Fingerspelling is NOT like finger-painting

Have you ever suddenly realized just how much you've learned?

Earlier this week, I was watching ABC Family's Switched at Birth which has a good bit of Sign Language on it and I suddenly realized--hey, I understand a lot of this!  Then I felt pretty cool. I really love sign language but it's interesting to find the things that I struggle with. I've gotten a lot better with actual signing and the speed that I learn signs. I don't find the direction signs are supposed to go a challenge anymore, or the spatial qualifiers as difficult either.  My new difficulty is fingerspelling. I don't struggle with the actual spelling of a word, although at times that can be difficult--you try spelling a word correctly and forming a hand shape at the same time. I struggle with processing the words quickly. Here is an example: Someone spells a word quickly and I'll be following it--"C-O-R-R-E-C-T" and by the end of the word...I've lost it because my mind struggles to process spelling a word silently, while watching handshapes. I'll get "C-O-R-R" and then I have to sign "repeat" because my mind starts filling in the blanks around it like a crazy hangman session: "CORRESPOND?" "CORRIZON? THAT'S A MISSPELLED SPANISH WORD, GLYNNIS!" I scream silently at myself. This process in my mind causes me to miss the second respelling of the word, I sign, "Sorry-Repeat." to the signer once more, and they do. This time I get it! Huzzah! CORRECT!  Continue with the signed conversation and pray there are no more fingerspelled words---oh crap, they're spelling something....

Sometimes when someone fingerspells a word I get as confused as I am about this picture. What's going on here? Cammy and Diddy are BFFS? And they appear to be inebriated. They're probably a fun pair to hang out with. Why didn't they call me? 

 I have been told that fingerspelling is the most difficult thing to learn in ASL. It is the most challenging and takes the most time to get used to. It is used frequently and interspersed throughout conversation. Signers will commonly be using signs and then fingerspell out a word--not every word has it's own sign in ASL. If you misspell a word as you are fingerspelling it, you must start from the beginning of the word. Spell it again for the signer because visual cues and perceptions are so different from auditory ones--if I was having a conversation with a friend and mispronounced a word, they would most likely be able to get the point of what I was saying. Not so with sign language. You mess up a word--you spell it again and you cannot start from the part of the word you messed up at. For example, if I was spelling "Handsome" and accidentally spelled it Handsa--but realized right there what I had done--I would have to start from the beginning.

ASL Alphabet--taunting me. 

Anyways, besides ASL I am also taking three other classes and just finished one--which was great. I just signed a lease on a townhouse and will be moving later this month with a best friend into that place, which I am very excited about because it is closer to town, work, classes. I am anxious about it because I am me and I like to be anxious--it's a state I live in! Things are, for the most part, going very well. I'm just trying to keep busy!

I hope everything is going peachy keen for you--and that you never stop living, laughing, and loving through this journey called life. I give you permission to write that motto on a wall above your bed. In fact, I encourage it. If you have "Always kiss me goodnight" written there currently--erase it, paint over, what ever is necessary and WRITE THE NEW ONE. LIFE. LAUGH. LOVE. I just created it! Right?

Until next time.