Written Regret

I sat down for hours upon hours with the look of unamusement permanently slapped on my face. Being back in class was the worst punishment my teachers could have given me. Working slowly and carefully as I traced letters over and over. Every time I thought I was done tracing, my teacher would slide another nearly blank paper in front of me. I would roll my eyes at the paper, and then continue to do the rudimentary work. To get out of this class, I would have done anything! Well, anything but actually try.

Throughout my life I was told I had bad handwriting. After being diagnosed with dyslexia in early elementary school, I was placed into a special class. They would pull me out of my music or art class and walk me down to a little cubicle in the hall where my handwriting teacher, the smell of markers, and my many incomplete papers awaits me. I knew I had terrible handwriting and needed the help, considering nobody could understand my chicken scratch. But despite knowing how bad I wrote, I still did not care for the classes. I would have much rather been with my friends in a more fun class than sitting at a cold table in the hallway, practicing how to write my capital “G” and lowercase “j” on repeat.

Nicole Green, a third year PhD student studying composition and rhetoric, has gone through a similar experience to mine. Green had been diagnosed with a visual disability and was forced to take special classes like I did. In her video titled “The Write(ing) Reward For Reading” she states, “I was forced against my will to learn braille - and I hated it because I hated being pulled out of class and I hated being different from other students.” While she eventually learned how to read braille, I performed pass fail in the handwriting training, and never tried hard on my writing in my regular classes. I simply did not care.

For years my handwriting on a day-to-day basis never improved. I distinctly remember that in middle school, when I was bored out of my mind in my hand writing class, my teacher spoke the most blessed words. She looked down at me, as I stayed slumped in my plastic chair, and said, “If you do well this week, you will not have to come to these classes anymore.” I was ecstatic to say the least. I can honestly say that for that whole week, I tried harder in that class than I have in all my years combined. By the end of the week, I was finally released from my paper and pencil prison. But sadly, the very next day, my spirits fell when my handwriting teacher entered my Language Arts classroom and requested to see my latest submitted paper. Knowing how disappointed she would be, I shamefully forked over my sloppy work that covered the innocent paper. She could obviously tell that I only worked hard on my handwriting while in her class that final week.

I then heard the dreadful news that I would have to go back into my torturous special class. For the whole next year, I worked tirelessly in both my handwriting class and in my regular classes to improve my handwriting. I tried every day to get my hand to cooperate with what my brain was telling it to do, but my stubborn hand would not budge. I had officially fallen too deep in my abyss of awful handwriting. My bad habit became a stain on my life that could never be washed out. It was too late for me to be able to be what my teachers hoped I would be, a person with legible handwriting. Eventually, I was released from those classes, but I was definitely not cut loose because my handwriting had improved. I am sure they only let me out because my teachers stopped complaining about my handwriting, knowing I was truly a lost cause; like trying to teach a dog to use a fork, it was simply not worth it. For years after, even today, I envy everyone whose “a” doesn't look like a “9” or a “u”. I am constantly jealous of people who can write the letter “e” without having to fix it because it looks more like a “c”. I wish more than anything that I could write a “y” without it looking like an “x” in math class and vise versa. There is so much that I wish I could do right when it comes to my pitiful excuse for handwriting. Everyone else has writing that is put together and neat while mine remains as messy and sloppy as it did when I was in second grade.

While reading an article called “What It’s Like to Be a Writer With Dyslexia,” I was able to relate to the writer, Brittny Pierre, when she talked about her insecurities in school. Pierre stated:

“I lived with the pressure of wanting to perform well. When a teacher called on me to read a passage, I would become anxious and read ahead, just to make sure I could read it correctly and not scramble the words. I lived in fear of my classmates making fun of me for reading simple words like “then” but seeing “them” and not grasping right away why it was incorrect.”

As a person who has been diagnosed with dyslexia, I understand that internal embarrassment and struggle to show your weaknesses. Communicating through passing notes back and forth to friends in class was something I never did, for I knew they would never understand what I was trying to tell them. I never volunteered to write answers on the blank white board in front of any of my classes. I was reluctant to show someone my notes when they asked to see them. I apologize to whoever reads my written papers and grades my written tests in class and always offer to read it to them if they need me to. Every day I think about when I had to sit in my handwriting class in the cold hallway behind a little cubicle in elementary school. I think about how much I hated it, and wished I was anywhere else but there. While I was truly jealous of everyone who naturally has pretty handwriting, I am more jealous of my foolish younger self, who had all the help and support she needed right at her very tiny fingertips, but sadly, still chose to be difficult and lazy. If only I could go back and work harder than I did, I would not have to worry about being embarrassed to see my handwriting on the white board next to the other student’s beautiful writing. I would be okay with showing my group members the work I wrote down on my paper. And I would not have to read my sentences to anyone because they would be able to do that themselves easily. Every day I think about the “what if’s” and “if only”.

I just hope that other people with this type of fixable issue will not take the same path I took when I was a naive elementary and middle school student. I can still try and write neatly, but it will never be consistent. And even my best, most gorgeous writing does not hold a candle to the beauty that is most other people's writing. I hope other people will catch their mistakes before it becomes irreversible. I still constantly feel embarrassed for my lack of handwriting skills and I hope nobody else has to feel the same way I do whether it is handwriting, speech, or any other simple misfortune. I regret my bad workmanship so much and I know that that regret will not cease any time soon. All I can do now is pray for other naive kids and try to move past my imperfections.