to completely flummox youngsters with their swirling, curvy and connected letters.

Imagine their confusion.

"What language is this?" the poor dears will ask each other.

I thought about way back in my childhood, not long after I learned to read. Cursive still threw me for a loop (get it ... loop?) and I struggled to read the handwritten notes and letters inside the Christmas cards that arrived at our home. I finally gave up and asked my mom, "What does this say?"

They might as well have been written in another language.

Quick history lesson: Handwritten letters were something people wrote with a pen and paper a long time ago before there were email and texts.

Quick confession: I still regularly send - via U.S. mail - handwritten cards and letters to people.

Quick question: Will people who never learned cursive print their signatures?

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DePaul may be contacted at jdepaul@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2221. Follow her on Twitter @JeanneDePaul