My, My, My, How UNUSUAL!

One of my new activities is being on the BOD for the DSO. Yeah, I've purposefully left this sorta "vague". Doesn't matter, isn't pertinent to today's post.

Anyway, last night, we had an "addressing and stuffing invitations" party. It was hosted by a very gracious and genteel (if a bit eccentric) grand dame named Lucia. Lucia (and her husband) are extremely influential within the community. Extremely. They now live at a very upscale retirement village in nearby Chapel Hill. This is where the "party" was held; as a side note, I was really impressed with this place. It felt more like the Waldorf Astoria than a retirement community. Note to self; make enough money so that when we "retire", we might ultimately get into this place (if need be).

BTW, Mr. B and I were at a party this past Saturday night and Lucia was there. She said to me "Y'all are coming Tuesday night, right?" to which I replied in the affirmative. She turned to Mr. B and said, "Well, honey, it's only ladies so y'all will have to go play golf or whatever it is you men do". Too funny!

So, there we all were last night doing various secretarial tasks. It was quite fun, actually; and, Lucia had set up a nice table of cheese, crackers, veggies, nuts, fruit and wine, along with some gorgeous flowers.

Because I arrived an hour later than the others (driving up from my "job" in Greensboro), I ended up addressing envelopes (one of the least-favored tasks).

After I finished with that, I stuck on return address labels and stamps. While stamping, I ended up sitting next to Lucia, who was a flurry of activity (and would wear me out if I had to hang around her longer than a few minutes). She was sorting through addressed invitations in order to pull out the ones to people she knew so that she could write a personal note (I have to say she had a huge stack; as I said, this lady knows A LOT of people).

As she's sorting through, she pulls out one in particular, looked at it, and said, "My, my, my, how UNUSUAL!" I looked over at her; she was holding an invitation I'd addressed. She continued, "I've NEVER seen handwriting quite like this before!"

I sort of grimaced to myself but spoke up, "Oh, that's my writing". She looked at me and said again, "How UNUSUAL! Did you grow up in a foreign country because your writing looks like someones who didn't originally speak English".

What could I say to THAT? I merely replied, "Nope, I'm just left-handed!" (Mr. B told me later I should have said, "I grew up in California"; ha ha ha, Mr. B!)

She smiled somewhat bemusedly at me, as if to try and remember who exactly I was. (earlier in the night, she'd referred to me as "Hey, Blue Lady!" (because I had on a blue shirt)).

Anyway, I did get a chuckle out of this because, frankly, my handwriting is a bit hard to decipher.

My handwriting; can YOU read it?

It's been this way ever since I can remember; certainly, it was this way when I was a teenager corresponding with my 90+ year old great grandfather (it was a toss up as to whose writing was harder to read; I think I beat him out, though!)

My friend Kathleen told me she always has to read my handwritten letters/cards to her husband Don because he can't figure out what I'm saying.

And, in my prior life, the folks that worked for me used to compare notes I'd written them and place bets on what certain words were.

Of course, it was all in great fun and, eventually, people ARE able to figure out what I'm writing. I think. Or, maybe they just make up what they think I was saying? These guesses might be even more interesting than what I WAS saying!

But, I'll admit, even I will re-read something I wrote (say, in one of my journals), and say to myself, "What the you-know-what is THAT word?"

As for the hundreds of invitations I addressed last night, what can I say except I've never had anything returned to me by the post office. So, the postal workers, at least, and I, are on the same wave length.

What does THAT mean?

Mrs. B