My Signatures

When I was younger, my signature was very, very basic, just my name written neatly. When I got a bit older, I curled a few of the letters, and after a little while I began to underline it. My signature stayed like that for years, until I decided it looked like a child had written it (hardly a surprise as I was a child when I first wrote it and it went unchanged). My signature suddenly changed into a scribble, that was essentially my name written quickly, slanted (kind of like in italics), and written with very little space between the letters. I felt this was missing something, so again underlined it.

My mum saw it one day and told me that you can tell a lot about someone from how they sign their name. When I asked her what mine told her about me, she replied:

"You're proud of your name, that's why you write every letter. However, you also don't want people to know who you are; that's why you write it so that it's illegible. Oh, and your attempt at underlining it; because you in fact cross out part of your name when underlining, suggests that you have low self-esteem and actually hate yourself."

Thank you mum.

Though it did set me thinking. I see, on average, 20 signatures a day. On busy days, I may see upward of 30. Some are actually quite interesting.

With the limited knowledge I have based on what my mum's told me, if I am given a signature where the person has written their full name and it's legible, I know that they are proud and want people to know who they are. If their signature is just a few letters, then I know they don't want to give too much away about themselves (or potentially hate their name).

Oh, and of course, if someone writes their name then scribbles over it they must hate themselves (again, my thanks go out to my mum)

One of the most interesting signatures I have seen though, was from a 40-50 year old guest at the hotel. Based on her appearance and how she spoke, I'd guess that she was upper-middle class, fairly wealthy, and the type of person who would do yoga classes in their spare time.

She began by writing her first name, Cynthia I think, very neatly in a curled artistic hand. It was delicately done and she wrote slowly and carefully. You could read every letter perfectly.

She then wrote her last name. I have no idea what it was. She wrote it quickly and aggressively, with each character spiked and completely illegible. She then underlined her name. The line went straight through her last name, yet managed to get under her first name just in time.

I'd say she was divorced.