Cursive

By Uncle Tim Heitkotter

When is the last time you received a really well-written letter? I mean a HAND-written letter, not an email like we seem to be comfortable with these days? Not a form letter or another silly solicitation from those credit card companies that we see in our mailbox every day. What I mean is, when was the last time YOU wrote a well-constructed letter to anybody?

Cursive Tattoo Lettering

It’s been brought to my attention that cursive handwriting is being eliminated in school curricula across the country. I’ve been told this by several people and I remember reading an article about it about a year ago. How can this happen? It seems like every time I turn around another art form is being eliminated from our schools. As the budgetary belts are pulled tighter, rather than cut useless programs, like football (which, in my opinion, teaches war skills like aggressiveness, ground acquisition and rage), music and art programs get tossed. So, now, writing is soon to fall as well? I guess it’s only two Rs now: Reading and ’Rithmatic.

I want to pose this question to my readers: When we read about different cultures and their societies or travel to different countries, what is the first thing we recognize? Their art, of course! We automatically associate Opera, the paintings in the Sistine Capel and magnificent sculptures like Trevi Fountain with Italy. The beautiful “onion dome” architecture belongs to Russia. Wonderful paintings by Renoir and Matisse, awesome wineries and a cool pointy metal building by some guy named Eiffel are unmistakably French. Hummel figurines and the heavenly compositions of Wagner are iconic to Germany. The writings of Shakespeare, Lewis Carroll and Charles Dickens obviously belong to England. Rock and Roll and the Blues belongs to the U.S.! The plain and simple fact is that art defines us as a society! Art proudly boasts who we are as a culture. Our need to create supersedes any other desire woven into our DNA. Even more than procreation, I think. To strip ourselves of our own art, in the way of eliminating handwriting skills, is to sell our soul to Microsoft.

Cursive Handwriting Practice

We only have to look at American Indians to see what happens when a society of proud people are robbed of their art and cultural traditions. Hawaii is another prime example of cultural rape. Although Hawaiians had no actual written language, their heritage is abundant with rich symbolic iconography(especially in their tattooing), that was and still is used as an important form of communication. When outsiders like Captain Cook and the missionaries came around, important cultural identity was all but lost and the struggle to regain it continues today. Is this what we want for the rest of America?

Cursive handwriting is one of the most elegant expression of our inner selves and we KNOW our Aunt Betty wrote that letter, because we recognize her handwriting. With emails, you cannot see facial expression, hear tone of voice or even really know who wrote it. My point is that you cannot compare the cold, sterile e-mail to a really well-constructed, handwritten letter. When it’s written on parchment with a real quill, it’s such a beautiful experience that it makes you feel like you really matter to the one who wrote it.

Some people say I have nice handwriting. I don’t think so. I think I can do better. I think we all can, but who actually practices their hand writing (cursive), in this day of electronic everything? Why should we, you might ask? I’m doing this column on my laptop, so isn’t that hypocritical? Well, it would be, if I weren’t writing for a website.

I want to stress the idea that practice makes perfect. Another saying pertinent to this column is “Use it or lose it.” If our traditions and skills aren’t practiced, they become obsolete and are discarded. I am re-learning the bass guitar and Holy Smokes, I forgot a lot! I haven’t picked up a bass guitar in over seven years, since I left Monterey, California, back in 2004. But now, because I am practicing practically every day, I am learning in leaps and bounds. My Polynesian Tribal designs are getting pretty slick, since I am drawing them every day now.

Practice, Practice, Practice...

But my golf game could be better. Why? Because I don’t practice enough. Same goes for handwriting. It seems like the simple act of filling out a check is a chore these days. I find it annoying and I want to just get it over with and I find my handwriting reminds me of my own grandmother’s. It’s kind of scratchy and wobbly looking, but not when I take my time and concentrate. Complacency really doesn’t have a place in art. If nothing happens, then nothing happens. If nothing changes then nothing changes. Same ol’ same old. Kinda like the U.S. Senate. But, I don’t want to get into that here. I just remember those old cardboard cursive signs with the dotted lines hanging ominously over the chalkboard in school. never liked the way an S was drawn, so I always drew my own. Despite the fact that I was in second grade, to me, the signs looked like they were drawn by a second grader. I can do better, I thought (we all can), I think it may have had something to do with growing up in my Dad’s sign shop and what I saw there was WAY better than what I was seeing in school.
When we take time to design lettering for a tattoo, it’s usually hurried and not well thought out. Our egos will tell us “no one knows the difference” or “that’s good enough.” It behooves us to do two or three rough sketches to tighten up out idea for a tattoo, so why not the same process for our lettering? Our handwriting is a good place to start developing our “scripts.” After all, scripts are nothing more than printers’ alphabets designed to imitate handwriting. Write out whatever you want and then run another tapering line alongside it, like in the samples provided. Or you can use some calligraphy-type felt markers found at any art supply stores these days. Dover Books has a really good script book. Take a few nice samples like “Dianna” or Commercial script and try to imitate them and “loosen them up” a bit.

The next time you design a script lettering design, write it out like you are writing a letter to somebody you really want to impress. Do not write it out so complicated that you can’t read it. Chances are that reader can’t make it out either. Leave plenty of room in between the letters and run your connectors way up high. Almighty God, Herself is going to determine whether you enter the gates of Heaven or not, depending on your penmanship. So, take your time.

Hold you pencil light and have fun,
—Uncle Tim Heitkotter