I don’t know why it caught my eye, or captured my attention. Maybe because it gave insight into the psyches of our three presidential candidates. Or maybe because my own signature is so horrid and erratic — comparable to what an electrocuted chicken might scratch out if given a pen.
It was a news story I saw online that analyzed the signatures of McCain, Obama and Clinton in an attempt to mine a wealth of new information about the candidates, especially after the Magic 8-Ball revealed so little.
I read the piece, fascinated. It told about how Clinton’s signature was written as if she were dodging sniper fire, how McCain’s when decoded said, “Age is 95 percent mental, and 5 percent how high you wear your pants,” and Obama’s stressed his main campaign theme by changing styles from one letter to the next.
But it got me thinking about my own signature and what it meant. How curious a thought — that how you sign your name might actually tell people something about you. What did mine say, other than I was sloppy or maybe didn’t even know how to spell it?
So I did some research and drew some conclusions about myself. For instance, I learned that if the letters slant to the right, you’re emotionally expressive, and if they slant to the left, you’re more emotionally withdrawn. If you have no slant at all, you spend too much of your time watching Jeopardy re-runs and trying to decide whether vermicelli and angel hair are the same pasta.
Oddly enough, mine slants both forward and back at the same time, which usually indicates the signature of a drunk man whose car keys should be confiscated immediately. Or maybe someone in the middle of an earthquake.
Similarly, when you sign your name on unlined paper, an upward slant indicates optimism and a lot of energy, while downward shows physical exhaustion, low energy, or that your equilibrium should be checked before you operate heavy machinery.
Again, my signature blends both, weaving up and down in a series of peaks and valleys. I can only assume that as I sign my name my energy level surges and peters out repeatedly. Could be a short circuit or loose connection.
When it comes to the general shapes of letters, I’m also struggling to come to any consensus, as it’s even more confounding. Circular letters are supposed to point to a generally agreeable and highly easygoing nature, while sharper, more angular letters indicate aggression and a certain directness. Square letters are practical, while irregular strokes are artistic and unconventional. I have them all, plus an octagon.
So once all is said and done, my final analysis was this: The ‘B’ in my name is slanted up into a great bulbous tip pointing to the heavens like the nose of Snoopy, or maybe W.C. Fields. This indicates my whimsy-ish nature, my dutiful personality and my penchant to, in the most nasal of voices, say things that sound profound, but are actually quite stupid. The rest of my first name is non-existent except for a little wisp of ink that looks like a ghost in a flowing dress. This could be taken as disdain for my first name, which I don’t think fits my personality. I would have preferred Edgar or Javier.
The ‘T’ of my last name has a very short base, the disconnection from the top symbolizing that I either don’t feel I am living up to my lofty expectations or that my neck is disproportionately long. (I’ve always considered neck reduction surgery.) The top of the ‘T’ is wide, grandiose and flowing, like a sombrero. I think this harks to my Latin roots and the fact that I really like Mexican food. From the tip of that ‘T,’ my signature drops off precipitously from a sharp point, showing both my seriousness and my belief that a huge drop in the stock market will wipe out my entire savings just days before retirement.
I don’t honestly know what the next letter is, which speaks to my confusion about who I am and where I’m going in life. Then it all finishes in a flourish of squiggly lines and a little wave. Could be it symbolizes my impatience with menial tasks, and also my hatred for snakes.
Who knows? That might be it. Or could be I just have terrible penmanship, or was recently electrocuted.